Under-gravel Filter

[Tw3lv3]

Hey, I have an undergravel filter in my tank and i am just wondering if i use a gravel-vac to clean my gravel will it get rid of my good bacteria?

cheers, Tw3lv3.

 

[youngfisher]

Most of the bacteria is actually in the filter sponge not the substraite, This will remove some bacteria but not enough bacteria for you to even notice it, neither the fish, So dont worry about gravel Vac'ing

 

[degsod]

Hey, I have an undergravel filter in my tank and i am just wondering if i use a gravel-vac to clean my gravel will it get rid of my good bacteria?

cheers, Tw3lv3.

Do you only have an undergravel filter? If so then the good bacteria will be in your gravel.

 

[Bobtastic]

Hey, I have an undergravel filter in my tank and i am just wondering if i use a gravel-vac to clean my gravel will it get rid of my good bacteria?

cheers, Tw3lv3.

As far as I know when you use a gravel cleaner on UGF you'll only be removing the detritus/fish waste. The good bacteria will be on the biofilm on the gravel and shouldn't be removed by sucking up waste.

 

[AdAndrews]

Hey, I have an undergravel filter in my tank and i am just wondering if i use a gravel-vac to clean my gravel will it get rid of my good bacteria?

cheers, Tw3lv3.

As far as I know when you use a gravel cleaner on UGF you'll only be removing the detritus/fish waste. The good bacteria will be on the biofilm on the gravel and shouldn't be removed by sucking up waste.

yah, with a ugf you dont need to gravel vac, just do a water change

 

[degsod]

Hey, I have an undergravel filter in my tank and i am just wondering if i use a gravel-vac to clean my gravel will it get rid of my good bacteria?

cheers, Tw3lv3.

As far as I know when you use a gravel cleaner on UGF you'll only be removing the detritus/fish waste. The good bacteria will be on the biofilm on the gravel and shouldn't be removed by sucking up waste.

yah, with a ugf you dont need to gravel vac, just do a water change

I would deffo leave alone, as it helps to promote the anerobic bacteria which is benneficial for removal of nasties.

 

[Tw3lv3]

cool thankyou guys i dont know where id be without this website id have made so many mistakes if it wasnt for guys like u offering advice

 

[Geoff1991]

Most of the bacteria is actually in the filter sponge not the substraite, This will remove some bacteria but not enough bacteria for you to even notice it, neither the fish, So dont worry about gravel Vac'ing

Under gravel filter?

Most of the bacteria will be in the gravel...

 

[bagu]

i have a UGF, i gravel vac, no harm done at all =]

 

[waterdrop]

Solid fish waste, excess fishfood particles and plant debris are the three primary producers of particulate debris that are pulled by gravity, if it can overcome your water currents, toward the bottom of your tank. In a gravel substrate, this debris will be caught between the gravel particles and will begin to be broken down by heterotrophic bacteria into ammonia and various trace metals and organics. When we gravel-clean-water-change, we remove some of the new debris and its resulting dissolved substances and also various older debris inbetween these two extremes.

An undergravel filter presents a special maintenance problem in that even though we can change water and get out the -fully dissolved- debris, and even though we might choose also to gravel-clean and get out a lot of the -new debris-, we have a new problem in that the "in-between" debris (perhaps we'll call it mulm, hopefully not confusing anyone) will have a tendency to collect *beneath* the UG plate and in doing so, carries the same risk of leaving your tank with possibly higher nitrate(NO3) and trace metal/organics concerns, just as if you had poor gravel maintenance habits.

The usual advice about this is to encourage you to find some way of using a siphon hose to suck this mulm out from beneath the UG plate. Its a problem that you can't even see beneath the plate to know if you have a problem. One method often tried is to use a simple siphon hose that has no gravel cleaner cylinder on it (so that the suction will be stronger at the submerged opening) and to clear all the gravel away from an area of the plate and press the hose end right onto the plate opening slots that normally are hidden by the gravel. Watch for clumps of mulm debris to shoot through the siphon hose as evidence of success in this endeavor.

The problem that many experience is that this turns out to be hard or not to work well enough. For this reason, many feel that maintenance is easier with modern HOB and external cannister filters. The big advantage though of the UGF is that its dirt cheap compared to these other filters. You just have to decide though, what fits your situation. My personal opinion is that although an expert aquarist can make a UGF work out, for too many beginners it turns out to be a seriously problematic device.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[OldMan47]

A UGF is a bit harder to maintain because you need to end up with a level gravel bed when you are done. Using a gravel vac on a UGF tank is a good idea. The mulm that gets trapped under the gravel plate would have been easily removed if it had been removed before it got under the plate. When you gravel vac with a UGF you are in effect doing a filter media rinse, it causes no problems unless you leave the gravel in an uneven mess when you are done. If you do not gravel vac, you are asking for trouble with that kind of filter, you are basically letting the filter get so dirty the dirt gets through it.

 

[Jabba]

I don't regard the UGF as a filter at all in the true sense it just hides all the crud under the gravel so you do need to keep sucking it out, in fact you should do it more often than those of us with external filters - or a lot of the good bacteria will be on the crud you are removing, you need to make sure that the good bacteria is on the plate and the gravel, too much crud in the gravel can lead to blocking of certain channels in the plate too and lead to anaerobic bacteria colonies that produce Hydrogen Sulphide as a by product - which is toxic to you never mind the fish - you really don't want to disturb those while the fish are in the area.

There are those in aquatic circles who advise uprooting UGF's every 6 months for a thorough cleaning, not sure I would want to do that I hate cleaning out the externals.

Personally though I wouldn't entertain a UGF.

 

[OldMan47]

For those of us who grew up with the UGF, it is a well known fact that it is one of the best available biological filters, Jabba. The gravel in a tank has several times the surface area of any canister around, even the biggest of them. It does not remove detritus from the tank, that is done with a gravel vac but it does filter out the solids as well as a well maintained canister filter and maintains the debris in the filter media as any filter does. To clean the filter media, you use the gravel vac. That is what it was invented to do, not to make a canister filtered tank look pretty. They are not as popular today as they once were because they require proper maintenance. They can't be let go and expect them to just keep on working properly like a typical canister can. I ran tanks with nothing but air powered undergravel filters for many years with good success before canisters became so popular. Today you have the option of driving a UGF with a power head but that was not the case back then either.

 

[Jabba]

I understand your position fully, I have had fish on and off since 1967 but like many things advancing years means that 'progress' changes the way we do and look at things.

I used to drive an old Morris - would I drive it now - not a chance.

I did state that those with UGF need to be a lot more thorough with their gravel cleaning and even gave the reason, but it is my experience that most with a UGF think it is a fit and forget system - I was one of them.

 

[meguro]

What if it's a reasonably well planted tank? Does gravel vacuuming still need to be as thorough then?