How Often Do You Change Your Water?

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It's never nice to lose any fish no matter how long you've had them but I know what you mean. I agree with you that if you try medications to save your fish and you already have perfect water conditions but the fish still dies then its hard not to feel down about it and that you want to just give up. All we can do is stay positive about it and try our best and enjoy the fish we still have As the saying goes, we don't keep fish we keep water... This is very true, if we have the perfect water and monitor it to keep it that way then the fish can basically look after themselves....

Any plec that gets to a max size of around 8 inches will be absolutely fine in a 55gal. Just make sure you have a sand substrate or a smooth edged gravel as anything else can damage a plecs mouth.

Ah ok, if you could the quarantine tank then ill have 4 tanks running at 1 time. My quarantine tank is 20 gal but thinking of swapping it for a 30 as I couldn't really keep big cichlids in a 20 if they were to get sick.

 

[DreamertK]

I do one 15-20% on Sundays and one sand/gravel cleaning (usually takes out 50% of the water) on Wednesdays for my 20 gal. Not yet cycled, I'm still observing ammonia levels in the tank for more changes.

I've gotten used to sand siphoning, it's pretty easy! Though there's still a bunch of dust left over from the original sand cleaning. I think my last vac got rid of quite a bit of it though, since now when I move things around it doesn't get all cloudy. Pretty much though, the fish waste should be picked up and then you pinch the tube so the sand gets about halfway up the siphon and the rest is sucked up through the tube without the sand. I'm excited for another change today.

I've been putting my 15% water in milk jugs for my plants, but I don't nearly use up more than half a gallon per week. It looks like human urine from all the drift wood pigment. But I want to store some just for cleaning purposes so that I dont get all that chlorine from the tap going in the tank.

My gourami don't appreciate the cleaning though, they're always hiding under the driftwood until the dust settles again.

Well I usually put my plants in sand and have gravel on the bottom but i also wonder if my loaches would enjoy it more if i just had the bottom all sandy but they like to hide under this ship thing i have and chill out there so when i vac i vac around it and then finally lift up the ship

and by pinching the tube? what do u mean by that?

Today I took the time to uproot my vars and do a little leaf trimming since my devil gourami's keep eatting its leaves. I guess I can rule out well balanced diet from any causes of concern. But occasionally you might want to mix things up in the sand/gravel because chemicals can get trapped in those spaces over long periods of time (months-year). I personally wouldn't want to spend money if the system is fine as it is.

Theres the head of the siphon and then theres the tube. If you pinch the tube before the sand goes into the tube from the siphon head, then water flow will stop and the sand will have the chance to escape the siphon head. Then when you stop pinching it, it'll suck up the dust/fish wastes/lighter materials than the sand. To pinch the tube you should hold the siphon head in one hand and one part of the tube in the other, with the hand on the tube just fold the tube over itself so that its going like "V" (with the pinch) instead of " | " (being straight) allowing the water to flow through the tube. Sorry I cant find any good pictures.

 

[elmo666]

I like to do 30% weekly. I syphon carefully off the surface of the sand, no point in using my gravel cleaner as all the detrius is on the top. Also, the 1/2" hose gets into the nooks and crannies well. I test my tapwater first and the only time I hold off on the change is if the nitrates are higher than the tank, which unforetunately does happen.

 

[Tizer]

My tank rarely has detritus on the bottom because of the amount of flow i have and the fish i keep so i never have to "vac". I do however do a 50% water change weekly during the summer, then when winter hits and the water gets colder i tend to just stick to a 25% water change once a week. All the other smaller tanks get a 10% water change here and there with the odd large one thrown in from time to time.

 

[Sherry1966]

I do a 25% weekly water change on all my tanks. That includes weekly vacuums too. I have pleco's in 2 of my tanks so vacuums are a given.