# Water Changes



## csk158 (May 22, 2014)

How often can I do water changes. I have a 55 gallon stocked with Yellow labs( Labidochromis caeruleus), Yellow tail acei (Pseudotropheus sp. msuli) and Blue zebra (Metriaclima callainos). The tank is currently heavily stocked with juvies anywhere from 1 inch to 2.5 inch. All the tests show water is good. I just want the fish to have a clean tank. Know I currently do them about every other day.


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## Mschn99 (Dec 24, 2012)

csk158 said:


> How often can I do water changes. I have a 55 gallon stocked with Yellow labs( Labidochromis caeruleus), Yellow tail acei (Pseudotropheus sp. msuli) and Blue zebra (Metriaclima callainos). The tank is currently heavily stocked with juvies anywhere from 1 inch to 2.5 inch. All the tests show water is good. I just want the fish to have a clean tank. Know I currently do them about every other day.


you can do water changes how ever often you want....there are some things to think about though....

water changes are good for fish, but also stress fish. IMO twice a week larger changes are better than every other day or daily changes for adult fish. Now fry are another beast of their own......my altolamp fry i change 40% daily.

What you want to look at, IMO, is nitrate. If your nitrate is low and you do regular water changes......no more is needed. If your nitrate is high, you need to up your water changes.

No reason to change "too much" but keeping nitrate low, especially for young fish, will help a lot


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## crazycolt42 (Nov 10, 2013)

Agreed. Base your changes on how your nitrates build up. IMO you want to do as few water changes as possible while keeping your nitrates below 20ppm. The process I use is to get a baseline nitrate reading 1 day after a water change. Let's assume it reads under 10ppm. I'll go a couple of days and then take another reading, let's say it reads b/t 10-20ppm, I then would give it another day or two and take another reading - this time it is reading around 20ppm or maybe a little more- that's when I would then do a water change. Over time, a pattern starts to form with consistent stocking and feeding. Now I know I can do about a 40-50% water change 1x/wk and keep my nitrates below 20ppm. I expect this may change as my mbuna grow. Now, some people may rather do two water changes every week and not change out as much so maybe 20-25% twice per week which would also work. IMO every set up is unique and so you have to base it on routine nitrate checks, but in general it seems a lot of people here on the forum average about 50% per week for mbuna tanks. It is probably true that you can change water too much because of the stress to your stock. My mbuna never seem very fond of the whole process. I should mention that I use the API water testing kit as well. Seems to be a popular choice on the forum. Hope this helps! :thumb:


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## Kanorin (Apr 8, 2008)

crazycolt42 said:


> Agreed. Base your changes on how your nitrates build up. IMO you want to do as few water changes as possible while keeping your nitrates below 20ppm. The process I use is to get a baseline nitrate reading 1 day after a water change. Let's assume it reads under 10ppm. I'll go a couple of days and then take another reading, let's say it reads b/t 10-20ppm, I then would give it another day or two and take another reading - this time it is reading around 20ppm or maybe a little more- that's when I would then do a water change. Over time, a pattern starts to form with consistent stocking and feeding. Now I know I can do about a 40-50% water change 1x/wk and keep my nitrates below 20ppm. I expect this may change as my mbuna grow. Now, some people may rather do two water changes every week and not change out as much so maybe 20-25% twice per week which would also work. IMO every set up is unique and so you have to base it on routine nitrate checks, but in general it seems a lot of people here on the forum average about 50% per week for mbuna tanks. It is probably true that you can change water too much because of the stress to your stock. My mbuna never seem very fond of the whole process. I should mention that I use the API water testing kit as well. Seems to be a popular choice on the forum. Hope this helps! :thumb:


This is a good guide to follow :thumb:


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## crazycolt42 (Nov 10, 2013)

Thanks Kanorin! Thanks to all of the moderators and experienced mbuna keepers here on the forum, I'm starting to get it all figured out. :thumb:


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## jimmie (Oct 23, 2002)

Man, just do about 25% water change once every 2 weeks, thats all you need.change or rise your filter media once a mth..add cichlid salt to your replacement water and also get you some water condition call Prime....


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## Kanorin (Apr 8, 2008)

jimmie said:


> Man, just do about 25% water change once every 2 weeks, thats all you need.change or rise your filter media once a mth..add cichlid salt to your replacement water and also get you some water condition call Prime....


