My fish and I dodged a bullet today.

[Fishmanic31 148]

When feeding my 29 gallon tank today, I noticed that my 5 Black Skirt tetras wouldn't eat and were hiding behind the plants in the back of the tank. My BN Plecos and my Bolivian ram were doing fine however. Yesterday I turned off my Marinleand 200 HOB filter to do a 60% water change. I noticed today that the filter wasn't running. I had forgotten to turn it back on after the water change. Uh-OH! I immediately turned it back on and did a test for ammonia. It was at .25 ppm. I then got out the trusty python water changer and changed about 75% of the water. After refilling, I waited about 90 minutes for the water to fully circulate and did another water test. Ammonia is now 0 and nitrates (per my Salifert test kit) was at 10 ppm.
Whew! my fish and I dodged a bullet. What a relief.

 

[BullTerrierChild11 1]

Glad to hear that no casualties occurred! I bought a large Striped Raphael Catfish in November who kicked up all of the sand in his path when he was moving. This released what I believe may've been trapped ammonia that killed off a bunch of my fish. The Raphael Cat is still with me and has learned by experience to swim more carefully!

Nice selection of fish in your 29, too!

 

[CaptainBarnicles7]

I've forgotten to turn the filter and heater on after a water change more times than I care to remember excellent quick thinking on your part!

 

[GaryE29]

It doesn't take long in some tanks... scary.

 

[Essjay31 146]

I once left the filter off for a week. I'd turned the heater and filter back on after a water change then noticed the internal filter was at a 45 deg angle so turned it off again so I didn't get soaked while repositioning it and only noticed at the next water change that it wasn't on. Testing showed 3 zeros. (Nitrate is normally zero; it's virtually zero out of the tap). Was that due to not being heavily stocked or micro-organisms over all the surfaces in the tank or live plants including the surface almost covered with floating plants? Or all three?

 

[TwoTankAmin26]

For 0.25 ppm of ammonia to be a slight issue, a tank would have to have a pH of 8.5 and a water temp. of 85F (29.7C)). And most fish can tolerate this level of ammonia for a while.

The greater danger in your tank was from a lack of oxygen in the water. Without a filter to roil the surface or an airstone to do the same, gas exchange at the surface slows. My best guess was turning the filter back on weould have corrected both the ammonia and low O level fairly quickly. The water change did the same thing and could have achieved the same result if it had been a smaller %.

Bear in mind that the nitrifying bacteria need oxygen as much as the fish do. The use it to oxidize ammonia and nitrite. While out filters often contain the most bacteria in a system, it is also in the tanks on the hard surfaces out of the light and where there is decent circulation. When the filters stop and there is no airstone roiling the surface, this will slow and eventually prevent them from functioning.

Live plants use ammonium, CO2 and light to do their thing and part it it is making O. When filters stop working the exchange of gas at the surface effects both O and CO2 levels. So, plants can only help for so long as the fish will not make enough CO2 on their own.

But, if the filter is only off for an hour or maybe three. it isn't too bad depending on if thee are live pants of not. I use a lot of AquaClear filters and we get power blinks here. I have not resterted filters for as much as a day and all was OK in the tanks with plants. Oddly, when there is a true power outage the whole house back up generator comes on after 20 seconds. In such cases the same filters which do not start after a blink mostly restart when the generator comes on.

Fortnately, we put in the generator in place in 2008 before the hurricanes came up the east coast in 2011 and 2012 which caused the power to be out for 13 days both times.

 

[Magnum Man32 147]

time to think like a prepper, a fish prepper… the mantra of “one is none” is common, with preppers, and often true on fish keeping, as a replacement piece of equipment is often not available same day… before I bought a high quality fish room air pump, my cheap linear pump went out on my 10 tank set up… most of my big tanks have between 1 and 3 hang on back filters, but I use a lot of air via 10 inch air bars on my river tanks, so I was worried about oxygen levels… all of those were fine with the aeration from the filter turbulence, but my shrimp tanks only had sponge filters in them, so a cheap extra diaphragm pump was employed to bubble those tanks, until a good quality replacement pump could get here…

I’ve been really struggling with memory lately… I’d like to think I’m just really busy, not totally losing my mind… so I’m setting reminders on my phone, and trying anything to keep from forgetting things on my tank maintenance… my heater style ( I have 2 per most tanks ) doesn’t require me to shut them off with 1/3 water changes, and I gave up all my aquaclear filters, as they required futzing each time… I now use tidal’s in their place, and I don’t have to shut them off during water changes…

my biggest issue is forgetting I have supplemental well water running ( main waters are RO and are pumped ) but the well water lines are small, and I repeatedly over flow tanks when supplementing minerals back…

 

[Fishmanic31 148]

For 0.25 ppm of ammonia to be a slight issue, a tank would have to have a pH of 8.5 and a water temp. of 85F (29.7C)). And most fish can tolerate this level of ammonia for a while.

The greater danger in your tank was from a lack of oxygen in the water. Without a filter to roil the surface or an airstone to do the same, gas exchange at the surface slows. My best guess was turning the filter back on weould have corrected both the ammonia and low O level fairly quickly. The water change did the same thing and could have achieved the same result if it had been a smaller %.

Bear in mind that the nitrifying bacteria need oxygen as much as the fish do. The use it to oxidize ammonia and nitrite. While out filters often contain the most bacteria in a system, it is also in the tanks on the hard surfaces out of the light and where there is decent circulation. When the filters stop and there is no airstone roiling the surface, this will slow and eventually prevent them from functioning.

Live plants use ammonium, CO2 and light to do their thing and part it it is making O. When filters stop working the exchange of gas at the surface effects both O and CO2 levels. So, plants can only help for so long as the fish will not make enough CO2 on their own.

But, if the filter is only off for an hour or maybe three. it isn't too bad depending on if thee are live pants of not. I use a lot of AquaClear filters and we get power blinks here. I have not resterted filters for as much as a day and all was OK in the tanks with plants. Oddly, when there is a true power outage the whole house back up generator comes on after 20 seconds. In such cases the same filters which do not start after a blink mostly restart when the generator comes on.

Fortnately, we put in the generator in place in 2008 before the hurricanes came up the east coast in 2011 and 2012 which caused the power to be out for 13 days both times.

I do have a large sponge filter on the opposite side of the tank from the HOB filter. But the tube was partially out of the sponge so just air partially going through the sponge. I also have an air stone not far from the HOB filter. Both of those were pushing air. So the tank was getting some air.

I also have lots of mature Anubias in the tank.

The Skirt Tetras do look more active today so all is good.

 

[TwoTankAmin26]

I never shut off my Aquaclears or heaters during water changes and tank maint.. With the ACs I remove the intake assembly since I need to remove and rinse the pre-filter. I also remove the basket to rinse media and change the floss. All the time the filter is still running. I return the intakes one cleaned bu do not push then into place so ththey would try to work until after I have almost completed the refill. I want to see them working before I have finished the refill as at that point I move on to another tank or something else. The only other hang-on I have liked were the Eheim ones but the biggest they made was a 200 gph. I also run AC a couple of 300s and a 110.

All of my heaters are placed close to the bottom of the tank on the back glass so they never get turned off during water changes. They are usually also out of site and they heat better in this location and orientation. ACs run very quietly for me. I also tend to have an air powered cubefilter in many of my tanks. Air pumps almost always restart after a power blink or switchover to the generator.

Almost all my tanks have multiple heaters and filters except for the 5.5 gal. My oldest AC filter, a 150 (aka 20) was bought used in 20