Just Bought One Of These ...

[Akasha72]

Hi all,

I've just got this (pets@home £5.99) mostly because I only did a 50% water change on Friday and my gravel looks a mess already - I appear to have a tank full of waste disposal machines

I'm planning to connect it up to my air pump later this afternoon and give it a go. The reviews on the Pets@Home web-site were very good but for all we know they could be written by employees of Algarde and p@h!!


Once I've had a go I'll re-post a review for anyone else considering this.


Akasha

 

[200sx]

i find them very good i got one or two i think the only problem is when they have been used the little bag drys out and when you go to use it again dont fit cause the bag has streched but they do a bag thats twice the length and iv been trying them washing them out and not had the problem yet only the smaller bags but still there easyly replaced

 

[Akasha72]

I guess an elastic band around the neck would do trick aswell if it becomes slack? I have seen the spare bags but I wanted to give this a go first - see how much muck it gets up.

Wondering if it will suck up un-noticed fry aswell? I'll have to make sure I check the bag carefully when I'm done

 

[CezzaXV]

I've been considering buying one of these but was scared of spending £6 on a load of rubbish. Do let us know how it goes!

 

[200sx]

depends what air pump you got it on i would think but i managed to suck up a rummynose but seen it happen so quickly kincked the air pimp and he fell back out lol it will suck up the gravel as well but then again if you only got a smaller air pump it should just suck up the waste

 

[fluttermoth]

Gosh, that's a blast from the past!

I had one of those some 20 odd years ago. I found it almost completely useless, tbh...must have used it three or four times before I realised I'd just be better off doing a small W/C

 

[Akasha72]

okay just used it ... here comes the review


Very very quickly does the job (I actually couldn't believe how fast it was!) In my 3ft tank it took less than 5 minutes to run it over the gravel and pick up the mess.
It did suck up some gravel though. I have 3 different sizes of gravel in my tank - one is a fine, almost sand, type. The next are soft round pebbles and because I couldn't get anymore of either recently I got a small bag of an in between size from p@h as the fish were pulling the plants up. I found it sucked up the finest of the gravel mostly but I don't think it's designed to be dug into the gravel like a syphon would be. It's designed to skim over the surface of the gravel to pick up bits of uneaten food and poop.

I have a valve for my pump that turns to flow up and down. Next time I may try it with that and see if that helps with the gravel issue.

To be honest, it's not a big issue. All I did was to tip the little bag out into a plastic cup and fill the cup with water. The poop floated to the surface and was easy then to drain off. I did this a couple of times then returned the gravel to the tank.


To sum up:

For £5.99 I think it's worth the money. I'm not sure what would happen if you have fine sand as a substrate though so maybe someone else can add a comment to that.
I certainly don't feel that I have wasted my money. I now have an item that I can use daily to keep my black gravel looking clean and nice and the plus side is that has to be better for my cories

 

[CezzaXV]

I might give it a whirl then next time I'm at P@H. My biggest concern was that the suction wouldn't be strong enough to pick anything up. I have sand in my tank but the flow gets rid of most of the mess, but I'll see what it's like and let you guys know. I'm more looking to use it to maintain my fry tank as I find with such a small tank that it takes longer to clean than it does to siphon out the water so I prefer to do cleaning and water changes separately.

 

[Akasha72]

I've not tried it on the fry tank yet as there are some really tiny fry in there and I'm worried it might suck them up! My fry tank is over due a clean and water change but I had a busy day yesterday and I'm in pain - not up to carrying buckets in other words.

I might give it a go on the fry tank in a moment and let you know

 

[Akasha72]

it is capable of picking up fry. I've just tried it on my fry tank and tipped the contents again into the cup and there was one of the tiny guys in there (still alive though so no panic!)

Using the valve made no difference to the suction either.

I still think it's a good item though. I don't mind tipping the bag out into a cup and checking the contents and returning small amounts of gravel to the tank.

Not sure I'd use it on the fry tank again though. I think I'll keep it for the main tank

 

[CezzaXV]

I tend to catch fry before doing a water change or cleaning or whatever. It was a problem before that I would siphon all the water out before I'd siphoned all the dirt so this should help.