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General Maintenance |
Cleaning a fish tank involves elbow grease. In fact, maintaining a fish tank is not for the lazy at heart. Concern must be shown at every step and every level. Your fishes' lives depend on your attention to detail.
Vacuuming
Vacuuming is one of the most important parts of maintaining your tank. You must prevent the buildup of mulm in the gravel. Mulm is a combination of fish wastes, plant fragments and uneaten food that decay at the bottom of your tank. It is very important to clean this up because it creates nitrites and nitrates, neither of which your fish need. It also clogs up the filters and builds up on the gravel.
Vacuuming is important even if you have an underground filter because you don't want the mulm getting caught in that gravel and preventing a flow of water through the filter.
Check the Filter
Remember to check the filter medium. The top-level matt gets dirty quickly and easily, as this is the stage that collects the largest pieces of debris. If there is a buildup in your box or power filter here, it will reduce the flow of water through the filter and reduce the filter's effectiveness.
Rinse the matt off at least quarterly. Maybe you'll want to replace it at the half-year mark and then again at the year mark. Replacing it is not always necessary. There are certain bacteria that build up in your filter that are beneficial to the filtering process. A good rinse is satisfactory.
Scrape Algae
Another important thing to do is algae scraping. An alga is the soft brown/green moss that develops all over your tank. It develops faster in some tanks than in others, depending on your tank's proximity to real sunlight. Algae scrapers are either sponges attached to long stick or are a pair of magnetized scrapers that will help you to clean the inside of the aquarium walls so that you can see better inside. It is important to stop too much algae growth. At lower levels, algae perform the same beneficial tasks that all plants do. However, algae can overrun your tank.
Never use soap to clean anything in your tank. Water and elbow grease are always the best weapons against dirt and algae.
Test the Water
In the beginning, water testing is very important. For the first two months, check the water every two weeks.
After that, there will be sufficient bacteria buildup for you to have what is known as a mature tank. After this takes place, you can reduce your testing to once a month.
Vacuuming
Vacuuming is one of the most important parts of maintaining your tank. You must prevent the buildup of mulm in the gravel. Mulm is a combination of fish wastes, plant fragments and uneaten food that decay at the bottom of your tank. It is very important to clean this up because it creates nitrites and nitrates, neither of which your fish need. It also clogs up the filters and builds up on the gravel.
Vacuuming is important even if you have an underground filter because you don't want the mulm getting caught in that gravel and preventing a flow of water through the filter.
Check the Filter
Remember to check the filter medium. The top-level matt gets dirty quickly and easily, as this is the stage that collects the largest pieces of debris. If there is a buildup in your box or power filter here, it will reduce the flow of water through the filter and reduce the filter's effectiveness.
Rinse the matt off at least quarterly. Maybe you'll want to replace it at the half-year mark and then again at the year mark. Replacing it is not always necessary. There are certain bacteria that build up in your filter that are beneficial to the filtering process. A good rinse is satisfactory.
Scrape Algae
Another important thing to do is algae scraping. An alga is the soft brown/green moss that develops all over your tank. It develops faster in some tanks than in others, depending on your tank's proximity to real sunlight. Algae scrapers are either sponges attached to long stick or are a pair of magnetized scrapers that will help you to clean the inside of the aquarium walls so that you can see better inside. It is important to stop too much algae growth. At lower levels, algae perform the same beneficial tasks that all plants do. However, algae can overrun your tank.
Never use soap to clean anything in your tank. Water and elbow grease are always the best weapons against dirt and algae.
Test the Water
In the beginning, water testing is very important. For the first two months, check the water every two weeks.
After that, there will be sufficient bacteria buildup for you to have what is known as a mature tank. After this takes place, you can reduce your testing to once a month.
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