Longest You've Gone Without A Water Change

I'm just curious. I do my best to stay on a strict schedule, but today I realized it's been two weeks since my last batch of water changes!

 

Probably a month. Went through a rough drought period and my house was only getting water for 1 hour a day for around 3 months. I'm lightly stocked though so it's not too bad.

 

When I fell in disinterest in the hobby...maybe 1 month. Since I’ve recommitted to it the longest I’ve gone w/o a water change was 3 weeks, cause of vacation.

 

1.5 months. I went on vacation for 1 month, then just was lazy. Thank goodness I had the mother of good filtration though. 10G tank with a filter rated for a 40G. Lol

 

You really don't want to know. Lol

 

I’ve probably gone a month. But two weeks doesn’t seem so bad now lol

 

probably 3 weeks? on unfiltered, tiny tanks too lol. nothing died.

 

A year, because there was nothing in it

 

Haha

 

Right now I'm at the longest between water changes. It's been about a month and a half. I've been really sick this whole year so I've been having a hard time doing water changes. I'm planning on doing a water change in the next few days since it will be another long span till I have time to do a water change.

On the plus side of not doing a water change in awhile, I found a cherry barb fry in my tank. I normally vacuum around the plants pretty aggressively so this little gal has been able to survive since I'm behind on water changes!

 

2 years... fish were fine, nitrate was in an acceptable range- and no, no live plants besides algae. This was ages ago, before going to internet and relying on Melbourne retailers.

 

I’ve gone probably close to a month while I was sick and in and out of the hospital, I lost quite a few fish that time as there was an outbreak of some mysterious fish-disappearing disease. Not even joking, lost 4 fish but found no bodies.

 

Too long...I have all 10 gallons and under and all bettas. My youngest dog died unexpectedly during dental surgery, and we don’t know why, so my depression hit with a vengeance. I’m dealing with the repercussions with multiple fin rot cases, and I lost all my RCS I had just gotten in January. It was well over a month. Not everyone was in bad shape, but I was in such bad shape my EE had lost a large chunk of his fins before I even realized he wasn’t just clamping them.

And I mean, definitely sounds gross, sorry, but he’s been gone over 3 months and I realized the other day I haven’t vacuumed upstairs since he passed. I didn’t want to vacuum up his fur and smell from the carpet

 

Months. Surprisingly, the fish were okay. I might have seen some sad faces when I finally did a water change, but it could be my crazy overactive imagination. Likely.

 

Too long...I have all 10 gallons and under and all bettas. My youngest dog died unexpectedly during dental surgery, and we don’t know why, so my depression hit with a vengeance. I’m dealing with the repercussions with multiple fin rot cases, and I lost all my RCS I had just gotten in January. It was well over a month. Not everyone was in bad shape, but I was in such bad shape my EE had lost a large chunk of his fins before I even realized he wasn’t just clamping them.

And I mean, definitely sounds gross, sorry, but he’s been gone over 3 months and I realized the other day I haven’t vacuumed upstairs since he passed. I didn’t want to vacuum up his fur and smell from the carpet

I’m so sorry. It’s never easy but when you’re not expecting it. I’m just sorry it happened. My heart hurts for you.

 

Mine right now is like four days. When I had to wear that blasted hip brace. Now I do PWC every other day. Need it every day but can’t. Nitrates and too many guppies. Again. Poodles.

 

I am sure I will get crucified for this but... I've had multiple planted tanks over the years where I never did water changes. Just top ups for evaporation.

In all honesty, that's sorta always my goal to get to that point where everything is balanced enough that all I need to do is top it up once a week.

 

I am sure I will get crucified for this but... I've had multiple planted tanks over the years where I never did water changes. Just top ups for evaporation.

In all honesty, that's sorta always my goal to get to that point where everything is balanced enough that all I need to do is top it up once a week.

That’s how it was back before we had water test kits and fancy smancy filters and additives out the wazzoo. All of our fish were quite happy and healthy. Our water wasn’t pure nasty back then either though.

