Fish waste fertilizer

FishForums.net Pet of the Month
🐶 POTM Poll is Open! 🦎 Click here to Vote! 🐰

Welshjonboy31

New Member
Joined
Aug 12, 2018
Messages
19
Reaction score
0
I have been keeping my tank now for 2 years and am quite confident with basic water parameters are. Having read quite a bit asked myself the following queation. To which i am asking this wonderful forum the following:
If I overstocked my tank slightly with Fish, would the extra waste provide extra food for my low-tech tank?. And if so, does that mean that overstocking with fish can be good for a planted tank??

Thanks

JB


Sent from my SM-G920F using Tapatalk
 
In a word, yes there would be more nutrients from the decomposition of the organics (fish excrement) but no it would not be good because the fish would suffer for it. Now to explain if I can.

It depends somewhat upon what you mean by "overstocking." Some people might consider some of my tanks "overstocked," but they are not, because there are several factors to the stocking issue. Sheer numbers of fish is important obviously but it also depends upon the species, feeding, water changes, and any other possible influences such as the substrate, filter, environment (aquascaping). A group of 20 tetras in the correct environment (water parameters, decor, proper foods, maintenance) might be fine in say a 20 gallon tank; but change those environmental conditions to be less than optimum with the wrong decor, parameters, etc, and the tank becomes overstocked because of the impact the fish have on the biological system. In other words, fish in good surroundings have less impact that the same fish in inappropriate surroundings.

To take the usual meaning of "overstocking," an aquarium that has more fish than what the biological system can easily support is a disaster just waiting to happen. Any number of factors could cause the system to crash. But even if that doesn't happen, the effect of the overstocking on the fish is very significant. And some of this cannot be seen or measured; we just know biologically that it is there. Major water changes, up to say 75% of the volume every day, might counter it, or they might not; point being that even "more" water changes are not always sufficient, and even if they are, that is again keeping the tank right on the breaking point and it could easily slide over.

A given environment can support a specific population of fish, with some built-in emergency support. Just as in nature. But whereas in nature the corrective aspect is usually sufficient [except when human activity throws this way off as we are now doing, with catastrophic results in fires and floods], in the closed confines of an aquarium the capacity of the system to handle these emergencies is very much less, and often not even possible.
 

Most reactions

trending

Staff online

Back
Top