What is the best way to do a complete water change?

Question

A complete water change?? Do we wash the gravel, or get a new filter?? Please answer with EXTRA detail please. We have a ten gallon tank(Fresh water) and about 10 fish. 3 danios, 2 alge eaters, 3 neon tetras, 3 frogs, a cory catfish, and 2 orange tetras.

Answer 1

Dart, you don't do a complete water change. The only time you'd do that is if you have no population at all, like if everyone died or whatever, but you don't do 100% changes unless you like to push your fish towards an early death.

For better answers and superior service go to fishless cycling.com or just use the link on my profile.

JV

Answer 2

The only reason you would need to do a complete water change is if you have had some kind of bad parasite "invasion", that you have tried everything to get rid of. In that case you might want to pour boiling water into the tank. You never want to do a complete water change unless the lives of your fish absolutely depend on it.
for normal every-week cleanings i recommend that you buy a siphon, the larger the intake the better. With a ten gallon with your load i recommend that you replace three gallons a week. If you have simply gravel in your tank take the nose of the siphon and run it through the gravel. This will pick up organic debris and parasites, and will help you to keep your fish healthy. Don't worry it won't suck up your gravel!
Filter companies tell you to put a new filter in every two weeks or so...once every month is good! just remove the dirty filter and in TANK WATER (if you use tap water the chlorine will kill the bacteria on the filter) gently squeeze and rub the insert to get rid of extra organic debris. The bacteria in these filters is what makes them work. When you entirely replace the filter you start out with a filter that has no bacteria. When it is time to replace the filter you need to run the old filter next to the new filter for about a week, this allows the beneficial bacteria to "jump". Make sure that one of the filters does not have carbon in it (when you do the jumping process) because too much carbon can mess up your tank chemistry.
About two years ago an acquaintance friend of mine had an outbreak of ick that we tried to kill for two weeks . the day that her last fish died she told me that she wanted to re-start the tank.
In an instance like this you need to siphon all of the water out using the gravel cleaning method,remove the filter and throw away the cartridge, and pour in very hot, was boiling ten seconds ago water. Add salt to the water, take apart your filter (is easily done on most filters) and let it sit in hot water that has parasite killer in it*. Any things that were in the tank like rocks or unpainted decoration should be left in the tank for the heat bath. Throw away all airline tubing. We also soaked all nets and the siphon itself in anti-parasite.
don't throw all that water away! use it to water garden plants(unless it is chocked full of chemicals)--they love the nitrate water!
*when trying to disinfect the filter do not put it in boiling water and do not try to use it until it is completely at room temperature, Things that are hot expand, and you may ruin your filter.

Answer 3

Hi, First of all you never want to do a complete water change, unless your tank has been poisoned by something and the fish are died. Doing a complete water change will stress out your fish and maybe even kill them. So what you need to do is buy a gravel vacuum from Wal Mart. Put the larger end into the gravel and let the fast moving water clean the gravel for you. Move the gravel vacuum around as needed until you have changed 25 percent of the water. Do this weekly and you will have fish that will be happy and healthy. Good luck

Answer 4

yeah man u dont wanna do a complete water change and dont wanna wash the gravel lots of benificial bacteria in the gravel just use one of them siphones and suck loose debre off it and u have way to many fish for a ten gallon

Answer 5

I don't think that you're overstocked, but definately DON'T do a complete waterchange, it just stresses out your fish and usually you loose some of your fish
just do partial waterchanges of 25% with a gravel siphon weekly and you will be fine
As for the filter, you're suppose to replace the carbon cartridge every 4-6 weeks


Hope that hellps
Good luck


EB

Answer 6

Ditto completely to the above answers. Only additional comment: You're massively overstocked. You should have a 30 gallon for all those fish, so, because of this, you will need to do probably 50% water changes at least once a week, if not more. Get a test kit because you are going to need to closely monitor this environment.

Answer 7

YOu don't want to do a "complete" water change. I wouldn't do anymore than half.