lolagurl

Those who have 30 gallon and 40 gallon and up tanks how do u clean it. I knwo you take the fish out , but how do you dump all that water, carry it, I could barely do it with a 10 gallon. Do you just take a cup and scoop the water out?
Probably a dumb question...and i dont think i put this in thw right area, but I already wrote it.

JMatt1983

you should never carry an aquarium full of water(1 gallon of water=~8pounds or 3.6kilos plus 40 to 50 pounds of gravel for 30-40G tanks) it puts a lot of un needed stress on the bottom glass, and also never empty all the water out of it. What most people use here, and personnally, i think its the best product ever, is a python gravel vac, basically its a suction vacuum to clean the gravel. You only remove 25% of the water in your tank, and clean only half the gravel in the tank per water change as that will preserve the beneficial bacteria that accumulates in the gravel bed, also NEVER clean anything with tap water, as the chlorine in it will destroy all bacteria, and you'll have to start over again with the cycle, just simply rinse your ornaments and filter media in USED tank water from your water changes

MamaM

Hi! *Here is the link on fishlore.com for tank maintenance http://www.fishlore.com/Maintenance.htm. *I use a siphon vacuum (basically, a plastic siphon tube with thin tubing attached--you can find it at any fish store/Petco/Walmart for as little as $4.99), and a bucket. *Once you get the hang of it, it goes very quickly (the water draining from the tube in the tank into the bucket). *Then all you need to do is dump out the old water from the bucket, and replace it with the same amount of dechlorinated (and I stress DE-chlorinated) water into the tank. *There are several products available that remove chlorine and other chemicals from tap water. *You should only be changing about 20-25% of the water in the tank during your weekly water changes. *You don't even need to take the fish out of the tank for it! * *

I hope this helps!
Sharon