Can U Change Stuff In Tank When There Are Fish?

[jenny6165]

just a question really,
can u change things like gravel and ornaments in your tank when fish are in there? or do u have to put them somewhere else?

 

[dwarfgourami]

Should be fine with them in, certainly I change things like ornaments and plants all the time. No more upsetting for them than a bog standard water change. They're used to having my hands in the tank. Gravel is more of an upheaval of course, but I imagine it would be doable.

 

[xoedusk]

My platies freak out when anything other than food goes into their tank. So provide plenty of hiding spots.

 

[xJake]

If you simply rearranging ornaments/plants I wouldn't bother removing the fish, however, if you are doing something more massive such as a substrate change I would go ahead and relocate the fish to another tank or to a bucket (or several depending on how many fish and what type) with an airator running for the time that you're changing around the tank. I would also suggest doing a 100% water change after changing the substrate and then reacclimating the fish.

 

[TammyLiz]

100% water change and a complete change of substrate sounds pretty major! If you do this, make sure you protect your filter media by adding it to the bucket because you don't want to end up with ammonia spikes by killing off your nitrifying bacteria. You might lose half your fish by doing that. If you have an undergravel filter, I wouldn't reccommend a 100% change of gravel in any case. You would certainly lose some fish. What type of filter do you have?

Changing ornaments is no problem. Just make sure you rinse new ones in hot water to reduce the chances of introducing something nasty, and only use aquarium safe ones. If the ornament is coming out of another tank, you might want to bleach it (soak in a water/bleach mixure for a few minutes, then rinse well!) to make sure you're not bringing in some sort of disease from the other tank.

 

[cleekdaFish]

thatsa gd q, wat if someone wants to remove have of their gravel substrate and put some sand substrate to go along with your existing gravel substrate, can that be done w/out taking any fish out?

 

[TammyLiz]

thatsa gd q, wat if someone wants to remove have of their gravel substrate and put some sand substrate to go along with your existing gravel substrate, can that be done w/out taking any fish out?

Probably would be fine. As long as you're leaving some of the gravel in there and not removing the filter from the tank while you do it, you've not going to lose the cycle. However, sand can be a big mess and make the water initially very cloudy. Rinse the sand very well first to get any debris out. Make sure the filter doesn't suck any of it up as you add it because it can get in the impeller (assuming you have a HOB filter) and make a terrible grinding noise! So turn off the filter while you do it, and lower the sand down to the bottom (maybe in a cup) and gently pour it.

IMO, sand and gravel don't look that great mixed. The sand mostly sinks to the bottom and gravel comes to the top.

EDIT: if you do want to do a 100% substrate change, such as from gravel to sand, it is fine unless you lose the cycle. I wasn't meaning in my post above that it couldn't be done, just that you need to be very careful with your filter media while you're doing it. Removing all the gravel and all the water and putting the fish in the bucket just sounded like something that could seriously affect the cycle.

 

[cleekdaFish]

thatsa gd q, wat if someone wants to remove have of their gravel substrate and put some sand substrate to go along with your existing gravel substrate, can that be done w/out taking any fish out?

Probably would be fine. As long as you're leaving some of the gravel in there and not removing the filter from the tank while you do it, you've not going to lose the cycle. However, sand can be a big mess and make the water initially very cloudy. Rinse the sand very well first to get any debris out. Make sure the filter doesn't suck any of it up as you add it because it can get in the impeller (assuming you have a HOB filter) and make a terrible grinding noise! So turn off the filter while you do it, and lower the sand down to the bottom (maybe in a cup) and gently pour it.

IMO, sand and gravel don't look that great mixed. The sand mostly sinks to the bottom and gravel comes to the top.

....thx for the info, im thinking abt putting sand along side the gravel...i wont mix them, just half and half , all gravel on 1 side and the other half all sand...like a beach and just fade the sand a bit into the gravel

 

[TammyLiz]

Sounds like it might be nice. Good luck.

 

[skiltrip]

i did a substrate change (gravel to sand) and didn't remove a single fish. also at the time, i totally redecorated with granite rocks and took out a lot of the plastic plants and fake plastic caves that were in there. they got on just fine. i feel like it's more stressful on them netting and moving them around, possibly exposing them to temperature jumps and what not, then it is to just take your time with what you're doing. move slowly if you need to. a gentle hand makes all the difference.