[Plants That Don't Do Well Together]

On 10/13/2021 at 8:33 PM, OnlyGenusCaps said:

Now, in an aquarium setting, where there is often significantly less water available and less is exchanged, as @MJV Aquatics would point out, there is the potential for various, what are referred to as, secondary metabolites to build up to levels not seen in habitat.

Yes, the average aquarium has less 'fresh' water than we most often see in nature. But it would be a stretch to blame allelopathy for any plant failure. New plants often 'melt' back due to how they're grown for sale. Often plants just don't get the nutrients they require for optimum growth. And then there's lighting. I quite like fast growing floating plants to aid in water quality as they more quickly convert nutrients (aka pollution) into plant tissue, eventually trimmed and removed. But of course these shade rooted plants already at a disadvantage due to tank depth. So if allelopathy is a factor in plant growth, it could be the least of several other issues. But if/when in doubt, up the anti on partial water changes in frequency and/or volume as generally speaking, 'there's no such thing as too much clean, fresh water' 🙂

[Using power heads to pump water up]

Yes, you want a submersible pump - they are rated as to GPH and head height. Even relatively inexpensive pumps will typically pump up to six feet.

[How have you made fishkeeping easier on yourself?]

- Switching from gravel to 3-4" of sand substrate that is never disturbed. No gravel vacuuming for me! Organics don't get down under to decompose and Malaysian Trumpet Snails manage things. The undisturbed substrate fosters an environment for advanced bio-filtration.

- Stay on top of routine periodic partial water changes! Lots of loose talk on the interweb about reducing partial water changes. However, with rare exception, as it is in nature, "There's no such thing as too much clean, fresh water".

- Using an inexpensive submersible pump connected to Python like hose for partial water changes. Water goes down the drain or out to the yard. The same hose with quick disconnects is used for refill either from a sink adapter or pumped from a 45g Brute trash can of preheated water (basement tanks).

- Filters - All of my filters are completely filled with sponge material. Sponge is often thought of only for mechanical filtration, HOWEVER, sponge material is also an EXCELLENT platform for biological filtration (I feel better than ceramics, plastics, or rocks!).

- Only clean filter sponges when flow rate noticeably slows down to a trickle. Much like the value of the undisturbed substrate, the beneficial biology develops and grows in the filter sponges. Excessive cleaning disrupts their progress so it's best to leave it alone until absolutely necessary!

- Feed only high quality foods augmented with live and frozen foods. High quality foods result in less waste and less waste means higher quality water.

-Plants, plants, plants. Plants, especially fast growing floating plants are ammonia sponges as they grow and convert nutrients (aka pollution) into plant tissue that's eventually trimmed/removed.

🙂

 

[Water change with powerhead?]

On 9/20/2021 at 10:16 AM, Atitagain said:

@ARMYVET @MJV Aquatics when doing gravel vac does this ever clog the pumps? Do you have to clean after each use to prevent this? 
I would imagine the powerhead would have a problem  with this, it seems to be a much smaller motor and probably just designed to move water not waste?

I use a sand (either pool filter or play sand) as the substrate that I never disturb...ever. Nothing gets down under with sand so partial water changes are merely that - no hassle with gravel vacuuming!

Note: The sand is managed by Cory catfish and an army of Malaysian Trumpet Snails. Down under the bacteria and microbes live undisturbed.

[Water change with powerhead?]

I use an inexpensive EcoPlus 396 submersible pump (from Amazon). It has a 6 foot pump height or so. Now I'm on a private well and septic system so my waste water often goes out the drain for the basement tanks, although I can run the hose out to the lawn for the 60g display tank in the living room.

[Do aquarium co op sponge filters suck fry?]

With excessive air flow or darting to avoid parents, fry could be drawn into a coarse sponge filter. Then again they could be hiding under it or, as mentioned, been a tasty snack for a hungry parent. After all, little fish are just food for bigger fish. Always a good idea to rescue fry and grow out until too large to be food.

