water changes controversy

[nicofish]

so me and my friend were chatting and we had a water change argument that dragged on for a bit. he favors large water changes every two days. while I favored 20% once a week. we both run Fx5 he on a 55 gallon and I on a 75.

what do you guys do? as far as water changes go. I have some seen some people do 90% a day!!! with very positive results in growth a over all fish beefyness

I am experimenting with 15% or so a day. so far positive behavior and appearance of water.



I will see if I can find a vid of the aro after one year. in the mean time what are your policies on WC.

thank you, Nico

[racoll]

Well, here's the answer you probably didn't want to hear: it depends!

Generally, you cannot change too much water, but some species react poorly to large changes and even slight shifts in parameters.

[nicofish]

actually that was my argument. but he stated that if your fish is used to the params of the tap and you keep your temp constant then no prob. that is as long as you always constantly water change


plecs are taking to it well they come out for food more and chill of their piece of peruvian drift wood. the silver dollars are looking silverier lol


hmmmmmmmm I guess what he is trying to do is have a tank where there is always a new flow of water coming in. I forget what that is called but it would be cool.


more oppinions would be great. ill se if I can get this on cichlid forum to see what the other fish keeping clan thinks


I suppose another point that could be made then is changing small amounts daily to mantain a constant environment. tho I doubt my water at leasts gets too dirty to shift between changes cause I over filtered the tank well

[2wheelsx2]

Discus keepers abide by this thinking. If you're constantly changing water, it's going to be closer in water chemistry than changes once a week, unless you are changing minute amounts, which may or may not transport enough of the wastes out to be healthy for the fish. If your fish load is low, no reason to change water every other day, but if you're fully stocked or overstocked, or you have a tank full of panaque, I think the wise thing to do would be to do more water changes rather than less. Filtration keeps the floaties out of the tank and provides a large biobed, but the system is still closed.

I think the term you're looking for is a "continuous water change" system, or a "continuous drip" system, which can be achieve a number of different ways.

[nicofish]

yes thankyou I was speaking of continuous drip.

I do about 15% every other day.

my tank isnt heavily stocked at this point but I do have an l83 ... (I was foolish) I suppose its the kind of mistake a noob such as myself would make despite knowing very well the size he could reach. I also impulse bought a strange looking Glyptoperichthys which you here were not able to ID for be at around the same time. I feel kinda bad about them but I will find a way of housing them once they grow. I bought by little l83 at an inch and he is now around 5 in a 3-4 months ive had him (growing fast of clean water hikari wafers and cucumber)

I feel super bad it makes my conscience hurt that I would do that but if it comes to it I will get a job during the summer and bribe my parents with my money to let me have a piece of the basement so I can properly house my fishy friends (cause I like them more than my people friends)

that got off subject... sorry

more opinions would be great

[racoll]

but he stated that if your fish is used to the params of the tap and you keep your temp constant then no prob. that is as long as you always constantly water change

Probably a lot of truth in that.

[nicofish]

yeah thats what I thought. ill keep up with my current schedule which is easy cause the FX5 just pumps out the water for me and Ill see how the fish behave.

[Bas Pels]

Almost all fish like clean water, and would therefroe prefer large waterchanges, and a often as possible

The exception? Some fish from swamps. Even in natural circumstances swamps can carry large amounts of waste, ans a few fishes have adapted so well to this, they don't even like clean water.

These are the fishes which need old, matured water

[MatsP]

Before separating from my wife, I had a fishroom where 4 of the tanks got water-change with the waste-water from the RO system, which I calculate to be roughly 4x the volume of the tanks each week, so roughly 50% per day. I saw absolutely no problem with this.

--
Mats

[nicofish]

nice thanks for the help matts thats what my friend is doing with his pacus. ill continue my current schedule perhaps bump a little. sad thing is the WC is the highlight of my day
(yes my life has gotten to that point and im 15)

[dw1305]

Hi all,

Almost all fish like clean water, and would therefroe prefer large waterchanges, and a often as possible

I agree with this one as well, even in lightly stocked planted tanks I like to change 10% a day, every day. If I have any concerns about water quality I just change a larger volume of water (up to 100%). I use rain-water, if I had to use tap water, I would pre-filter it initially, ideally with a planted filter.

