Pimafix & Carbon - Yay Or Nay?

[fluffycabbage]

Ive got carbon in my external filter atm to get rid of any traces of protozin. I did a complete water change, washed substrate and also added new substrate.

Im now treating the residual fungus with pimafix, but have carbon in the filter. Should i take it out?

 

[raptorrex]

Ive got carbon in my external filter atm to get rid of any traces of protozin. I did a complete water change, washed substrate and also added new substrate.

Im now treating the residual fungus with pimafix, but have carbon in the filter. Should i take it out?

its always best to remove carbon full stop. it has no benefits (this century) and many possible problems can arise.

its most often used, purely, to remove meds after treatment.

so yes remove it to treat. and replace it to clean up after treatment.
then remove it and throw it way.

 

[Bugdozer]

its always best to remove carbon full stop. it has no benefits

Apart from acting as quite a good substrate for beneficial bacteria to live on, just like ceramic noodles which I don't hear anyone telling us to throw out.

 

[FishLover66]

I'm using Pimafix at the moment to treat some fungus that infected my fish that were hard-hit by ick. It seems to be working very well and didn't take long for the fungus to disappear. It says right on the bottle to remove the carbon if you can. I always remove the carbon when medicating, otherwise it just removes the meds from the tank--kind of a waste of money.

 

[fluffycabbage]

I'm using Pimafix at the moment to treat some fungus that infected my fish that were hard-hit by ick. It seems to be working very well and didn't take long for the fungus to disappear. It says right on the bottle to remove the carbon if you can. I always remove the carbon when medicating, otherwise it just removes the meds from the tank--kind of a waste of money.

oh jeez does it? duuuuuuuuuuuuurrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!!! what an idiot! thanks fishlover!

 

[Alm0stAwesome]

BUT! If your carbon has been in the tank for ages, then the odds are it is now inactive and is only serving as a filter sponge and you'd be OK to dose your meds, just to confuse everything

 

[FishLover66]

LOL ! Oh, yea, I meant to mention that. I replace the carbon about once per month, so in my case, it would remove the meds. If you don't bother changing it, than it probably wouldn't. But in that case, why would you even use carbon?

 

[raptorrex]

its always best to remove carbon full stop. it has no benefits

Apart from acting as quite a good substrate for beneficial bacteria to live on, just like ceramic noodles which I don't hear anyone telling us to throw out.

perhaps if you understood carbon a bit, you wouldn't make such an erroneous comment.

it does. have an high surface area. apart from that, its nothing like ceramic media.
carbon is chemically active. it adsorbs many things from the water, including things your fish need.
there is also the problem that carbon leaches back it adsorbed nasties. not something you need in a tank
carbon also exhausts very quickly opinions run between 1 day and a week. this is the opinion of people who know what they are talking about.
you cannot clean carbon. this alone makes it useless as a bio media.

honestly even cursory research would have avoided you making such an uninformed comment.
even a simple forum search will confirm what i have said.
even in the 60's-70's and 80's. most didn't use carbon as a bio media. it was used to chemically clean the water.

 

[Bugdozer]

you cannot clean carbon. this alone makes it useless as a bio media.

honestly even cursory research would have avoided you making such an uninformed comment.
even a simple forum search will confirm what i have said.

Even a simple forum search will show you other people with the same opinion as me on this. Including one of the currently active threads on a similar subject. Honestly, even cursory research would have avoided you making such an uniformed comment.
Some examples:
"Yea you dont really need carbon, but once it is full, it makes a great bio media. There are plenty places for BBs to latch onto the carbon."

"It is often said that exhausted carbon will leach adsorbed substances back into the aquarium. This is unlikely under normal conditions. Specific chemical conditions are required... such as extreme pH values outside the normal range for aquaria. All that will happen if you leave carbon too long without changing it is that it will no longer be effective for its intended purpose and will instead become coated in a biofilm and become part of the bio-filtration."

And there are others. Do your own homework. And there's equally as many articles agreeing with your viewpoint. I don't object to your differing point of view regarding carbon, but I do object to being sneered at by "people who know what they're talking about". My view actually has more grounding in science than yours does, unless you can show me the results of a study indicating that beneficial bacteria do not adhere to the surface of carbon and showing rates of harmful chemical leaching at normal pH levels?

 

[Tizer]

I'd read some of these threads regarding carbon not leaching back into the water and i can well believe it, but activated carbon pieces in a chem bag are a little different to carbon sponges so there is probably some confusion here! If you have bagged carbon in your filter, its an utterly pointless addition, unless you are wanting to "polish" the water a little or remove meds. If its a carbon sponge, then its my opinion that it does an utterly crap job at doing both of the above and is better off used as bio media for bacteria to grow on.

That's my view anyway

 

[the_lock_man]

My twopenn'orth

I think both Raptor and Bugdozer are right in their own ways. But if you introduce a carbon filter to remove medications, and then leave it there, it will build up a bacteria colony. Presumably, the next time you need to use carbon to remove meds, you would have to take out the old carbon, in order to free up the space to put the new carbon in. Therefore, you will be removing some of your bacteria, which, whilst it's unlikely to cause a major problem in a mature tank, is an unnecessary risk to take.

 

[Bugdozer]

My twopenn'orth

I think both Raptor and Bugdozer are right in their own ways. But if you introduce a carbon filter to remove medications, and then leave it there, it will build up a bacteria colony. Presumably, the next time you need to use carbon to remove meds, you would have to take out the old carbon, in order to free up the space to put the new carbon in. Therefore, you will be removing some of your bacteria, which, whilst it's unlikely to cause a major problem in a mature tank, is an unnecessary risk to take.

This is a good point.