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ok i did pre soak my driftwood.for about 2 days.which i don't think is long enough because the tanin still stained it lol.it's like a green tea color right now.besides heavy water changes that destroy my biological filter is there anything else i can do to help it?

Est solarus uth mithas,My honor is my life

Water changes will have no effect on your biofilter unless your doing something wrong like not dechlorinating your water. Otherwise if you don't disturb the substrate or the filter you aren't removing any bacteria. You can do all the water changes you want so long as you match water parameters(including temp) in order to avoid stressing the fish and dechlorinate properly.

Driftwood will continue to release tannins for usually at least a couple weeks. Some driftwood will release tannins forever and constantly add that tint to the water. It is completely harmless and most fish actually prefer it so the only reason to try to remove it is for looks. All chemical filtration will remove the tannin stain to a point. Carbon removes moderate amounts and will probably be enough for 1 small piece of driftwood but you may have to change it around weekly to keep the color down. That's fine if your wood only releases a small amount of tannins for a short amount of time but mine doesn't. My solution instead since I have every tank packed with wood that constantly releases tannins is to use seachem's purigen. This will remove tannin coloring 100% even on tanks that would otherwise be black within the week. It's also rechargeable with some bleach. http://seachem.com/products/product_pages/Purigen.html
You can't overuse the stuff so I just buy the 100ml bags even for my smaller tanks since they are the right size to keep the really fine purigen inside and withstand bleaching so never need replaced.

oh,that's cool didn't know water changes didn't disturb the the bacteria,i'll do that then.and i don't have to worry about chlorine cause i have well water.which is just right for the fish anyway,i've tested it.thanks so much sham,you've been a great help!

Est solarus uth mithas,My honor is my life

There will be no filter problem in doing the water changes no need to worry at all.

The Tannins are a different matter. Some DWs have a lot of tannins and they will just continue to release it as long as it is in water. (I DID SAY SOME) I would take the DW out and re soak for several weeks changing the water and scrubbing it at least twice a week. If it is still releasing tannins after all that it will continue no matter what you do.

I will leave DW soaking for at least a month before I even think of putting it into the tank.

Now for the good points of tannins some fish prefer it in their tank as in their natural settings there is plenty of tannins in the water.

Have a look in [link=My Profile] http://www.fishprofiles.com/forums/member.aspx?id=1935[/link] for my tank info

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Betta 11Gal Desktop & Placidity 5ft Community Tank Photos

Keith

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What about these fish?6 black skirt tetras 1 blue gourami,3 bronze cories and 3 salt and pepper cories.that's what's in my tank.Will they do fine in tannin stained water?it's a 29 gallon and the DW is about 12 inches long.

Est solarus uth mithas,My honor is my life

Oh yea almost forgot it's a planted tank also will it effect the plants?

Est solarus uth mithas,My honor is my life

I soaked my DW for over a week, didn't have any problems. Are you chaning the soaking water when you soak the DW? I changed mine every day, and that helped... I got tannins for most of that week....

Tannins don't harm any fish or plants. The only harm it could do is lower the ph of your water if you already have soft water and let the tannins build up. My ph doesn't budge even if the tank turns too black to see into. I just toss my driftwood directly into the tank after spraying it off in the shower. I don't even bother to soak it. I don't really see a point in waiting to aquascape my tank and enjoy my new piece of wood when the color is harmless. Plus I have so many pieces that still release tannins(with the help of wood eating plecos as well) that it's extra pointless for me. The only reason I see to soak is if you got a piece that won't sink but then I just stick some rocks on it and put it in the tank. Eventually when it stops trying to lift up I pull the rocks off.

For example this piece: http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v244/aqh88/fish/55g/P10101152.jpg is as long as my 55g and 4" thick in the middle. It took nearly 10months to soak up water, mostly sink, and stop releasing tannins. I did remove the rocks 4months later but it still floated if I didn't bury the slate base under the substrate. In the time I would have had to soak it to make it sink or stop releasing tannins I already had it coated in java fern, anubias, and willow moss.

I dont like the Tanins either and hated it when I didnt know better and put my DW in the tank and the next day the water was blood red. It looked yucky.
So what I did was boil the heck outta the DW. I put it all in a huge pot of water and put on the stove and boiled for about 4 hours. Then I soaked the wood another 24 hours and then put in my tank.
I have approx 15 pounds of DW in my tank and NO tanin coloration at all.
So, maybe boil your wood if you dont like the tanin color.
It works.

Thanks guys you all have been a great help,i changed water out.been about 24 hours and no tannin staining as of yet.just some water cloudiness.

Est solarus uth mithas,My honor is my life

Zookeper.

With Tannins it is not how you treat the DW if the timber naturally releases a lot of tannins no matter what you do nothing will stop it.

All boiling does is actually break down the fibres of the wood it may release a lot of tannins because of the boiling. I have some DW that has never released any tannins at all.

Have a look in [link=My Profile] http://www.fishprofiles.com/forums/member.aspx?id=1935[/link] for my tank info

Look here for my
Betta 11Gal Desktop & Placidity 5ft Community Tank Photos

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

I've never used Purigen, but according to the web site it is supposed to absorb nitrates. This could be a bad thing if you have a planted tank, especially if you are not fertilizing. If you are fertilizing, it sounds like a lot of the nitrate you are adding may be absorbed by the Purigen, so just something to watch out for if you try it.

Not in my experience it doesn't. I thought it trapped the organic materials that were broken down into nitrates. At least that's what I gathered from the description.

Purigen™ controls ammonia, nitrites and nitrates by removing nitrogenous organic waste that would otherwise release these harmful compounds.

It will not lower nitrates already present in the water. I've used it on probably around 10 tank setups including many planted tanks as well as my saltwater tank and know for certain the nitrates do not lower when you add purigen without a water change. It may slow the increase of nitrates(not a noticeable amount to me) but does not effect levels already present. It also absorbs less of the useful nutrients for plants than carbon which is why it's often specifically recommended for planted tanks.