 

Too long...I have all 10 gallons and under and all bettas. My youngest dog died unexpectedly during dental surgery, and we don’t know why, so my depression hit with a vengeance. I’m dealing with the repercussions with multiple fin rot cases, and I lost all my RCS I had just gotten in January. It was well over a month. Not everyone was in bad shape, but I was in such bad shape my EE had lost a large chunk of his fins before I even realized he wasn’t just clamping them.

And I mean, definitely sounds gross, sorry, but he’s been gone over 3 months and I realized the other day I haven’t vacuumed upstairs since he passed. I didn’t want to vacuum up his fur and smell from the carpet

Oh no!!! I hope you are doing okay. Things like that are never easy.

Mine right now is like four days. When I had to wear that blasted hip brace. Now I do PWC every other day. Need it every day but can’t. Nitrates and too many guppies. Again. Poodles.

FOUR DAYS!!!! I WISH I could WC every four days

 

Oh no!!! I hope you are doing okay. Things like that are never easy.

Thank you for the kind words and Gypsy13 as well. I’m not but trying to work through it.

FOUR DAYS!!!! I WISH I could WC every four days

And hahaha same reaction. I don’t have time for that in 7 tanks... Wish I could! That’s super impressive!

 

That’s how it was back before we had water test kits and fancy smancy filters and additives out the wazzoo. All of our fish were quite happy and healthy. Our water wasn’t pure nasty back then either though.

Exactly and I kept fussy fish in these tanks (rams and loaches and all sorts of shrimps). I honestly think the trend is to OVER change the water these days.

I try and keep it simple, under stock, filter LOTS, feed sparingly and keep at least one live plant in every tank.

 

I've done about a month and a half without doing a water change on my 60g, but the stocking was two mystery snails and an amano. Somehow they still managed to keep the cycle...

 

I have to do frequent WC on my tanks because I tend to overstock lol. With good filtration I can get away with it, but if I go a few weeks without changing the water I get a huge ammonia spike.

 

Alphafish98 saw your recent post and thought you should see this thread

 

Many years ago, when I was a not very committed to the hobby, I had a 10 gallon tank stocked with 5 giant danio, 4 red eye tetras and 3 tiger barbs (overstocked and too small of a tank for these species). I never did a water change on that tank, I only topped it off from evaporation. That tank was running for at least a year and a half, and all the fish survived. We ended up giving the fish to our local lfs. (I would not recommend doing this of course).


These days I have a very set schedule of water changes. Two 50% changes a week for some tanks. And the other tanks 50% just once. I learned from my mistakes and try to care for my fish the best I can.

 

2 years... fish were fine, nitrate was in an acceptable range- and no, no live plants besides algae. This was ages ago, before going to internet and relying on Melbourne retailers.

I have probably gone almost as long. A year for sure on some tanks. Really trying to buckle down and keep to a schedule now!

 

Exactly and I kept fussy fish in these tanks (rams and loaches and all sorts of shrimps). I honestly think the trend is to OVER change the water these days.

I try and keep it simple, under stock, filter LOTS, feed sparingly and keep at least one live plant in every tank.

I’m pretty much the same...it’s cumbersome to liquid test 7 tanks plus a quarantine and a hospital, so I use test strips and test with liquid if it looks suspicious. I change as needed based on readings, but try to do at least every other week. It’s been difficult with recent events in my life but I’ve been much more on top of it the last month or two and I’m still having problems unfortunately.

 

Id say 2months.... It was well filtered though. And for other reasons.... Right now I'm trying weekly water changes for all 7 tanks. My mom told me for her 2 gallon betta tank to do it once the water level gets low or every month or so. I SNATCHED the betta away from her into my room into a filtered 5gallon.

 

If I go a full week I get apprehensive. But, I have a betta sorority, so I'm always trying to get someone's fins to heal.

 

Six years
I only topped off once a month or so.

 

Eek!