I don't personally subscribe to the "aged water" idea, or Diana Walstad's "no water changes for low tech tanks" (although I like the rest of her ideas). I'm old enough to remember when "aged water" was in vogue in the 1970's, and I think it was one reason that I was a much less successful fish keeper then than I am now with lots of water changes.

cheers Darrel

[MatsP]

I agree, "aged water" is just the same as "dechlorinated" water before dechlorinators were invented. As long as the water is at the right temperature (within a couple of degrees C either direction, but cooler is better than warmer), and the water chemistry doesn't change too much.

Whilst aged water was probably recommended when I started out, I never used to do that. And I don't really see the purpose of it.

--
Mats

[PlecoCrazy]

There was an article in TFH or FAMA on this. It said something like a 20% water change only removes equivalent of 1 days worth of pollution. So by tomorrow it would be as if you never did the water change today.

I change 50% 1-2 times a week on most of my tanks. Some times if I forget I'm draining a tank and it gets 90%. I just make sure i fill up the tank slower the more water I drain from it.

[MatsP]

Tehcnically, for a 7-day week, each day adds 1/7th of the weeks total polution, so polution does indeed increase by about 14% per day.

--
Mats

[RickE]

Tehcnically, for a 7-day week, each day adds 1/7th of the weeks total polution, so polution does indeed increase by about 14% per day.

--
Mats

Doesn't that assume you start the week with no pollution?

[dw1305]

Hi all,
The "aged water" was the yellow tinted (presumably due to DOC) water that you got in the aquarium when you didn't change the water, just topped up any evaporation. It sounds strange now, but this was what was recommended, and if an aquarist said that they did lots of water changes, it just meant that every now and then they'd remove a couple of jugfuls of the tank water, but never a enough to lose the tint in the water.
This aged water was meant to possess almost mystical properties and be essential to keep your fish healthy.

If you want to check whether your water changes are maintaining the water in the condition you want, you can use a TDS meter to measure the conductivity. I find that my lightly stocked, planted tanks will stay at about 150 microS using 10% rain-water a day as a water change (rain-water varies from about 70microS to 180microS). I very rarely test anything else, but it will be about 10ppm NO3.

cheers Darrel

[MatsP]

Tehcnically, for a 7-day week, each day adds 1/7th of the weeks total polution, so polution does indeed increase by about 14% per day.

--
Mats

Doesn't that assume you start the week with no pollution?

Yes, what I meant was the ADDITION per day to the existing pollution is 14-15% of the pollution produced over a week. Clearly, if you already have 10 weeks worth of pollution in there, it won't add another 14% to the current pollution level each day - it is not an accumulated interest calculation for "easy loan" on TV...

And it does make a difference of course, if your average level of nitrate is 50ppm, and you remove 20% and replace with water that has 0ppm nitrate, you are back to 40ppm. If your fish add 10ppm nitrate over the week (including the stuff taken up by plants, etc), the overall level ends up back on 50ppm. Of course, if your fish produce more than 10ppm per week, it will slowly increase the nitrate level, and if they produce less, the nitrate level will slowly go down.

--
Mats

[MatsP]

Hi all,
The "aged water" was the yellow tinted (presumably due to DOC) water that you got in the aquarium when you didn't change the water, just topped up any evaporation. It sounds strange now, but this was what was recommended, and if an aquarist said that they did lots of water changes, it just meant that every now and then they'd remove a couple of jugfuls of the tank water, but never a enough to lose the tint in the water.
This aged water was meant to possess almost mystical properties and be essential to keep your fish healthy.

Yes, I guess I can confess to having done something like that, and of course the large water change on that would cause a big change in pH/conductivity/DOC which could shock almost any fish to death... But I also have heard of people using water that has stood for 24-48 hours to "age" it.

If you want to check whether your water changes are maintaining the water in the condition you want, you can use a TDS meter to measure the conductivity. I find that my lightly stocked, planted tanks will stay at about 150 microS using 10% rain-water a day as a water change (rain-water varies from about 70microS to 180microS). I very rarely test anything else, but it will be about 10ppm NO3.

cheers Darrel

Whilst I understand the principle of this, I'm not entirely convinced this works. If you have low KH/GH, and the nitrate level goes up, I think the CO3+ ions are (to some extent) consumed during the nitrification process, so the TDS value stays about the same, but water has deteriorated in quality. I'm not saying your tank is suffering from this, just that I'm not sure a "constant TDS" is a good way to determine if you have increase in (for example) nitrate...