[Do I dare replace my substrate?]

I'd say that you're stuck unless you totally tear it down to start over.

[Thank you youtube for a great idea!]

It's an interesting idea for a bare bottom tank... but I tend to prefer 2-3 inches of sand for a bio-rich substrate.

[Need help cutting cost of fish room]

On 8/21/2021 at 11:01 PM, CT_ said:

I think most heated fish rooms are for the latter reason than the former.  Thermodynmaics says it takes more energy to heat the whole room. 

If we assume the room is already 'room temperature' it would take very little to raise the temperature 4 degrees or so.

[Need help cutting cost of fish room]

On 8/21/2021 at 5:26 PM, CT_ said:

Unless you're using a heat pump to heat the room I don't understand this.  There's lots of good reasons to heat the whole room but money isn't one of them.  In the end you're just heating more mass than just the water (though it may not be much more since water is probably a large chunk of the heat capacity of the room). 

I disagree. It seems to me that if a fishroom is already at room temperature, increasing the temperature slightly makes more sense than having 100w-300w heaters in every tank. It also eliminates the potential of any heater failures that may kill fish. I don't have energy data but I know that many dedicated fishrooms heat the room rather than individual tanks... Each to his/her own.

[Need help cutting cost of fish room]

KUDOS on taking in the grandkids! ... I hope the circumstances weren't/aren't too disheartening.

You might breed fish to help pay for food, but unless the scale is large, it's not really NOT a money maker to offset other costs. Selling fish to a LFS is about 1/3 retail price so the average tropical fish yields about $1/each. Gotta sell a lot of fish to make any real money! I can't speak to selling plants, but again, in general, you need to sell a lot to make a little!

A fish breeder won the lottery and when asked what he will do with the win fall he said "I guess I'll just keep breeding fish until it's all gone."

Energy and food would seem to be the biggest cost savings...

- As others have suggested heating the fishroom might be better than individual tanks. However, if you're already at room temperature, you may need little or no additional heat at all? I took a different approach in my unheated basement by insulating tanks with styrofoam. For a 110g stock tank I used a double wrap of old carpet padding to make a koosie.

- Although a I'm 'a fan' of deep sand and fast growing plants for improved water quality, you might push out partial water changes a little, I wouldn't try to skimp too much on partial water changes. Don't over clean filters as powerful bio-filtration is a fishkeepers best friend. I use coarse sponge material exclusively in all my filters and let them continue to run until flow is noticeably reduced as this provides the very best bio-filtration and crystal clear water.

- FOOD: As previously mentioned, buying fish food in bulk can save $ over time. Store in the freezer for longer, fresher use life. High quality commercial fish food can be expensive. You might culture /collect some live foods to help offset the cost while providing even greater nutrition and diversity for your fish. Micro worms, white worms, daphnia, scuds, and collecting mosquito larvae in season may be options. I have a lot of articles on my blog about culturing live foods.

I hope everything works out for you and if scaling back makes the most sense, gotta do what you gotta do, 🙂

[Male guppy after losing a mate]

We don't think of fish as monogamous but then I've seen a lot of amazing videos of fish and animals that have far more compassion than we often credit them for. I was driving home one night and on the side of the road I saw a young racoon that had been killed most likely by a car. It looked like a sibling was frantically trying to get his/her brother/sister to get up and go...sadly to no avail. It was a real heart breaker. 'Critters' have feelings too.

I don't really have any advice other than to just let it play out in time.

[Pool-Owner Client Wants Fish Pool]

Pools can be turned into ponds but it takes a commitment especially depending on location. For example if it's in an area where real winter comes, will the pool support life or will fish need to be re-homed? Then again, this almost sounds like a homeowner that's let his yard turn into a field and wonders if he could get sheep or goats to mow the lawn! ... I appreciate your skepticism.

[Best in tank live food]

You really need to culture and/or collect live foods as live foods are really not sustainable in the aquarium as fish will eat them as quickly as they appear. I have many articles on my blog about live foods. I especially like white worms, daphnia, and collecting mosquito larvae in season.

