Cleaning My Tank

[loohoo313]

I am finally giving up on some of the obsession I have about my lone fishes single white spot. He seems fine and active. I have treated for fungus, treated for bacterial things, treating for ick. Nothing seems to make it go away.

With that said, I am concentrating on keeping his little home super clean and free of anything that might make him sick in the future. I bought one of those siphon vacs and I have been doing that and changing 50% water every 3 days. I have the filter out while I am still treating (probably a futile effort) for ick. My question is, how often should I give the whole tank a solid cleaning?? How often should I take everything out? How should I wash the plants and stones on the bottom?? The plants are silk and the stones are glass. I am afraid to clean it all with bleach for fear that it would somehow remain in the silk plants. I plan on putting the filter back in.
Please advise.
I think I got lazy in the cleaning about two months after I got him and I feel terrible guilt that it casued his initial problem. Now I'm working like crazy to make sure it doesn't happen again.

Another question- I feed him about 5 pellets in the morning and about three bloodworms at night. Good? Bad? How he loves those worms. His little fins start fluttering with joy. I have heard they might cause problems. Please, any suggestions.

Thanks

 

[lisie]

There's no reason to wash a healthy fish tank's decor except to prevent/get rid of algae. What I do is just take it out when I see algae starting to grow and scrub it off in just water. If you're vacuuming the gravel with every water change, you shouldn't have a problem there. But, if you want, you can take out the gravel and rinse it all out in -dechlorinated- water to get rid of any gunk that builds up that you didn't reach with the gravel vac. How often you do it is up to you. There's definitely no need for using bleach on a fish tank unless it's diseased, and even then some people recommend against it.

Bloodworms every day is too much IMO. Once or twice a week is more like it.

He sure does sound like a spoiled guy! He's lucky to have found you to be his owner!!

 

[ILM]

I forgot how big your tank is (memory is shot) so a lot depends on how much extra water you have to play with (the bigger the tank, the more leeway you have). First, every time you tear down your tank and sterilize it any beneficial bacteria you've been building up will die--so you have to consider that. If the tank is healthy, try doing weekly cleanings during which only 50% of the water is taken out, vacuum the top of the marble layer (most of the gunk will get sucked out without having to dig for it) but keep an eye on the water level too. Wipe the sides (inside) down with a paper towel to get as much of the algae off if you don't have an algae-eating critter in there to do that chore for you. Do keep an eye on those marbles--I've seen too many bettas with marble floors where, over time, the marbles begin to crack and chip and the fish go down to gulp a fallen piece of food and swallow a shard of glass and die an aggonizing death and you can't do a thing for them (the glass marbles are beautiful but I wont' use them). If the marbles and/or silk plants get a little dingy looking, taken them out (doesn't necessarily have to be all at once, you can do "spot" cleaning on just the stuff that is dirty as needed) and soak in real hot water--which should kill most things. If you ever get ick, just put some ick med in there since you'll need to treat the whole tank (ick "bugs" go through several stages in life, only one of which is on the fish--you'll need to kill the other stages too), hopefully you won't need to worry about that ever. If you do have to bleach things, which I do when I tear down a tank, use about 3x the amount of declorinator then usual and let everything soak at least overnight (then rinse thoroughly in hot water before using in a tank again--helps if you dry them out too since most aquatic bugs and things can't live out of water). UV helps (UV as in unfiltered sunlight) although it'll fade your silks. 5 pellets per feeding is too much and could make your fish constipated. 2-3 pellets per feeding is enough (their stomachs are only about the size of their eyes--unless you regularly overfeed and stretch it. They are good at begging for food even after they've just been fed). 3 worms is sufficient per feeding but try to get other foods as well--frozen mysis shrimp, frozen mosquito larvae (sometimes called glassworms), frozen brine shrimp with vitamins added (don't do a lot of this since adult brine shrimp are mainly just fiber), live blackworms (cleaned), live white worms, live daphnia, live fruit flies and maggots. You can also chop up earthworms into bite size pieces (baby earthworms are good since they are still pretty skinny). I occasionally feed mine little bits of plain cooked chicken and seafood (that I'm planning on eating after the fish are fed)--just no butter or sauces or spices or herbs, etc. Someone I know feeds his canned crab and shrimp (fish get a little bit, he eats the rest) since he can't keep live fish foods in their house or frozen in their freezer.

 

[loohoo313]

Thanks for the advice Lisie and ILM. I guess he does have me wrapped around his little fin. I will adjust his feedings down immediately. I did buy some frozen bloodworms. Do the normal pet stores sell the other things? I bought a book about bettas and it provided little or no real useful information. This forum has been invaluable.

Another question!! I'm just full of 'em. Last night I saw that Nemo was not swimming around his tank. (5 gallons BTW) I got up to search for him and couldn't see him. Well, I eventually found him slipped up inside between two leaves of a nice plant I put in there last week. He looked like he was in a sleeping bag. Is that how he sleeps? Can he breath like that and stay there?

I think I am getting hooked. If I had more space here I think I would be cruising for another fish baby, but alas, I will have to wait.

 

[jayjay]

my betta often does the same in his plants just lies in them excpet when he goes up to breathe and when i walk near he comes to the front. as he neads the air to breatha mine normally spends the night resting up at the top of the plant about 2inches from the surface where he swins to get air.

no he still needs air and i duno if you can really call it sleeping when they have no eyelids lol.

 

[ILM]

As far as foods go, depends on what you have locally. Some lfs carry a whole line of things you can feed different kinds of fish (frozen usually) and I've heard folks on fish forums (brag) that they can get live daphnia, bloodworms and glassworms. My lfs carries lots of frozen and always has live blackworms, sometimes when the gods are kind it also has live brine shrimp. Daphnia can be cultured in a bucket or tank--all you need is greenwater (water than turns green from the floating algae in it). Other things like mosquito larvae you can make yourself (but I don't risk it, all I need ia mosquitos flying around inside if the fish dont' eat all the larvae) by leaving a bucket of still water outside, then netting out the resulting wigglers in a week or so.

And, yes, if they find a comfy plant, my bettas love to snuggle in the watersprites--I keep it unplanted and just floating so the fish can sleep in it and not have to move very much to get some air. I think when they are truly asleep their metabolism slows down so they don't use or need as much oxygen (thus, don't need to gulp air too often).