Jon

How often do you change out water / scrape for algae / vacuum your gravel? I wont attach a poll because it seems that since this is a combo of questions it would be easier just to type a response.

EmpPleco

I do water changes twice a week(one of those times being a gravel vac, and havent had any algae to scrape Pleco gets to it before I can lol

Jon

i vacuum the gravel and change 15% water subsequently bidaily... i know i should cutback but for some reason i find it very fun.

Jason

I clean mine once a week. Change water 30%, vaccum. algae clean etc.

fish_r_friend

10% bidaily

newbie101

Me too I just don't like hauling heavy buckets from the laundry room...I change the water and siphon the gravel (at the same time) every saturday, 10-25%. I never have to scrape algae, it never grows

Marc

Typically I do about 10 gallons every other day. 11 gallon buckets are nice

Gunnie

I normally change out 50% in each tank every week except my turtle tank. The speedster gets a 100% water change every week.

Jon

is there any real danger of cleaning your tank too often with an established tank?

EmpPleco

IN my opinion, you can never do any water changes, but IMO gravel vaccing more than one time a week i s alittle too much.. I try not to mess with any good bacteria _but you have to do it once i week to get rid of any uneaten food, fish poopies, etc. LOL

Butterfly

Jon as long as your fish are happy don't worry about it, I doubt you can do too many water changes
i do 25 - 50% weekly and vacumm at that time. Plecos do the algae scraping
Carol

Fish Girl

I plan to change the water every week in my tank. The first time I tried one of my fish died but I think I know how to do it now.

dano569

i change 25-30% a week and vaccum half the gravel at the same time.

atmmachine816

i change about 5-6 gallons once a week thruough a gravel vac and scrape algae everyother month or so

these darn otos dont do the job i need a pleco

EmpPleco

My one pleco keeps my entire tank algae free. they are definately good housecleaners

dano569

my mbuna tank has brown algae.i don't have a pleco in that tank.

Jon

my tank has brown algae on just the back panel so i scrape it every once in a while... no biggie

EmpPleco

I heard that brown algae is a sign of having nitrites and ammonia present in your tank.

Do you guys think this is true?

Jon

my amonia PPM is 0
my nitrite ppm is 0
my nitrate ppm is 2...

i doubt it...

dano569

it's just from having excess nutrients in you tank, i think.

EmpPleco

and again, i can't believe what i read on the net, because if you google:

brown algae in aquariums

there are numerous sites that say this is caused by excess of nitrites and nitrates, and then some others that also say inadequate lighting and lack of oxygen

Jon

well my fish have plenty of oxygen and a decent amount of lighting (1.5 WPG enuff for low req plants)... the water is also immaculate, not to sounds conceited, and i still have trace amounts of this

EmpPleco

weird...

chickadee

I change the water 50% twice a week and NEVER vacuum the bottom as I have a water additive that takes care of the debris. It recommends vacuuming about every 6 months and I am watching to make sure there is no sludge build-up. I have used it for about 3 months now and so far the gravel is clean as a whistle and all is well with both fish and plants.

Rose

atmmachine816

hey rose whats the additive you use i would really like to know since gravel vacuuming the 2.5 tank is a pain and what type of heater do you use in your tanks because i use a 25w and was wondering if there is anything smaller

atmmachine816

in case you do find this rose i pm you since i dont know if you will ever see this and i really would like to konw

wolfman21

clean it and change the water 1-2 times per week, depends on the school work load and such

genie

Right now-- a lot. My betta is sick.

Neville

i think frequent water change is very very important to keep your fish healthy. hi genie, what happened to your betta?

tan.b

every sat morn i test the water to check all is well.
if it is (which it has been for a while now - horay). then i change about 20% of the water, and rinse out the filters.
i dont gravel vac. the gravel looks clean and darent mess about with it as really dont want any ammonia/mini cycle probs. if it aint broke, dont fix it!!! if it does get dirty i'll get a vac . of course its bigger and more frequent water changes if the fish are poorly.

algae isnt a prob as the plecs deal with that. there was a slight film on the loach tank, so whizzed over it quickly with my magnetic algae thing and that did the job, took less than a minute. i have a very lazy loach :. he's not a good cleaner at the best of times. he doesnt touch my plants. they're covered in algae! my plecs however do an excellent job. would recommend them! think i might get some cories to help my loach. i got him some shrimps to help, but they dont do algae, just hoover up the scraps of food etc! and i doubt a plec would fit in the tank with my loach. its a small tank. loach would prob suck onto the plec too. cant risk that happening
tan