[When to do a water change?]

On 8/19/2021 at 3:46 PM, Nik_n said:

But it really comes down to plants. The more plants you have the more "filters" have. Plants act as filters in the wild. That is way ecosystem and non filter tank works. 

But if we're comparing tanks to nature we'd have to acknowledge that in nature, fresh water is constantly renewed by rain and snow melt. Creeks, streams, and rivers flow endlessly. I read that the volume of water exiting the amazon river is so great that fresh water can be collected 12 miles out at sea. Ever go to Niagara Falls and marvel at the millions of gallons flowing between the Great Lakes?

So nature does water changes 24/7 in a flow through system! Now of course there are exceptions, but the water quality is typically much lower in those exceptions.

[When to do a water change?]

On 8/19/2021 at 2:05 PM, Zenzo said:

I think the difference with Charles, is that their system at Goliad is so large, with giant plants and trees growing up to the ceiling of their greenhouses, that water changes may not be nearly as necessary as the common hobbyist keeping fish in systems a fraction of the size. 

Of course, but one could make the case that the principal could be scaled down to the home aquarium in that with enough fast growing plants that convert nutrients (aka pollution) into plant tissue, partial water changes, be it frequency and/or volume, could be far less than a similar tank with only plastic decor (Assuming good aeration/filtration and appropriate bio-load for balance).

On the other hand, there's rarely, if ever, been a case that I've heard of where too much fresh, clean water caused a problem.

[When to do a water change?]

On 8/18/2021 at 8:58 PM, Hobbit said:

@MJV Aquatics I was thinking of you the other day when I watched one of @Zenzo’s recent videos about how he gets his fish to grow so big. One of his answers was lots of water changes. 👍

There are different schools of thought... Greg Sage of Select Aquatics, my friend and collaborator (I have many of his articles on my blog) swears by super fresh water to grow out larger fish quicker. Auto water changing and large capacity tanks w/sumps. On the other hand, Charles Clapsaddle of Goliad farms has vats in his greenhouses on a closed system, lots of plants, and doesn't do water changes. His vats has several inches of mulm that he's convinced is beneficial, full of beneficial bacteria and paramecium.

I think both methods clearly can work as it does for them as long as the water quality remains high. For the average hobbyist, I think there's no such thing as too much fresh, clean water...but there also needs to be sufficient aeration/filtration to leverage beneficial micro-organisms.

[Plop and Drop?]

+3 - three degrees is relatively insignificant...and always important to minimize water transfer between tanks.

[When to do a water change?]

On 7/24/2021 at 1:37 PM, HH Morant said:

I think over-filtration is good. A clean filter is not good.

Over filtration is measured primarily by the effective surface area of your filter media. So a large-capacity filter filled with good media is great.

I tend to agree. Ideally it would be nice to remove organic waste before it can decompose and pollute the aquarium water. But this is practically impossible unless you cleaned the filter media daily...and this would be counter-productive from a bio-filtration perspective. A better approach is to minimize organic waste inputs by feeding less and removing plant waste.

I'd also like to restate or clarify a previous statement. When I posted that tank generated nitrates are perhaps worse than nitrates from source water, I did not mean that the nitrates themselves were really any different. Merely that tank generated nitrates are also in combination with other pollutants resulting form decomposition that don't necessarily make the trip in source water 'contaminated' by agricultural run off of chemical ferts.

Edit: I would tend to disagree about over filtration, or rather the conventional thinking about over filtration. To many hobbyists, over filtration is additional or more powerful filters up to 10x flow relative to tank volume. Over filtration in terms of increased filtration surface area is another matter although overkill can be pointless.

[When to do a water change?]

On 7/24/2021 at 10:26 AM, KentFishFanUK said:

I think I am going to have to play devils advocate here as I'm not sure I entirely agree with all your points. With all due respect of course, you are far more experienced than myself! 

