What should i do with my tank?

Question

i am at college, i have a five gallon tank with one beta in it, winter break is coming up and i am trying to figure out what is the best thing to do with the tank, i am going to take the fish back in a bowl, but it is too inconvienient to take the tank back with everything, i dont want to kill off all of the good bacteria in the tank, and i dont want it to get filthy, i will be gone for three weeks, should i just let the tank sit ful with water, empty the water out partially, or what? the power is shut off to the rooms, so i cant keep the filter or the bio wheel running.

Answer 1

Without a fish contributing to the food source your pro-bacteria need, the tank will crash within a couple days after the fish leaves. Also, your fish won't have a cycled tank to be put into upon arriving wherever you are going on school break (unless you take water, gravel, filter, etc. with you or your "parents" (if that's where you're going) have a tank containing fish you can borrow from). If the travel between school and home is less than a day away, just pack the dirty filter & media, a bunch of gravel and take it with you so you can use in the vacation tank (make sure you fill with conditioned water, make sure water is warm and acclimate your fish to the new water/warm water); when you return to school, bring the dirty filter & media, gravel back with you and put it back into the tank, do a cleaning and water change (not 100%), make sure the water is warm enough, acclimate the fish to the tank and viola. Or you can leave the tank as it is but when you come back, do a cleaning/water change, but since all the pro-bacteria will have died without a fish in the tank, you'll have to cycle the tank when you come back to school--either get some Bio-Spira (instant cycling) which will probably cost about $10 or constantly test the tank and do daily (sometimes 2X daily depending on the test results) water changes to keep the nitrite and ammonia levels as low as possible so you fish doesn't die.

Answer 2

A great plant tank is far more problematic to preserve. I consistently desired one. Cichlid tanks aren't essentially the most complicated degree of freshwater aquariums. Cichlids are for novices. You might have got to be beautiful dumb to kill one off. All you have got to do is feed them and maintain the water blank. There are a lot more problematic fish to maintain alive, freshwater puffers, discus, black ghosts and elephant noses, the record is going on and on. Try preserving an African Tigerfish that's as dumb as a bag of hammers and runs into the tank at complete pace whilst scared. He additionally appreciated to leap so prime out of the tank, he just about hit the ceiling. Thank Jesus for carpet, friend. He rate $a hundred and sixty and died in two months, anyhow. That's o.ok., I might have ultimately needed to get a swimming pool for that damned factor.

Answer 3

Does your 5gal have a fluorescent light on it? If so, you could get some live plants and some snails and a few cherry red shrimp. They would have enough food from the plants (algae) and would produce enough ammonia to keep the bacterial population alive. Put a timer on the light to keep the plants alive, a 5$ timer would be just fine.

Otherwise, just empty it and re-cycle when you get back. Order some bio-spira or something and you can instantly re-cycle.

Answer 4

three weeks is alot but i wouldnt worry one things so little as that. just empty out and dry the tank cus when u clean it comming back from three weeks it wont be so great to clean. On your trip bring a thermomiter u wanna make sure ur betta has a warm but not to warm water heat :D

Answer 5

Too bad for the bacteria, I would just empty and clean it, then fill back up and filter when you get back.