How Often Should You Clean Your Tank
- Sep 27, 2021
- Anshika Mishra
- 497 0 0
Are you supposed to clean your aquarium once a week or once a month? The answer is, it depends. So keep ready as we share the systematic method of figuring out how often you need to clean your aqaurium.
The reason why is it so important to know when to clean an aquarium is that, if you don't do enough, your aquarium is going to get very gross, your fishes will be living in their wastes which, in turn, can make them very sick, and sometimes they might die.
However, if you clean your aquarium too much with huge water changes all the time, it will look good. Still, the wildly swinging water parameters, the potential loss of beneficial bacteria is also very stressful on your fish and could lead them to fall sick.
Goals of Water Changes
To know how often you should change your water, we have three goals. The first one is to control the nitrate level, which is the measurement of how much fish waste is in the aquarium. It is one of the toxic nitrogen compounds produced by fish waste, and you want that level of nitrates to be below 40ppm.
The second goal is frequency. And, the third goal is the wildly swinging parameters mentioned before. You want to change ideally less than 50% of the water, precisely 25%-30%.
Assuming that your aquarium is already cycled, meaning it is not brand new, it's been running for a little while. Then also, you are not adding any fertilizer that would artificially change the water chemistry. This is because the only thing going into your tank at its time is fish food, which turns into fish waste.
Get the Materials
Make sure you have a water test kit that measures the nitrates in the water, as well as a log book. You can simply use a piece of paper to writer down the level of nitrates, or you can also use an excel file if you want to insert some more information alongside.
You want to test the nitrate level in your tank first. Then, for the next 3-4 weeks, measure and log your nitrate levels. Each week lookout if the nitrate level is above or equal to 40ppm. If yes, then go ahead and do a 50% water change. If the level is below 40ppm, then go ahead and skin the water change for the week.
At the end of the 3-4 weeks, you will have an average amount of nitrates that your fish tank makes each week. So, if it is 5ppm that you are measuring as an increase each week, you can go ahead and change your water to 25% water changes every two weeks.
If your tank is making a ten ppm increase, then go ahead and do 25% of water change every week. If the increase is even more, you want to start doing over 25% water change twice every week or a 50% water change every week.
What to do For High Bioload Tanks?
Your aquarium is heavily stocked, so in the short term, you need to do a 50% water change every three to four days until you can get the nitrate level below 40ppm. If the multiple water changes don't allow the nitrates, you need to temporarily leave the strain on the aquarium by feeding less.
So, decrease the feeding every other day. Less food means less waste, and hopefully, you can get those nitrates under control.
In the long term, you have a few options. You can either remove some of the fishes from the aquarium, get a bigger aquarium because more water volume will dilute the number of nitrates in there, or get live plants.
Keep the Track
Your aquarium is a living ecosystem. So every time you add or remove fish or plants, if your plants get bigger or they are consuming more Nitrogen, or your fish get bigger, and they are making Nitrogen, then all of them will affect your nitrate level.
So, put a reminder in your calendar or mobile that at least once a month, you want to make sure that everything is on track because otherwise, you may fish that those Nitrate levels are suddenly skyrocketing or plummeting without your knowing.
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