First you mention about water in the wild being constantly renewed. Aren't some bodies of water simply topped up but otherwise not really flowing as such? Besides, in many environments these rain water etc 'renewals' actually hugely increase water turbidity and presumably mean a lower water quality in some respects, temporarily at least. I would also guess that these renewals actually excite fish with the prospect of more food arriving with it and that is possibly why we see increased activity etc. 

Secondly what even is 'fresh' water? Most of us will be using municipal water which we simply don't know the exact chemical make up of. My tap water, for example, comes out around 40-50 ppm of nitrates (50 being the legal UK limit apparently) yet my planted tank always reads around 20-30 ppm so in that regard is actually cleaner. I get that that's only one of the half dozen or so parameters we test for the bazillion others we don't test but still I'm sure the same could possibly be said for heavy metals or bacteria and who knows what else too. I know we could use RO water and add in the minerals etc we need but even then do we really know nothing beneficial at all is missing? Or nothing harmful has made its way in? Kind of leads to my next point - 

You say there's no such thing as too much fresh water, too many water changes etc but couldn't it be argued that sometimes a build up of 'stuff' could help fish build strength or higher tolerances to such fluctuations in parameters? Or when breeding help the gene pool stay 'hardier?' As per natural selection and all that. I mean humans like oxygen and dislike virus' and pollutants but I'm pretty sure I can be confident in saying raising human babies in a bubble only ever breathing purified air would not be conducive to building the individuals immune system or the populations hardiness. 

My last thought which might be less relevant (or more stupid but I'm enjoying my uneducated musings on the subject so bare with me) - many of our traditional food preservation methods boil down to allowing a strong colony of harmless bacteria to thrive on the food and as such out compete harmful bacteria so as to keep the food safe for us to eat. In a thriving and balanced ecosystem this could potentially be playing a role in a similar way (similar to a balanced tank having less algae issues) but by messing with it could lead to an imbalance allowing a harmful bacteria to multiply and threaten a fish with sickness of some sort. 

I think your method is surely the 'safe bet' answer, as with so many variables to consider it is impossible to factor everything in to come to the perfect conclusion, and it is the tried and tested method and general wisdom/consensus answer to the question after all. However I don't think it is nearly as black and white as you imply. 

 

Does their happen to be any freshwater biologists or hydrologists or microbiologists around to explain why everything I just typed is nonsense? 😅

 

1 - Yes, there are some bodies of water not fed by streams or rivers (but not the case for most wild tropical fish). Many of these are spring fed and there are sky ponds that collect rain water, most of which have overflows.  Most stagnant pools of water are often foul and the quality of those waters is probably less than waters that are constantly refreshed, Many contain little or no aquatic life.... And 'muddy' water, although not clear, is just not the same as polluted water. During the rainy season, many bodies of water overflow creating ponds in ditches. Sadly the life trapped there survives only as long as the water does.

2- More and more we see high nitrates in source drinking water, especially in agricultural areas with farmland runoff where animal waste and/or high nitrogen fertilizers are used. I've written volumes about the nitrates in my well water. I tend to believe (but of course can't prove) that nitrates in source water is not as harmful as tank generated nitrates. Perhaps because tank generated nitrates also contain many other pollutants we simply can't measure.

3. The fact is that a partial water change does not remove all bacteria, merely reduces the pollution by dilution. Fish food and fish/plant waste build up in the glass cage and plants and bacteria can only do so much to purify and filters merely trap detritus where it continues to decompose and pollute the water - oh the water looks cleaner, but it is not more pure. The only way to really maintain a somewhat stable water chemistry in an aquarium is with routine partial water changes to dilute the pollution and replenish valuable necessary minerals.

I will admit that I am still learning but I base the above on over 50 years in the hobby with some lessons learned the hard way. 🙂

[When to do a water change?]

