WATER CHANGES [DIAL them IN PERFECTLY!] *HERE's HOW!*
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- Опубліковано 15 жов 2024
- There's been a lot of talk about water changes recently and in this video I share with you my tips for dialing in your water change schedule PERFECTLY!
Check it out and let me know in the comments below what you think of this dial-in process. Feel free to share your thoughts and tips in the comment section. We all learn from each other at this channel. Remember to always be learning and don't ever forget that you reading this right now - YOU ROCK!
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More great info !!!!!!!!!!! Ben you make it SO much easier to understand!! Thanks
Ben, appreciate your sage advice on water changes and for avoiding the silly clapping back that is currently taking place among other UA-camrs who cover this hobby. We should not get personally offended over different philosophies regarding how to care for our fish because we can all learn from each other. Learning from other fish keepers and implementing the ideas that best benefit my ecosystem is what makes this hobby fun and interesting in my opinion.
Thank you and very well said 😀👍🏻
Hi Ben, Yes I agree with you it is truly a very fluid situation and each individual aquarium even for the same hobbyist may be very different and so water changes should be dialed in based on the water parameters, type of fish, temperature, feeding schedule, filtration system, age of the tank and many other variables.
Ben,
This was a great video. Thanks for this. Yes water changes have become a hot topic lately. FF tanks are near and great he is practicing the heavy plants low fish load. That is possible. Plenty of fish keepers do it. The best tank I seen was a heavy planted tank and chili rasboras. The red would just pop against plants. I have 2 planted tanks. One is a 55 gal the other is a 20 long. I have to do water changes every 2 weeks. I have a 90 gal cichlid tank and it needs water changes every 2 weeks also. On the off weeks I check my filtration to see if it needs any clean up. We each can set up tanks how we want.
Truth Jeremy. Thanks!
Nice info sir
I do two HUGE water changes every week on my 210 New World Cichlid predator tank without testing anymore because I know the nitrate creep at this point. Water changes on my tanks with smaller fish and more lightly stocked get done once a week.
Are you getting nitrates from your tap?
@BenOchart Unfortunately, yes. More often than not, anyway. I'm on a well near several ag fields, and I think the ferts they use (or at least some residual affects from them) must leach into the water table. They've been as high as the highest measurable ppm count on the tetra test strips right out of the tap at times. As near as I can tell, anyway. Like many people out there, matching colors is something I struggle with. It's a deep red, that's all I can tell you.
Well said sir
Love the video. I've got 1 Father Fish tank, a 14G rimless cube. It's doing great. And tomorrow I'm setting up my new 60G Breeder, Father Fish style, river bottom theme. One thing I've noticed, with doing no water changes, I don't think I would have an issue with minerals going down, as I don't use tops and I'm having to top off about every 3 days. In my 75G, I do my water changes maybe 14-18 months, that tank's been running near 20 years. I only do the change because with the evaporation, I think my mineral content increases faster than the plants and fish remove them, so I just do a 70% every 14-18 months to reset everything.
Good points! Thank you for watching and commenting!
Thank you for sharing your advice and experience I truly appreciate it. The internet is full of all kinds of crazy information and I was getting so confused till I found you. I learned to pick someone who just makes sense to me and stick with them. You also saved my fish from some unnecessary medication treatment. When I saw my blood parrot fish "flashing" on things in my aquarium I panicked. Then I saw a live stream video of yours where one of your fish flashed to and someone commented about that. You asked the person right back saying "does my fish look sick"? "Are you a veterinarian"? You have no idea just how much you calmed me down with just a simple answer..........does it look sick! I learned you have to be careful with the internet because it can certainly program you to believe something and then immediately jump to action.
I enjoy your channel, great information, & no ranting!👍🏻
Great video. I really like polished, crystal clear water. It's easy to do with a canister filter, but in addition for me has always required a regular water change. Usually every 2 maybe 3 weeks. Without water changes I just don't get that crystal clear look. Again great video, thank you for sharing with us.
