antbfc

Hi,

once a tank is fully cycled (or when mine is :-p ) i will do 25% water changes weekly. I just wandered does this include a full vaccuum of the gravel as well or should that be fortnightly. I also heard that it can be best to siphon clean half the gravel one week and half the next. Any tips?

Lucy

I vacumm the whole tank with no ill effects. Others do 1/2 then 1/2 the next week.

eiginh

What I've read from here is that it's better to do half and half so you don't have the possibility of vacuuming all the good bacteria at once. You can also vacuum half the gravel per each water change.

antbfc

seems like half and half is the preferred option.... I'm just about to do a 50% water change on my tank to add some tss to help it cycle. Should a vaccum the bottom at all. i'm getting high readings of ammonia and nitrates

Time

Algae will use nitrate to grow and that may control your nitrate levels. Not sure just an idea, I think adding plants will to but I don't know if ammonia kills them. My nitrate and ammonia are undetectable. I think you can buy something to lower ammonia at the pet store. I heard getting the filter media from a established filter can do it.

antbfc

hi time keeper,

That does make sense because even with my plec and 3 loaches i have been getting algae. I have just done a 505 water change added 100ml of tss and de-toxified the chloriune using tetra aquasafe. I know the produc tyou are referring too it is ammo-lock which gets rid of chlorine and detoxifies the ammonia. I have a bottle but i am holding fire on using it to see if i can push this LONG cycle through

mathas

Ammonia will not kill plants... in fact, they seem to prefer it to other nitrogen sources.

An except from Diana Walstad's Ecology of the Planted Aquarium can be found at AquaBotanic.com. She says (among many other things):

Time

Sure you can. I think adding plants can help control the nitrate. Try using some filter media from a developed tank, I think that can lower ammonia level, it helps speed up the cycle nitrogen cycle but I would buy the stuff to lower the ammonia. I would let algae grow or add plants.

Shawnie

now that you have added TSS, give it 7 days of adding NOTHING else to the tank....otherwise you have wasted your money after 7 days, test your tank and go from there

aquarist48

I second Shawnie's post. Once the Tetra Safe start has been added, don't do anything to the tank for 7 days and then check your readings. You can top of the water from what I understand, if necessary, will no delays to the cycle. Shawnie has had "great" success with TSS, however, some have not.
Keep us posted
Ken

antbfc

I know i should have left alone but i tested my water today and ammonia has dropped to zero :-) nitrites zero. nitrates area a little high at around the 40 mark... looks as if this tank is nearly cycled!

Craig-D

I vaccum the whole tank too each time and I only do it bi-weekly. I was doing it weekly, but found there was very little debris build-up in that short a time. I've had no problems whatsoever with that schedule. I've found no evidence to suggest vaccuming actually strips bacteria off the gravel. It sure doesn't come off my lava rock.

aquarist48

Good morning. I've moved your thread to the Cleaning/Maint. section of the forum.
Thanks!
Ken

antbfc

is it ok to vaccum once a week then just to keep the tank clean? so you cant vacuum too much?

Craig-D

Vacuuming once a week is fine. Can you vaccum too much? Sure. Vaccuming every day would be overkill I would think for example. How dirty your gravel becomes depends on your stock and their bioload. A tank full of low bio-load cory catfish is going to need vacuuming less often than a tank full of relatively messy platies, or even worse waste producers like goldfish.

antbfc

see i have guppys platies 3 loaches and a plec. pretty high bioload so vaccuming once a week shouldnt do any harm

Craig-D

If you have a common pleco, you need to get a bigger tank for him or find him a new home. His bio-load will be the least of your problems when that sucker eventually grows to its adult size of 15" or more long. They need a minimum of 55 U.S. gallons and your tank measurements work out to be about 35 U.S. (30 U.K.) gallons.