The sad truth is that fish can live, or rather survive, in poor quality water. This seems to give some hobbyists a 'license' to skimp on routine partial water changes. In nature fresh water is constantly renewed by rains and snow melt. Just look at all the creeks, streams, and rivers etc. that flow endlessly on the way to the ocean...And yes, there are some exceptions but I would suggest that the water quality is lower in those exceptions. Having an aquarium with infrequent partial water changes is like a small animal cage that rarely if ever gets cleaned - 'stuff' builds up.

A well established tank with lots of plants can go longer and/or have a lower volume partial water changes...but (being redundant here) generally speaking, there's no such thing as too much fresh water.

Too many times on forums like this we see hobbyists brag about rarely or never doing partial water changes. They claim that their fish are fine...and even breed. Some say their fish live an average life span of 2-3 years...when the average life span of tropical fish is 10-15 years. Then there's the hobbyist that can't figure out why his old fish 'are just fine' but any newly added fish die in a day or two. S/he blames the fish store for poor quality fish rather than the poor quality of the water in his/her aquarium.

So up to a point, aquatic life can survive in poor quality water, but it rarely thrives there. Fresh water is always better than polluted water. :-)

[The myths and legends of anaerobic bacteria]

On 6/17/2021 at 9:30 PM, gardenman said:

The Amazon has a rainy season and a dry season. There's not always fresh water flowing in. From the end of February through July is the rainy season. Then there's lots of fresh water flowing in. After that, not so much. Is there some? Yes. But not a substantial amount during the dry season. The water level rises quite a bit during the rainy season then recedes a lot during the dry season. 

Yes, but as far as I know, a substantial amount of fresh water flows constantly 24/7, year round so there is always fresh water flowing. 🙂

Ever been to Niagara Falls and marveled at the volume of [fresh] water that flows between the great lakes?

Nature constantly recycles and replaces/refreshes fresh water.

Edit: As a matter of fact, imitating nature, the best aquarium setup would be a flow through system where fresh water constantly replaces used tank water at some appropriate rate. This is often done in large breeding facilities or sometimes automated daily partial water changes. Unfortunately, short of a dedicated fishroom, this is just not practical for the home aquarium so we do routine partial water changes of a sufficient volume to maintain an acceptable water chemistry. I tend to do 50%+ weekly, but on heavily stocked grow out tanks, I often do 50% twice a week.  Although methods to lower, or eliminate nitrates are not without merit, nothing beats replacing polluted water with fresh, clean water. You've likely heard that "there's no such thing as too much filtration". Well that's a hobby myth, but in general, there's no such thing as too much clean, fresh water.

[The myths and legends of anaerobic bacteria]

On 3/31/2021 at 9:00 AM, gardenman said:

Even the heaviest of rainfall is less than a fifty percent water change we often carry out in our tanks. Doubling the volume of the Amazon would take a heck of a lot of rain.

The water change of the Amazon river is not the result of a single rain storm over water but a constant never ending flow of fresh water.

[The myths and legends of anaerobic bacteria]

On 3/30/2021 at 8:13 PM, anewbie said:

just that under certain circumstances the nitrate will stay very low despite high fish load - most likely due to bacteria eating the nitrate. Also while there are benefits to water changes it is a mistake to suggest that water changes somehow imitates nature  - this is simply not the case.

It is only anoxic or anaerobic bacteria that can convert nitrates into nitrogen gas and these conditions are difficult to achieve and maintain in the highly oxygenated fresh water aquarium. I've tried for a very long time with deep sand, Seachem Matrix/De*Nitrate filters with low flow, and Dr. Kevin Novak's Anoxic Biocenosis Clarification Baskets and just never see significant nitrate reduction. The very best approach seems to be with fast growing floating plants and routine partial water changes. 🙂

Routine periodic partial water changes, like rain and/or snow melt do imitate nature as polluted water is replaced by fresh, clean water. In the very best system, fresh water would be constantly added as used water drains away.

[Sealant for concrete/brick pond]

I might also be temped to use Flex Seal, but the prep work for any fluid sealer to ensure good adhesion is gonna be a bear.