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Just wondering..
I have a decent sized filter with 2 things.. a blue pad and then a white scrubby pad that go side by side.. what care do I need to do in order to keep them both clean? I'm thinking that you only replace the blue filter and keep the bio (white) pad there.. is that correct or anything different?
Thanks!
/:'

Well you really want the filter media do be dirty actaully, but if it get too dirty and blocks up, just rinse it under some cool water to get th surface dirt off.

The pads are where your bacteria live, which is what Fish Guy was talking about when he mentioned you want to keep them dirty .
However they do get clogged up as the larger particles are trapped (that's also what they're there for). So as the flow rate slows down, and or on a reglar basis gently squeeze out and rinse the pads in used tank water when you do a water change.
What I do is siphon a bit of the water into my WC bucket, then swish one of the two sponges in my filter through then as a final "rinse" I siphon a bit more water from the tank through the sponge while squeezing the excess out. Using the water from the tank preservs some of the bacteria on the sponge while at the same time removing most of the gunk that's clogging the filter.

Its' always a good idea to rotate which foam you rinse out, doing both at once can throw the tank into minicycle.

^_^