I have a 75 gallon tank with a big community, around 29 small creatures. Im having a hard time because I have a water softener on my house. I hate adding water or doing water changes because of this and I can't figure out what to do. We use salt for the water conditioner because potassium has been sold out for quite a while everywhere, it appears. I will change over to potassium when I can, but right now I dont have a choice. Every time I do a water change I put in API water conditioner, and I just started to use 1/2 tsp of Seachem Equilibrium in the last batch. That is way less than they suggest on the bottle for a 75 gallon tank. A few fish didn't like that and were acting funny. I mix up my water beforehand in a 2 gallon glass lemonade jug, and I open it up and let it sit on top of the tank until it's empty. Then I get another 2 gallons and put some API water conditioner again and let that run. I have a sand substrate and I don't mess with it, except for vacuuming up the poo on the very top. Today one of the most aggressive platys was sitting still for 10 mins in one spot at the top, then later on he went down to hide in a cave by himself. He is always chasing one of the fish around 100% of his days, so that is not normal for him. I would love to switch to a sand capped dirt tank, but right now I only have 100 pounds of sand in there, with 3"-4" of sand in the middle and it is pretty sparse on the sides. That's just how it landed and I left it how it was. I have 2 internal filters, 1 large airstone block, 2 skeleton air bubbles, and a sponge filter. I have a bout 13 plants in there right now that aren't amazing. They aren't thriving, even though I am using root tabs. I also have some medium sized bubbles on top, but I can't see any residue or slicks on top. I have about 5 bubbles at a time forming so I know that's probably not good. I feed the fish every other day with a light feeding of flakes and a high quality wafer food. I feed them a blood worm block once a week for a treat on a day they get fed. I don't know how to fix the water issue except for buying water and I dont really want to be doing that. I got the water conditioner to have better water, but I didnt realize it wasn't better.
Some of my fish like the new water coming in and bask in it like my big plecos and pictus cats and goldfish, they love it
Do they play in the stream? So funny when they do that.
@@BenOchart yes got some videos on my channel woth them doing it
Mine too. My cory cats get excited when they get fresh water.
Awesome video Ben! I'm a natural fishtank keeper like FF. I started out in this hobby like everyone else thinking that what we are doing is wrong or right so we start finding other videos and they say that other people are doing it wrong and you should do it my way and i think that a lot of people lose interest in this hobby. As a hobbyist of fish keeping we all evolve and decide on what we like and what we dont like to do as a fish keeper. I've had cichlids and every fish in between and out of all the years I have learned that if your fish and tank are healthy and happy. Don't fix it if it's not broke!
Words of wisdom my friend😀👍🏻
I think changing the water a bit is a good thing, all sorts of things besides nitrogen products build up in a closed environment like an aquarium and it's good to dilute them with reasonable regular water changes.
Of course use some common sense. Great advice. Thanks Ben. Idk why I feel this argument from others is manufactured or intentional.
Like a reality show or wrestling on TV, LOL!
Spot on. What you said is exactly what I do. One other thing I periodically do is compare my strips to my test kit to be sure they are still accurate or if I need to replace one.
Love the way you've put this...I've been watching all you guys for yrs now n there's all kinds of different factors involved in how you do it... different water...city water that's changed...well water in different places really differ...n what ya want in your tank n what kinda time you have to put into the hobby n the list goes on n on... individual based n Ben is absolutely right when he says test!!!
Nice video with decent advice. I do water changes when kH goes below or Nitrate goes above my preferred levels. Do whatever seems to work for you 😉
Very sensible. Thank you!
Love your videos Ben I have learned so much from you.
Thank you Shane
That's exactly what I took from the father fish video... Instead of doing weekly water changes, I now do them every 2-3 weeks.
Hey Sir ! ! Tnx for info, I just found your channel and tnx to you i learn a few things... I m new and excited af !! How do you make that stone you clean in the beggining of your video so stable ? When I touch a thing in my aquarium there s a new decoration set :D
I water change my tank based on nitrate readings. As my tank has "aged" I have noticed I am going longer between nitrate levels going up and the need to do water changes. So far from once a week to about every three weeks, testing once a week. I gravel clean about every 4-5 weeks or so. Curious as to your schedule for gravel cleaning in your planted tanks. Thanks. 29 gal w Fluval 207 lightly planted with pothos growing outside.
& then u do a water change video lol i love it 👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼
“Hot Topic”🤣
On minerals, if you have high pH, high hardness water source like my water in Indianapolis, fish metabolism does not even put a "dent" in your mineral content- specifically calcium and magnesium. Iron, aluminum, and manganese may also be found in certain tap waters. If you are dosing East Green or similar, iron, aluminum, and manganese and other minerals are being added too. Mineral replenishment is not the reason for water changes from a water chemistry standpont.
7:52 You should test your well water for salt if you live within distance of an ocean. In Florida, they have county monitoring wells to check the groundwater, and every year the salt creeps in farther due to the amount of water being sucked from the water table. The pull of the fresh water creates a vacuum to bring the saltwater into the water table/groundwater.