This may be true for a very lightly stocked tank, but not true for a typical "overstocking" of malawi cichlids.


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## Mschn99 (Dec 24, 2012)

jimmie said:


> Man, just do about 25% water change once every 2 weeks, thats all you need.change or rise your filter media once a mth..add cichlid salt to your replacement water and also get you some water condition call Prime....


Horrible advice. You cannot give a simple broad based answer that will work for every tank. Testing water and understanding parameters is the best way to figure out what water change routine works for a NJ y specific tank


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## jimmie (Oct 23, 2002)

Mschn99 said:


> jimmie said:
> 
> 
> > Man, just do about 25% water change once every 2 weeks, thats all you need.change or rise your filter media once a mth..add cichlid salt to your replacement water and also get you some water condition call Prime....
> ...


I hear ya bro..do yall thing :zz: it works all the time for me..and also its not like he have a saltwater tank or a reef tank..prime, amquel, cichlid salt work all the time, check your parameters and he should be fine...african cichlids is hardy fish :fish: compare to saltwater bro. 8)


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## DJRansome (Oct 29, 2005)

I like to change about 75% weekly. Never less than 50% weekly.


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## BillD (May 17, 2005)

I concur that every tank set up is different. Blanket statements are not helpful. While nitrate levels are useful as an indicator, they only help determine what the minimum change should be. Changing more is not detrimental, and in fact is beneficial. You can never really get the water clean doing partial water changes. As well, 2 x 25% is not the same as doing 1 x 50%, even if you do one right after the other.
You have to strike your own balance, but doing more than the minimum is beneficial in the long term.
If you want to see a serious water change watch this. 



 there are other similar ones out there. Perhaps this will lay to rest the commonly repeated "water changes stresses fish" myth to rest.


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## crazycolt42 (Nov 10, 2013)

Bill D - You bring up a good point that you're not going to negatively impact your water chemistry by doing more than necessary like a 50% change when nitrates read 5ppm and the fact is that frequent water changes probably do not lead to fish mortality, but I gotta tell you that video is insane! This is a matter of opinion, but that did not look enjoyable to me for the discus. We all have different ideas of how we think our fish feel and what they are sensing and me personally, I would never do that to my fish. There was a good research article that hit major headlines recently about the potential intellect of fish. Just going by my observation when I do water changes, my fish hide and stay hidden until I'm all through. To me, that means they are spooked which means stress. These fish also swim all over the place when you walk up to the tank, so it's not the norm for them to hide. I try to keep the tank peaceful and clean by keeping my parameters @ comfortable levels and intervening in the tank only as necessary because to me that gives my fish the best "aquarium life". :fish: :thumb:


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## jimmie (Oct 23, 2002)

crazycolt42 said:


> Bill D - You bring up a good point that you're not going to negatively impact your water chemistry by doing more than necessary like a 50% change when nitrates read 5ppm and the fact is that frequent water changes probably do not lead to fish mortality, but I gotta tell you that video is insane! This is a matter of opinion, but that did not look enjoyable to me for the discus. We all have different ideas of how we think our fish feel and what they are sensing and me personally, I would never do that to my fish. There was a good research article that hit major headlines recently about the potential intellect of fish. Just going by my observation when I do water changes, my fish hide and stay hidden until I'm all through. To me, that means they are spooked which means stress. These fish also swim all over the place when you walk up to the tank, so it's not the norm for them to hide. I try to keep the tank peaceful and clean by keeping my parameters @ comfortable levels and intervening in the tank only as necessary because to me that gives my fish the best "aquarium life". :fish: :thumb:


Thats what im saying, you got to feel your tank out, I see how the fish react etc.etc.like me myself I do a water change once a mth.doing the weeks I top of my water every 2 days are so and clean my filter media about once every 3 weeks,like recently I just did 50% water change on my tank..and I didn't do that in a while...so I guess that comes over time..but for as saltwater aquarium goes and I know this not a saltwater site....you got to, stay on top your water changes and check parameters for saltwater, , but for as freshwater not so bad, you have room to deal with the water


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## PiccoloJr (Oct 14, 2013)

Jimmie, what are your nitrate levels when you do your monthly WC?


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## BillD (May 17, 2005)

For what it's worth, the late Dr. Joanne Norton, who was a major contributor to the hobby, especially in the area of genetics, spoke at a CAOAC Convention years ago. She advocated large water changes. She said her fish had to lie on their sides to stay wet. At the angelfish forum, they always considered her to be the ultimate authority on the keeping of fish, especially angels.