--
Mats

[Viktor Jarikov]

CO3 double-negative charged?

[MatsP]

CO3 double-negative charged?

Yes, sorry, it's been too long since I last did real chemistry...

--
Mats

[Bas Pels]

If you want to check whether your water changes are maintaining the water in the condition you want, you can use a TDS meter to measure the conductivity. I find that my lightly stocked, planted tanks will stay at about 150 microS using 10% rain-water a day as a water change (rain-water varies from about 70microS to 180microS). I very rarely test anything else, but it will be about 10ppm NO3.

cheers Darrel

Whilst I understand the principle of this, I'm not entirely convinced this works. If you have low KH/GH, and the nitrate level goes up, I think the CO3+ ions are (to some extent) consumed during the nitrification process, so the TDS value stays about the same, but water has deteriorated in quality. I'm not saying your tank is suffering from this, just that I'm not sure a "constant TDS" is a good way to determine if you have increase in (for example) nitrate...

--
Mats

As Mats admitted, carbonate is nigetively charged, just as nitrate / nitrite - therefore the rest of what he wrote is not really relia ble either

However, if you start with a tank with water, and you don't do anything to it, the carbonate in the water will basically remain unchanged - unless the pH changes.

Apart from evaporation, the content of anorganic ions should remain quite the same. However, as we all know, the nitrate content does increase and I noted the conductivity (and therefore the DTS measurement, which is nothing but a conductivity measurement) will increase

Apparently, some positive ion will be released - and I think the ion must be organic


However I once read in the DATZ (a general fishmagazine, in German) about a breeder who uses the conductivity to verefy whether the water is still usable or needs refreshment

[MatsP]

Hmm, my point was that CO3-- gets consumed in the production of nitrate, and at least some of the source I find seem to agree that some carbonate is consumed by the nitrosomans and nitrobacter "beneficial bacteria" in the nitrogen cycle that happens in the tank, however, the level of CO2/CO3-- consumed appears to be about 1 in 8 to the NO3- that is produced.

Now, I don't know how much effect on the TDS this "change" has...

However, if you haven't got enough KH (carbonate) buffer in the tank, the consumption of carbonate is what causes the pH to drop or crash...

--
Mats

[Marc van Arc]

I'm old enough to remember when "aged water" was in vogue in the 1970's, and I think it was one reason that I was a much less successful fish keeper then than I am now with lots of water changes.

Me too, and although the theory of aged water has become outdated, I kind of sticked to it. I do a 25% water change per month and the week before I clean the Eheims. If I was less successful in the past it was caused by a lack of experience.
Imo the fishes themselves are the best means to see whether you're doing okay or not. Nowadays (too) many people are using rules, (high-)tech and all others kinds of redundant stuff to convince themselves they're doing okay.
Fish keeping should not be a science in my view. Let your fishes convince you!

[grokefish]

I do 50% every week.

[apistomaster]

I have participated in the water change debates for decades with other Discus keepers. Just to keep Discus, they can tolerate water which is below my standards.
I do not agree with those who make 90% water changes. Having their Discus laid over on their sides is stressful and usually result in some scrapes and bruises when they freak out.
I find changing 75% of my water about every 4 days has worked well for me and for all the fish I have kept.
In a closed system aquarium, which describes most peoples' tanks, I think you can stay well ahead of nitrate accumulations and in absolute terms, is a higher water change volume than one 90% change per week and your fish are not so badly confined when you leave 25% of the old water.

