FishProfiles.com Message Forums

I currently have glass discs as my substrate and I plan on changing it to regular gravel. My tank is a 42g hex and has been operational for about 6 weeks. However, due to beginner mistakes, a major bacterial bloom developed a couple of weeks ago along with a huge amonia spike in the 6.0 area. The tank has finally cleared up and the amonia is in the 1.0 to 2.0 area. I don't plan on doing the change until the water paramaters are ideal. I would like your opinions as to how I plan on proceeding with this task. I'll be draining about 75% of the existing tank water into containers. Move the fish into one of the containers. Set up and run the filter in another one of containers. Remove all contents of tank and clean thoroughly. Place rinsed out gravel in tank with decorations, plants. Fill with old tank water and additional 25% fresh water, as well as returning the filter and adding the fish.

Does this sound right? I really want to avoid another full-blown cycling, so any suggestions would be very much appreciated. Thank you!


*Mitch*

First of all, aquarium water contain very little " good " bacteria e.g. nitrifying bacteria. So it kind of useless to keep the old water from your tank.

In an aquarium, "good" bacteria are found in 2 places : your filter medias and the substrate. Changing your substrate will affect your chemical balance and may lead to a small spike in ammonia and/or nitrites.

Since you are speaking of "glass" substrate, I imagine it is of rather large size compared to regular gravel. If you wish to completely avoid any impact on your tank chemical balance, simply dump the pre-rinsed gravel on top of your existing large glass pebbles. Leave it there for a week or 2. Then, simply remove like 20% of the water and take out your glass pebbles out. They should be easy to sort out. Replant / decorate and voila ! No peaks, no harm done, no fish in buckets stressed out of their minds.

Hope that helps you and good luck.

Sponge

What Bob said can be done.

I would prefer to do as you intended but keep the filter running in the saved water.

Depending on the amount of new substrate you are intending to use, you could add it to the tank in an open mesh bag for about a month this will seed it and reduce the problem just a bit more.

No matter what you do get some good Bacteria starter (there is one which is refridgrated) and use as directed also a good stress coat will help.

Finally give your self plenty of time dont start late in the afternoon as this is one way to make too many mistakes as you will/can get very tired.

Have a look in [link=My Profile]http://
www.fishprofiles.com/interactive/forums/profile.asp?userid=6741" style="COLOR: #00FF00[/link] for my tank info

[link=Betta 11Gal Desktop & Placidity 5ft Community Tanks]http://photobucket.com/albums/b209/keithgh/Betta%20desktop%20tank/" style="COLOR: #00FF00[/link]

Keith

Near enough is not good enough, therefore good enough is not near enough, and only your best will do.
I VOTE DO YOU if not WHY NOT?
VOTE NOW VOTE NOW

Thanks guys, appreciate your comments and suggestions.

I think I'm going to have to go with my original plan. My tank is just too tall for me to be able to reach the discs. It has to be empty so that I can remove it from the stand and lower it to the floor.

It's going to be a long process but here's hoping all goes well!


*Mitch*

Definately keep the filter running on the saved water while your fish are in hiatus. This will go a long way to reduce any ammonia/nitrite spikes when you set it all back up.

Also, i'd advise you to keep as much of your old water as you can. While it's true that much of the 'good' bacteria is in free-floating form suspended in the water, it's best to keep it for chemical balance purposes.

The fish will already be used to the water and it's chemical properties, hardness, pH etc. if you dump a majority of fresh water in the tank, you'll change these parameters for te fish, creating stress. Additional stress is the last thing you want to put on your fish when you're netting them, tearing apart their home and putting them back.

I would not remove the sunbtrate and replace it prior to adding your new one on top of it. The idea of putting the new substrate in a mesh bag is a brilliant way to do and easier than what I proposed you.

Did you consider the use of a tool, such as a scoop, a laddle, a long spoon, even a fish net to get your substrate out ?

Just a few thoughts.

Sponge

Just leave the filter going in another tank & keep 75% of the water.

Empty the tank & then fill in the new gravel & add the 75% of the water & filter. Top up the remaining 25% with new water & hopefully everything will be fine.


http://uk.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/s8xi5heh/my_photos
http://www.geocities.com/s8xi5heh/classic_blue.html
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/buzaqq/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/corydoras/
Member of the Malta Aquarist Society - 1970.
http://www.maltaaquarist.com

Mitchee
This sounds like a previous posting I suggest you go back and consider some of those very good replies.

[link=Refer back to previous post]http://www.fishprofiles.com/files/forums/Water%20Quality/67086.html" style="COLOR: #00FF00[/link]

Have a look in [link=My Profile]http://
www.fishprofiles.com/interactive/forums/profile.asp?userid=6741" style="COLOR: #00FF00[/link] for my tank info

[link=Betta 11Gal Desktop & Placidity 5ft Community Tanks]http://photobucket.com/albums/b209/keithgh/Betta%20desktop%20tank/" style="COLOR: #00FF00[/link]

Keith

Near enough is not good enough, therefore good enough is not near enough, and only your best will do.
I VOTE DO YOU if not WHY NOT?
VOTE NOW VOTE NOW

Here is a modified idea of a few ideas already posted.

