Filter Media

[cathyb]

Right, so I have the tank and the stand, the heater and the plant substrate. I now have the filter, a Tetra tec EX700 and the tank is a 180 litre tank.

I am planning on setting it up tonight, and buying the plants tomorrow. I am a bit confused about a few things and would love your advice please!

I have heard mixed reports about the use of carbon, after doing some research I dont think i am going to use it unless its to get rid of medications of if there is a need for it - is this a good idea? If so, what do I put in the media basket instead of carbon? It comes with filter floss pad, biologicalfilter foam and carbon in one basket, so do I just leave the carbon out or put an extra biological filter foam in its place? Also, if I can find anybody to donate some mature media, what type of media is this and where does it go in the filter? regarding cleaning and replacing, am I right in thinking you just rinse the majority of it out in tank water, which elements need replacing?

I have some special plant substrate, is this enough or should I put normal gravel on top of it?
What sort of plants would you recommend?

I think thats it for now, I will be back on soon to get opinions on stocking it if thats OK!

thanks,
Cathy

 

[waterdrop]

Hi Cathy and Welcome to TFF!

I see you have one other post and in that post it appears you are in a Fish-In Cycling situation and OM47 and Assaye have given you advice about some of the ways to procede in a fish-in cycle.

Is this the same tank or perhaps a different one? Perhaps this is a new one and you plan to learn about filter media and then start a proper Fishless Cycle? I'm going to assume you have read the 3 baseline articles in the Beginners Resouce Center: The Nitrogen Cycle, The Fishless Cycle and The Fish-In Cycle.

I think you are probably making the right decision to hold off on carbon. The problem is expense: Carbon only lasts about 3 days max when it is picking chemicals out of the water and then its ready to be tossed and replaced. We hobbyists greatly value carbon as a "chemical media" but we keep it on the hobby shelf and only use it to remove medications (as you've said) and sometimes to remove yellow tannins from wood or the occasional organic odor that we can't figure out in a tank. All those are fairly rare situations for most people. Also on occasion people with "show tanks" will run a course of carbon along with new fine floss when they plan to be photographing or showing off the tank for a special occasion.

What you want to fill the space is any sort of "biological media" or "biomedia" as we call it. Since you already have sponge, you might want another variation such as Seachem Matrix, Eheim Substrat Pro (or whatever their special biomedia is called, I think that's it) or any of a number of other sintered glass or ceramic media that are out there, depending on what you can find. Another good biomedia, believe it or not, are plastic pot scrubbers - the trick being to find some that for sure don't have any soap or chemicals on them or in them. More sponge would also be ok if its of the same type or ceramic gravel.

Getting a mature media donation is great for your first fishless cycle, it can really speed things up. -Any- type of media that someone will donate can help. You often have to get creative about fitting it in to your filter (its only really useful -inside- the filter, not out in the tank) such as cutting messy sponges with scissors or figuring out where to fit loose media (mesh bags can help keep your new stuff separate from the donation if you like.) The important thing from the donor point of view is that they shouldn't remove more than 1/3 of their biomedia at a time (in case its a friend you are working with who might not know.) Its customary to offer them new replacement media or money for it.

The cleaning of filters is a whole skill topic that the members can help you with if you bring it back up here during the weeks of your fishless cycle. For now, you don't want to disturb the media during the time that any cycling is going on unless the filter becomes clogged (which is unlikely, especially with a filter like yours) and yes, filter media should only ever be unblocked in tank water, never tap water, since that can kill bacteria.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[OldMan47]

Welcome to the forum CathyB.
The space you are not using for carbon is a good place to put a nice ceramic biological media. the one I have on hand is called Matrix but there are lots of similar media that would work just as well.
Filter floss is something that you only use in thin layers as the last stage of the filter media. It is the only media that I will arbitrarily toss while I try to preserve the rest of my filter media.
I cover my plant substrate with a bit of regular coarse sand/fine gravel because I tend to use common potting soil in my tanks, the same thing you would use for house plants. That stuff will make a mess of your water if you don't cap it with something to hold down the floating organic bits. If you manage to source a donation of filter media, which happens way too seldom in my opinion, place it into your filter as best you can as early in the flow path as practical. The idea is to get the mature bacterial colony to spread onto your media and the earlier in the flow path, the better it can move to the rest of your media. I have plenty of different media that I could give you if you are close enough for an exchange. Where are you located? With 25 tanks running, I would never miss a bit of media from one of my filters.

 

[cathyb]

25 tanks! Wow, thats alot, am guessing you have a room dedicated to tanks?!! This is my second, I am keeping my 60 litre going too - I seem to have caught the fish bug!! The water in that tank is fine now, am thinking of putting the four platys in the bigger tank and just putting a shoal of neon tetra in the 60 litre as I think the fish I may keep in the larger one may eat the neons but I really want some! Would the 60 litre be OK for a few neons, how many do you recommend and should I put anything else in there with them?

I live in Berkshire but am happy to travel a bit to get some media. There seems to be a person who lives in Swindon which isnt far away who is on the list to donate media, but I cant work out how to PM him or her?!

So I think I will definitely ditch the carbon and put some more bio media where the carbon would go. And I will buy some courser sand or gravel to put on top of the substrate, having just read the instructions in the box it does actually say to put a fine layer of gravel on top.

If soembody could come back to me on the neon tetras in the 60 litre that would be great. I will start a new post on stocking the new tank, as thats a whole other subject!!

 

[OldMan47]

I sent a PM so maybe you will here back from them now Cathy. You do not have enough posts yet to use the PM system. The limit is done to hold down the number of spammers who would use the PM system to spam people. Spammers live by quick hit and run tactics and a minimum post count makes it not worth their trouble to stick around.

 

[toshapetriji]

e mail me at

roberthawkers(at)gmail.com should be able to help you out with a little media.