If I had an truly open system, where conditioned fresh water is flowing in all the time, there really is no harm to change as much prepared water as you want. 90% daily or 500% daily, you can't go wrong and the fish will grow better than in any standard type of closed system aquarium using any water changing regime. Few of us have the proper circumstances to build and operate a flow through system using fresh conditioned water.
My regime, one 75% water change about every 4 days has a good track record.
In absolute terms this is larger water change than a weekly 90% changes and if you have fish as large as Discus and Arowana, you are much less likely to incur as many panic induced scrapes
It is foolish to do the minimal water changes of 15 to 20% weekly or even daily. The numbers soon catch up and fish growth will not be optimal. If minimizing accumulated wastes is your concern and you think your plants will compensate as they use the accumulated nitrates and phosphates you will be fooling yourself if you believe the "natural" method which relies a lot of good plant growth, is a wise course of action. Plants are net waste producers as they only photosynthesize when the lights are on and plants are selective about what chemicals they extract from their surrounding water. Better to consider your plants as if they were fish when considering adopting a particular water change regime.
Even lightly stocked, planted tanks, do better if you make 2 water changes of about 75% every 4 days instead of 90% weekly.
I would love to be able to use a flow through water system if it was practical.
Another factor to keep in mind when considering 90% water changes is that if you use mostly tap water, the water chemistry is subject to much variation from even a single water purification plant. The techs need only use approximate amounts of Chlorine, ammonia and MgSO4 to stay within their broad guidelines. Their standards are not nearly as exacting as a serious aquarist.
That is one of the reasons I prefer large but less water changes than 90% weekly. A 75% change every 4 days produces all the fresh water stimulation of a larger one but is protected somewhat from large chemistry changes compared to 90% once a week. We never know when a pipe line repair somewhere upstream from us will require an injection of a larger than normal addition of chlorine to disinfect water unintentionally contaminated during the repair.
Because these variations really do occur rather frequently, I commonly use 2 or 3 times as much Prime during my water changes than the directions stating 1 drop per gal. This extra bit of water conditioner does no harm to the fish but can insulate you from an unknown event upstream where an extra dose of Chlorine may have been added to protect customers from water born illnesses.
A daily water change of 15 or 20% is not of much benefit except as compared to making no water changes at all. Even the few species found in small bodies of water which have considerably higher tolerances to the usual pollution sources are rarely as closed as an aquarium. Along the equatorial zones even ponds receive a large and regular influx of fresh rain water. For those that don't, and this mainly applies to some annual Killiefish, their prolonged egg incubation periods in a damp substrate keeps them insulated from when the pond water becomes so foul it can no longer support fish.

[nicofish]

its ate now so will not have time to read all of our great posts but I skimmed and its looking good. the hobby is changing. my friend told me his grandfather had angels and he never did WC just topoffs. I want to stay at the head of the hobby its great to see what you all know from experience and im happy to see that my water changing methods aren't delusional.

keep the discussion going

[nicofish]

I do not agree with 90% becuase of the stress that it causes the fish as was listed above. if 20%only gets rid of one days worth of waist shouldent the standard for water change be 25-30% daily?

if you are doing 75% every 4 days you are changing about 18% of the water and as was said that is the same as doing no water change at all. eventually you waste levels will catch up with you becuase you are having a theoretical 2% accumulation.

the bit about the plants was very interesting. a lot of people use "bio" filters and they put plants in . are you saying that all of those systems may cause more harm than they help?


so ill just have to gear up a bit of the water changing schedule so as not to stunt the fish.

if anyone has anymore opinions please feel free to post. if you don't mind I will reference these posts on other sites with all credit to planetcatfish of course they were very informative

[apistomaster]

Plants are selective about which chemicals they extract. So I don't mean to say they do nothing, just that they can't remove all wastes.

I don't think the amount of waste in a typical tank accumulates as rapidly as the number being used and that one water change of 75% every 4 days is as good or better than one 90% change per week.

[nicofish]

I would say more often is better because you experience less swings. what I will do is 25% a day o every other day. and 50-60% on saturday

monday 25%
tues No WC
wed 25%
thurs no WC
friday 25%
saturday 60%
sunday no Wc


thats my schedule today is saturday so I did a big cleaning of the filter as well as the tank

I guess the idea is you have accumulation all week that is slowed by the water changes every other day and then on saturday you get rid of all the crap and start a new week.

[apistomaster]

I think your water changing regime is as good as any other one in which a large volume change is a part of it.
The exact numbers are not important so long as they are sufficient for a given bioload.
There are many ways to accomplish the goals intended by making regular large water changes. In a lightly stocked tank the volume of water changes doesn't have to be as high as in an overstocked grow out tank.
I just think 90% water changes are too much. Some Discus keepers carry this to an extreme changing 90% daily. If the new water has been treated to neutralize chlorine and chloramines and the fish are used to these regime they will do fine. Not so much of a problem with catfish but with Discus it can mean making them lay flat on their sides. It is hard to avoid bruising and scrapes doing that.
I may be keeping more plecos than Discus presently, but when you you make such a large water change in a tank containing large Discus they must heal all week until they get bruised up again in next week's water changes. Plecos rarely suffer physical injuries when making 90*% water changes but such a large water change has other potential stressors than just scrapes and bruises. Something a little less and more frequent tends to minimize other stressors.