Time to consider a brackish tank 😉. This could end up being a very serious issue with drinking water.
I usually do a water change every week to every week in a half in my 38g aquarium. That has 4 fancy goldfish, an algae eater, a few snails, some shrimp, a couple clams, and is fully stocked with live plants and even an FX4 filter. So, basically, a full ecosystem on overdrive.
So my question is, when i'm doing a water change, should I turn off the fx4 filter during maintenance? Because usually I turn mine off. And it's only off for approximately a 1/2 hour or so.
The reason why I turn mine off during maintenance is because the power of the FX4 Filter ends up splashing the water and naturally kind of stores up everything. And the last thing I wanna do is stress out my fish more.
Am I doing the right thing by turning off the filter during maintenance?
I let mine run and consider that splashing “super oxygenating” the water. But honestly, either way works.
Awesome!! Thank you. 😁😃😀
And thank you for another amazing video.
Can I use my Seachem American Cichlid salt in the African Cichild tank?
That might be a formula specific to American cichlids. Probably wouldn't hurt but the trace minerals might be better suited for American cichlids. Malawi Lake salt products (Fritz and Seachem makes them) would be better IMO.
You're not wrong in saying things can go wrong during a water change, though. I killed my 3 year old 27 inch arowana kicking off the new year when I turned the filtration off to do my weekly water change and then failed turn it on again when Ibwas done. Because it was New Years Day and I feed my fish every other day, it was off for almost 48 hours. She was gone the next time I went down into my fish room. I don't worry about temp changes too much. I know plenty of people with much bigger fish rooms than I have. There's no way people have enough hot water to do the changes on 60, 80. 100 tanks. By the end, they've got to be pumping nothing but cold water in. Heck, I've heard people say they use their garden hose to fill their tanks back up and that water is freezing (at least up here in the northern states).
Sorry about that arowana, damn. Yes, there’s a risk whenever we mess with our tanks. In California I repositioned canister filter outputs and the next morning several fish were gone from lack of oxygen. Hard lessons.
I kept discus fish and I’m doing 50% weekly water changes on my 125-gallon tank . Father fish may be correct on the type of tanks he keeps. I don’t think discus fish keepers will follow his method, if anyone out doing it , I like to hear from them.
Do you keep plants with your discus?
Hi friends
Lodi NY
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I hope you all have a beautiful day
I'm watching all the fish people on UA-cam, trying to gather as much information as I can process before I build my first tank, and honestly this whole debate is making me scared of trying and killing all my fish because the plants weren't enough, or were too much, or something like this.
No such thing as too many plants, that I can tell you for certain. This channel is a very good one to listen to. Ben is knowledgeable, kind, and no BS.
And good on you for doing your research first, that's awesome
Jump in. A lot of the learning comes from doing. You’ll dial it in. Don’t overthink and go into analysis paralysis😉🤣😀👍🏻.
Honestly, the current controversy on UA-cam is nothing new. The business model for any social media platform is to get people mad at each other and confused. This shouldn't stop you or get you scared, take it for what it is. This hobby is really not that complicated, I have some "old school" books that I purchased back in the 90's and I still follow the advice. Ben is a good resource and won't steer you wrong but even he is trying to gain viewers to his channel so you need to take that into account.
@GabbyNeves please don't be discouraged by this. This is a distracting debate among veteran fishkeepers and the bottom line is that everyone's tank is different. Take Ben's advice and jump in. As you learn more you will become more aware of the fluid situation that this is.
To start with...a 20 to 50% weekly water change in any aquarium is encouraged and will always be helpful 100% of the time.
"No water changes" is the exception, not the rule.
It's discouraging to see potential newcomers become confused and scared over this topic that has become so "Hot" over the past few weeks.
It's nothing more than a distracting debate among veteran fishkeepers and to understand this "fluid situation" you must have a bit of knowledge and understanding.
To all of the beginners: It will always be 100% safe to change 20-50% of the water in any tank weekly. Fresh water will never ever hurt your fish.
True (unless they make a big mistake)
A good fish keeper never needs to change his water.
Kg tropical new video. Now I’m the villain!!!! Lol
I believe Father Fish's attitude of "my way or the highway" has destroyed a lot of his channel's credibility. There are more than one way to "skin a cat" in this hobby. Aquarium fish are very adaptive- look at how hundreds of species from around the world have thrived in the canals of Southern Florida in high pH, very hard water!
get lots of plants in that tank and never change the water again.