What we have here is
1. Substraight that needs to go
2. Substraight that needs to be added
3. need to stableize bacteria and water
4. a means to the end.

If you can only change the gravel with the tank empty would it be possible to then instead of seed the new gravel with bacteria prior seed it after by putting the old glass into a mesh bag to keep the surface area for a while connect that to some fishing line or something so you can pull it out later and voala you have your new gravel installed the water presereved the filter still caring for your fish in the waters u saved and the bacteria from the old stuff still there for a week or so to keep your cutlres reproducing.

cheers

Thanks again everyone for your advice. I want this changeover to be as stress free as possible on my fish and not to mention myself. I have about 50 pounds of gravel that needs to be added and just a little less in glass discs to be removed. In any event, this won't be happening for at least another few days. You have all provided me with many alternatives to consider. Thanks so much for taking the time to give your help to an eager fledgling.


*Mitch*

If possible, you can always just net out the current substrate and use a wide bore pipe or tube to funnel in the pre-rinsed new stuff. Saves a lot of messing about with buckets and filters, although you might want to take the fish out for the disc extraction process could be noisy

For animals, the entire universe has been neatly divided into things to (a) mate with, (b) eat, (c) run away from, and (d) rocks. - Terry Pratchett

Mission accomplished! It took my husband and I 2.5 hours to change the substrate last night. Although all suggestions were considered, we went with my first plan of removing the fish into a separate container with existing tank water, running the filter in another container with existing tank water and then transferring as much as possible of the remaining tank water into another container. All glass discs and plants were removed, new gravel added, plants replaced, old tank water returned and topped off with fresh water. I also added a good dose of bacteria starter and of course water conditioner. So far, I have one loss. Stress was just too much for a balloon molly All other fish seem fine however water parameters are not ideal (amonia has spiked to the 2.0-3.0 range, no nitrites or nitrates). I'll be keeping a close watch for sure.


*Mitch*

If you have more bacteria starter, add a half-dose to try to get those bug-levels up faster. thats a biggish spike.

For animals, the entire universe has been neatly divided into things to (a) mate with, (b) eat, (c) run away from, and (d) rocks. - Terry Pratchett

Well, since changing my substrate on 27 Dec./05, I have been able to bring down my ammonia level to the .50 range. For some reason it will not go below this. I have done 40 to 50% water changes, and the level goes to 0 for a day and creeps back up to the .50 within a few days. I have no nitrites or nitrates registering. I only feed my fish once a day for 2 minutes. I also keep adding "Cycle" as per instructions on the bottle. I now have an intense brown algae problem. My once white gravel is now rust coloured as is much of my glass and decorations. I added plants 2 weeks ago,as well as 4 ottos to try and keep the algae in check but there has been little improvement. The light is kept on for at least 10 hours a day.

My current fish load is:
3 danios
4 guppies
2 swordtails
2 balloon mollies
2 platies
4 ottos

Am I doing something wrong? Should it be taking this long to get my tank completely cycled or am I not being patient enough?

Any suggestions would be most welcome!!


*Mitch*

[imglink=http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v195/Babelfish/heartagrambanner.jpg]http://www.heartagram.com/[/imglink]
Sadly you're not being patient enough . One dose of cycle per 7 days if I remember the directions properly. You may need to have your tap water tested for phosphates, call around to the various LFS in the area and see if anyone will do the test for you for free as I seem to remember it being a rather expensive test to purchase. Otherwise just leave it. Yes white substrates will show the brown algae (it's actually diatoms you can do a search on this site you should come up with plenty of threads). The diatoms come from excess phosphates the number one cause being excess feeding. I'd cut back to just one sprinkle once a day or even every other day. Fish will survive just fine . However if you do find out you have signifigant source of phosphates in your tap water you can purchase filter additives that will remove it I use seachems phosguard in a few of my tanks.

As for that ammonia spike. Just leave it, don't do the water changes unless the fish are stressing. By doing the water changes yes you do reduce the ammount of ammonia in the water, but you also end up losing the ammount of ammonia that you need to establish before you can get the nitrItes that need to exist to consume the ammonia. In other words you need enough ammonia before you can get any nitrItes to get rid of the ammonia for you then get the nitrAtes to get rid of the nitrItes.
I hope that was everything

^_^

Thanks Babelfish. Glad to know that this is normal. I did try to do a search on brown algae as you suggested but nothing comes up. I'm guessing this feature is out of commission on the site for a little while.

Thanks again for the info.


*Mitch*