If the results of a weekly 90% water change works well for your fish far be it from me to say it is wrong. I personally don't like making such a large and less frequent water change. It doesn't matter that much to me what others do and if you are happy and your fish are doing well, then adopt whatever water changing regime which produces good results for your fish.
Changing 75% about every 4 days has always worked well for me whether it is for my Discus, plecos or all my other fish. I have used the 75% changes almost daily in some of my crowded Discus and pleco grow out tanks because of the numbers of fish and the heavy feedings. So even I am not fixated on a strict 75% change every 4 days. I know that sometimes that much is not enough but I always avoid making 90% changes regardless the schedule. If a tank is so crowded that a 90% daily water change is necessary that is a clear enough sign to me that my tank is badly over stocked and it indicates that thinning out the tank is a good idea.
Another factor which is not as tangible is that fish being kept with frequent 90% water changes to stay ahead of the pollution is that when and if you sell those fish, they encounter a much lessor level of maintaining water quality at a fish shop and probably most hobbyists. Even at my preferred regime of water changes, before I sell my fish I begin to reduce the amount and frequency of my water changes. This helps them adapt to a fish shop's tanks and those of it's customers so the shock of going to these other environments is much less. I have more experience with selling Discus to fish shops and I have seen how my "hardening" period helps eliminate mass losses among the Discus sold to shops than they experience when going from a high level of water changes to a much lower one. Except for a few species of plecos, they are generally more adaptable to new conditions such as those in a fish shops tanks than Discus but I perform the reduction in water changes before I sell them anyway because it does help them adapt to a fish shop's tanks better than if I skipped the temporary reduction of water changes. I have long practiced this with nearly all the fish I raise and sell because it has kept mine or my customers' losses at a minimum.

Water changing is important and they should be fairly large but it is necessary to reduce them before I sell the fish to minimize the stress of going from a higher level to lower. There is no perfect schedule. Use what is most appropriate for your fishes' needs which can change over time or circumstances.

Once upon a time, "old water" was given almost magical properties by hobbyists. But as we learned more about our fishes' needs, old water has become an archaic holdover some few hobbyists still adhere to.
I think a breeder has a different perspective than those who mainly keep fish and frequently, planted tanks. Those who keep high tech planted tanks do seem to do fewer and smaller water changes than fish breeders. In part because if they made either 75% water changes every 4 days or 90% once a week, they are flushing a lot of expensive plant fertilizers and/or possibly black water supplements they tend to use, down the drain almost as fast as they are adding them. Their tanks are rarely as overloaded as a breeder's grow out tanks so their needs are different. The plants do also have ameliorative effects although as I mentioned previously, I do not think plants can sufficiently compensate by nutrient uptake, all the other undesirable waste products present in the water. The healthiest high tech planted tanks are those which do receive frequent and large water changes and the aquatic gardeners consider the flushing and replenishing of added fertilizers just a necessary part of the cost of maintaining high tech planted tanks. Plants grow better when their tank receives plenty of large water changes just as the fish do. Clearly, old water, which is a very relative concept. Most everyone has their own concept of what constitutes old water.

The use of plants in a sump of a closed system aquarium does not accomplish as many benefits as they contribute to open aquatic systems such as those found in nature. These natural systems are many orders of magnitude more complex in their ecology and can only be crudely simulated in a closed aquatic system. I say crudely, but the necessary plumbing and added mechanical complications are anything but crude. However, if you can manage to make a sump be both part of the biological filtration system aided by vigorous plant growth you are getting some of the best of both worlds. It isn't very easy to integrate plant growth in most sumps so that method of bio-remediation is something only very few hobbyists use. It is difficult to do. The best method is to have dual sumps where one is your primary mechanical and biological filtration system and the other is set up purely for plant growth much like a reef tank refugium. I feel these projects are more in the province of fish keepers and aquatic gardeners. Breeders producing fish to sell do not have the luxury of devoting so much of their time to the maintenance of refugiums when sufficient water changes produces the desired results in an easier way.