# Water Changes for a Large tank



## firsttenor (Jul 7, 2010)

Hey there, I have a long water changing device that attaches dirrectly to my kitchen sink. 

I have a six foot by two foot tank. 

Cleaning the gravel is such a pain! It's so much easier to do dirrect water changes with the device. 

I am wondering if it is okay to do a 50 percent water change everyweek without cleaning the gravel. (if I do have to clean it how often?)

I am asking everyone with larger tank for their opinions on what is best.


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## firsttenor (Jul 7, 2010)

Also, is flake food better or frozen food?


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## Illbuyourcatfish (Jun 3, 2010)

I do 50% water changes on my 6x2 every 3 days and only vacuum as needed. I also use a python that attaches to my sink but instead of gravel I have a light layer of sand. With sand a lot of the detritus will just sit on top and eventually get blown into a filter by the current so vacuuming is almost never needed. If your tank is heavily stocked, you have a heavy feeding schedule and you notice an abundance of uneaten food I would vacuum at least once a week. If you have less fish and don't overfeed you could easily get away with vacuuming every 2-3 weeks, but I would keep an eye on nitrate levels to make sure they aren't getting too high.


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## rescuepenguin (Apr 21, 2010)

Question 1) I strongly recommend vacuuming the gravel. Every time I have had a tank crash, very dirty gravel was a factor. I now vacuum my tanks every water change.

Question 2 ) What kind of fish do you have? You should be feeding them on a rotating diet of a variety of foods. What would your reaction be if you were feed the same food every day, and it was selected by someone else, I plan the diet of my fish the same way I do my family.

Steve


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## Elle (Oct 25, 2010)

I have a 5' long tank with gravel and fancy goldfish (aka crap machines) and a canister filter. I clean about 60% of the gravel weekly or every other week if I'm lazy, changing 50% of the water each time.

For the cichlid tank, I vacuum at least every other day right now and change at least 50% of the water every 3 days. They're in a temp tank that is smaller than I like until their 6x2 tank is up and running.

I don't use a python to drain the tank because I am paranoid about the gravel getting into the sink, and also because it wastes water to drain it. Instead, I drain the water into large buckets and use them to water the garden, then fill the tank again using the python. Plants LOVE fish water (fertilizer!), and I find filling the tank is WAY faster.

Without knowing what kind of flake food/frozen food you're talking about and what kind of fish you have, I can't answer the second question, but high quality and variety are the key to healthy fish. I feed flake, frozen and fresh veggies to all my fish on a rotating basis.


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## firsttenor (Jul 7, 2010)

rescuepenguin said:


> Question 1) I strongly recommend vacuuming the gravel. Every time I have had a tank crash, very dirty gravel was a factor. I now vacuum my tanks every water change.
> 
> Question 2 ) What kind of fish do you have? You should be feeding them on a rotating diet of a variety of foods. What would your reaction be if you were feed the same food every day, and it was selected by someone else, I plan the diet of my fish the same way I do my family.
> 
> Steve


I have angel fish, cardinals, musk turtles, clown loaches, and various bottom feeders. 
Thanks for the repply


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## firsttenor (Jul 7, 2010)

rescuepenguin said:


> Question 1) I strongly recommend vacuuming the gravel. Every time I have had a tank crash, very dirty gravel was a factor. I now vacuum my tanks every water change.
> 
> Question 2 ) What kind of fish do you have? You should be feeding them on a rotating diet of a variety of foods. What would your reaction be if you were feed the same food every day, and it was selected by someone else, I plan the diet of my fish the same way I do my family.
> 
> Steve


can you recommend a good brand of fish food?


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## joker1535 (May 23, 2010)

Marina got a nice vacuum cleaner on batteries. It sucks up the waste in a little bag. No need to take water out the tank for this. I use it to vacuum the sand every day. 50% a week for a wc (in my opinion) is enough. That way you don't scare the fish every 3 days. Unless your tank is ridiculously overstocked. 

As for food, most food is good. Variety of foods is the key!


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## Rastapus (Apr 21, 2010)

We recommend never exceeding 50% water change. Agreed once a week is great unless overcrowded. If it is weekly, likely you can gravel clean each week, just don't wash your filter in tap water.


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## Luke78 (Apr 24, 2010)

Food wise for the fish you mentioned, i would try the NLS line (New Life International), Omega One, or Ocean Nutrition as a few others.Live food is good such as brine shrimp or blackworms,bloodworms(not often very little nutrition),daphnia,krill,foods based with spirulina.As mentioned earliar, varied diet is best.



firsttenor said:


> can you recommend a good brand of fish food?


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## firsttenor (Jul 7, 2010)

I've been feeding my fish bloodworms and krill, mostly just the big fish eat krill. I was told by the petstore that 100% bloodworm diet was best....

Wow I didn't know they had bad nutrient value... probably why they said not to feed bloodworms to the turtles.



