Sanitizing a tank

I lost the second of my two sunburst gouramis to .

On the positive side, this is a prime example of why to use a quarantine tank: the two fish never made it out of the 10 gallon QT.

More from laziness than anything else, the tank has been sitting there, but I want to get it ready again as a QT, and this means getting it sterile.

This is the setup: a 10 gallon tank, LED hood, Fluval with a QuietFlow 10, 100w heater (pulled from a bigger tank, which is why it seems oversized). I also have the Biomax bag from an Aquaclear 30 in the tank--in the filter compartment at the moment, since I'd removed the carbon in order to dose meds (otherwise it was hanging in the tank).

My thought is to dose the tank with chlorine bleach and let it run for a bit--literally, so that the bleach water goes through the filter. My goal is to be sure that every surface that has come in contact with the tank water before will so again wit the sterilizing solution. Of course, once done I'll rinse and rinse, dosing with chlorine neutralizer during the last rinse.

But I'm a bit thrown by how much bleach to use. From what I've seen, the recs are to do 10:1. If that means putting bleach into the existing water, that's about 1 gallon of bleach! Is it me, or does that seem excessive? The alternative is to make a gallon or so of solution (about 13 oz bleach, 115 water) and wash out the tank, leaving it wet for about 15 minutes, then rinse, and do the other parts (HOB filter, etc,) manually with the remaining solution.

I have some plants in the tank... mostly cuttings and discards from the display tank, though there's also a moss ball. My thought is better safe than sorry: toss them. The only one I'd sort of regret is the moss ball, since that was specifically purchased for the new tank. Safest to just toss?

The other issue is the PFS substrate. Best to toss it, or just mix things well so that the chlorine water penetrates?

I want to be careful here: I have to presume there was some sort of infectious agent here, so this sterilization isn't merely a precaution, it's to make the tank safe. Which of course means cycling the tank from scratch; I think it would be foolish for me to move the Biomax to my display tank to keep the colonies going.

Any tips? Thoughts?

 

If you're going to completely break down the tank, I would just empty everything and bleach it separately. Since you have to empty the tank anyway, I would think it would be easier that way and you could use way less bleach. I have heard of doing bleach baths on plants to sanitize and save them. I've never done it, but if you want to keep any of them it might be worth looking up. I would think that the PFS substrate can be heated to sanitize it using boiling water in a large pot or bucket. That would safer and easier than trying to rinse bleach out. This would also work on any rock or driftwood if you have any.

 

Hello Scott...

I never use chemicals to clean anything where my fish are concerned. You'll never get all the residue cleaned from the surfaces. I use standard aquarium salt, warm water and new sponges to clean everything. I use a couple of tablespoons of the salt in a gallon of warm tap water. Rinse all surfaces well after you scrub them.

Everything gets clean and you don't have to worry about toxic residue.

Old

 

Hello Scott...

I never use chemicals to clean anything where my fish are concerned. You'll never get all the residue cleaned from the surfaces. I use standard aquarium salt, warm water and new sponges to clean everything. I use a couple of tablespoons of the salt in a gallon of warm tap water. Rinse all surfaces well after you scrub them.

Everything gets clean and you don't have to worry about toxic residue.

Old

Bleach washes off relatively easily, so long as it's not a product with a detergent or the like in it. If there's a pathogen in the tank, aquarium salt won't do much of anything to sanitize it.

 

If you're going to completely break down the tank, I would just empty everything and bleach it separately. Since you have to empty the tank anyway, I would think it would be easier that way and you could use way less bleach. I have heard of doing bleach baths on plants to sanitize and save them. I've never done it, but if you want to keep any of them it might be worth looking up. I would think that the PFS substrate can be heated to sanitize it using boiling water in a large pot or bucket. That would safer and easier than trying to rinse bleach out. This would also work on any rock or driftwood if you have any.

I like the boiling water/PFS idea, though I might use an old pot and boil the sand for a while. Some pathogens can pretty heat hardy, and I'd have to use a LOT of boiling water to sanitize it, factoring in the quick cooldown because of the sand's thermal mass. Or I can put it on a sheet tray and stick it in the oven for a while.

 

Is this QT also a display tank? If not then for me it would be much better not to have sand, plants or decorations in it. That would make it much easier to clean and disinfect between occupants.

I wouldn't think there would be that much sand in a 10 gallon quarantine tank so if it were me I would toss and replace instead of going through trying to sanitize it and taking the chance on something bad still living in it. I would also toss the filter media and just replace it with seeded media that I would have had running in one of my main healthy tanks.

 

One of the first fish I'd used it for were a set of cory cats, so sand had made sense at the time. But I guess just throwing it out would be easiest.z

The plants I had tossed in there were from the display tank--ones I decided not to keep there because they weren't true aquatic, or pieces I took off while trimming. All but the moss ball which I'd bought to supplement the plants: they were in there to help buffer the ammonia/nitrites/nitrates; I did 50% changes 2x a week, but with a 10 gallon I figured that having an extra little bit to consume waste wouldn't hurt (it was temporarily holding more fish than I'd otherwise normally keep in a tank that size).

The tank's HOB is a QuietFlow; it doesn't really have swappable media. The only thing meant to be removable is the carbon/floss cartridge, with the BB medium being its " Bio-Holster," which is basically just a plastic surface that holds the carbon cartridge. I had my doubts about it, which is why I put in the Bio-Max--which was leftover from a AC30 in my display tank that I swapped out for a 50. But if I'm going to sterilize the Biomax bag, it's basically like starting from scratch since I don't actually have any extra seeded media from my display tank.

 

Hello again Scott...

As long as you've never used the piece for purposes other than for aquarium use, salt is all you need. Salt removes water from the cells of anything that may be living on the surface of a dirty tank or any other piece of aquarium equipment and kills it.

Vinegar is also an efficient means of cleaning, but I've always used aquarium salt.

Old

 

Hello again Scott...

As long as you've never used the piece for purposes other than for aquarium use, salt is all you need. Salt removes water from the cells of anything that may be living on the surface of a dirty tank or any other piece of aquarium equipment and kills it.

What if the pathogen is viral?

 

Virus will die out with no host to infect. If you're really concerned, you can safely bleach the tank. Either method you originally mentioned would work. If you're just going to dump it in the tank while running, I'd say a quart would get the job done.
Using that method, rinsing after the bleach will be a pain though.
No matter which route you take, I recommend losing the substrate.

 

Here's what I did:
emptied out the tank completely. The only things in it that didn't get trashed were the heater and the HOB filter.

Took it all to the basement, spritzed the inside of the tank with a 10:1 mix of water and bleach. Let it sit a minute while I disassembled the filter. Spritzed filter parts and heater. Rinsed inside of tank. Sprayed tank again. Rinsed filter & heater. Rinsed inside of tank. Wiped down tank inside with paper towels, rinsed again.

Put everything back together--the only things in the tank are the heater and filter (sans charcoal cartridge) and filled the tank and got it running. Added API Tap Water Conditioner 50% above standard dose. Will let it run for a day with the lid off, which should allow any residual chlorine to evaporate. Then I'll add Stabilize and get the tank cycled again.

I'm going to have to clip my display tank's water wisteria again soon, so I guess I can add that to the QT to help speed the BB a bit. I don't really have other stable media I can add.