Luke78 said:


> Food wise for the fish you mentioned, i would try the NLS line (New Life International), Omega One, or Ocean Nutrition as a few others.Live food is good such as brine shrimp or blackworms,bloodworms(not often very little nutrition),daphnia,krill,foods based with spirulina.As mentioned earliar, varied diet is best.


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## Rastapus (Apr 21, 2010)

I have never heard that blood worms have a low nutritional value. I would think any worm would be a nutritious food, for fish anyways. Brine shrimp however I agree, not much there unless it is gut loaded with Spirulina for example.


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## firsttenor (Jul 7, 2010)

are they okay as a staple?
Or are they more of a treat?


Rastapus said:


> I have never heard that blood worms have a low nutritional value. I would think any worm would be a nutritious food, for fish anyways. Brine shrimp however I agree, not much there unless it is gut loaded with Spirulina for example.


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## Illbuyourcatfish (Jun 3, 2010)

People claim that bloodworms are low in nutrients because they read the values on the packaging. The frozen bloodworm cubes have a high water content that de-values the nutrition of the worms. I believe it's been shown that the worms themselves are quite nutritional.


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## katienaha (May 9, 2010)

i also find that when i have not vacuumed for a long time, despite regular water changes, i get algae blooms.


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## mcrocker (May 29, 2010)

I have a venturi valve water change thing (maybe a Python), and I find that my drain rate is not that fast for a large tank when using the valve, so I only use it for filling.(minus the venturi piece itself)

I have a drain outside a patio door right near my biggest tank, so I put a bucket beside the drain, and syphon water directly from the tank into the bucket. I just keep syphoning into the bucket, letting the water flow over the top, while the junk settles to the bottom. Anything that does flow over the top of the bucket I assume is small/light enough that it will not clog my drain (it will suspend itself in water, so should wash through the drain) and I'm left with a bucket full of waste.

I have sand as my substrate and I've found that it's hard to separate the poop from the sand with a gravel vacuum end piece, so I just have the hose going onto a 4' piece of straight pvc which I can put in from the top without getting my arm wet, and suck from any area of the tank. I don't worry much about sucking up sand, since it settles to the bottom of the bucket. I just suck up any obvious waste picking up any surrounding sand that comes along with it. Once I've done a few water changes and have a quarter full bucket of sand, I rinse it and put it back into the tank.(you could do this each time you do a water change, I'm lazy sometimes) Then I hook my hose up to the tap and fill 'er up.

I suspect you could do the same thing with gravel, using a bucket to separate the waste.


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## EdmondsAquarium (Sep 1, 2010)

mcrocker said:


> ...... Then I hook my hose up to the tap and fill 'er up.
> 
> I suspect you could do the same thing with gravel, using a bucket to separate the waste.


Just wondering how you heat the water up so quickly....I normally heat the new water to the same temperature before add


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## Illbuyourcatfish (Jun 3, 2010)

EdmondsAquarium said:


> Just wondering how you heat the water up so quickly....I normally heat the new water to the same temperature before add


I'll take a digital thermometer that has a cord and suction cup and stick the cup into the end of my python. Then I can adjust the temperature on the go as the tank fills and I do other stuff. You an match the temp almost to .5 of a degree. But on a 180 gallon tank it doesn't really matter if the last ten gallons come in 20 degrees cooler as the other 160 gallons will balance it out pretty quick.


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## Shell Dweller (Jul 11, 2010)

I have 11 tanks ranging from 33gal to 160 gal. I use a python attatched to the sink and do a 20 -30 % w/c weekly. I clean the gravel weekly especially in my 120 gal which has around 25 to 30 large cichlids, a pleco, and a bichir. I find in my tank the poop ends up in two sections for the most part and I start cleaning those areas first. I refill using the python adjusting the temp before refilling to match the aquarium temp. I have gravel in most of my tanks and the python doesnt lift it out into the sink. It falls back into the tank as I clean the tank. I do have sand in one 33 gal and it also doesnt get lifted out into the sink, although I usually just skim the surface in that tank for the most part. 

I feed flake, bloodworms, pellets, and my homemade beef heart mixture. Also lettuce leafs and Zuchinni. The smaller community fish all get NLS for the most part. I really do think cleaning the gravel is very important at least once a week. Personally I dont think I could let it go for longer than a week without cleaning the gravel.


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## firsttenor (Jul 7, 2010)

I found this works best, thankyou 


Illbuyourcatfish said:


> I'll take a digital thermometer that has a cord and suction cup and stick the cup into the end of my python. Then I can adjust the temperature on the go as the tank fills and I do other stuff. You an match the temp almost to .5 of a degree. But on a 180 gallon tank it doesn't really matter if the last ten gallons come in 20 degrees cooler as the other 160 gallons will balance it out pretty quick.


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## gklaw (May 31, 2010)

I almost never vacuum my gravel in my planted tanks and never had algae boom. Occasionally if the surface look dirty, I likely vacuum the top for stuff sitting on the gravel surface.

I never kept fish only with gravel. With by discus bare bottom, I vacuum the waste every few days.

That's just me, the lazy hobbyist


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