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## johnnymarko (May 30, 2014)

I have a 55 gal overstocked Malawi tank.

I do a 40%-60% change about every 5-6 days. Water stays clear and my parameters stay top notch. YMMV.


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## crazycolt42 (Nov 10, 2013)

I definitely want what is best for my fish, but short of having an expensive and/or elaborate automated water changing system, there is no way I could keep up with draining and refilling nearly 160g of water/week. I'm gonna stick with keeping nitrates below 20ppm, but thanks for that info BillD. Good to know what would be ideal. Maybe I can try to work in another 25-40% change every now and then.


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## kwang (Sep 16, 2012)

DJRansome said:


> I like to change about 75% weekly. Never less than 50% weekly.


+ 1


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## seattle_530 (Mar 6, 2007)

I do 80g water change a week on my 150g 20g a week on my 2 55g. It can't be to stressful on them I usually see at least one spawn after a w/c and many attempts to spawn


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## Kanorin (Apr 8, 2008)

I think water changes might be stressful for the ~10-30 minutes (depending on tank size) that the tank volume gets low, but once it's refilled mine seem to bounce right back into action - begging for food, displaying, showing good color. Overall, the water quality improvement is well worth the few minutes of stress!


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## hisplaceresort1 (Mar 10, 2014)

50-60% weekly keeps me between 10 and 20ppm in my tanks, 29 gallon and 75 gallon.

crazycolt42; I change out about that much water between several tanks per week, and my system is neither elaborate nor expensive. 
a 50' garden hose
some pvc & fittings to make a "U" shape that will hang over the edge of a tank
a garden hose to pvc adapter and you're set for filling.

then, I take the cylindrical end off a cheap Aqueon gravel vacuum,
hose barb to fitting to garden hose, 
and I can drain & vac gravel at the same time.

When I'm done draining, I take the end of the garden hose that I've stuck out my window to dump the water, and take it into the bathroom where I have one 5 gallon bucket and a pump, with a couple of fittings to go to that end of the garden hose. Run the water into the bucket at approx the same speed the pump pushes it out, (dump your water treatment into the bucket first!) and go fill...

I know that's not the greatest description, but you get the idea; the same hose to fill and drain, just change the end at the aquarium if you need to gravel vac.

On the other end, attach to a submersible pump in one 5 gal bucket with cheap fittings you can get at home depot. keeps the mess down, no drips, etc.

For me, making the chore as easy as possible keeps me changing the water more frequently!


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## fishboy85 (Apr 26, 2014)

A 50 percent water change on my 50 gal takes me an hour I need to look at speeding it up going to try implement something like this to speed it up and make it easyer imstead of carrying buckets through the house and stop taste testing the tank water


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## DJRansome (Oct 29, 2005)

Use a Python to avoid the buckets. Takes me about 20 min to do a tank with vacuuming the substrate. Or if you are in a real hurry use a pump like the LFS does.


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## fishboy85 (Apr 26, 2014)

I have heard of those pythons but using them you wouldnt know wat temp your water is going in the cold tap comes out at around 64 f at the moment, then theres the buffer I add and the declaration do you just add that after the water is in.at the moment I mix it in a large container on a stand and make sure the temp is the same and pump it in with my old filter. How crucial is the temp of the new water compared to the tank water? im always within 1 degree


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## forestfalcon (Mar 10, 2014)

fishboy85 said:


> I have heard of those pythons but using them you wouldnt know wat temp your water is going in the cold tap comes out at around 64 f at the moment, then theres the buffer I add and the declaration do you just add that after the water is in.at the moment I mix it in a large container on a stand and make sure the temp is the same and pump it in with my old filter. How crucial is the temp of the new water compared to the tank water? im always within 1 degree


We use a python. My husband uses a thermometer on the water coming out to refill the tanks. We don't have more than a half degree temp difference. I have two digital thermometers in the tank. Works well.


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## hisplaceresort1 (Mar 10, 2014)

I use a pump in one 5 gallon bucket, and check the water temp in the bucket with a Raytek mini-temp laser thermometer I robbed out of my husband's car stuff... I am not nearly as accurate with my temperature as I should be. I try to maintain a tank temp of 79. the water coming out will not stay the same temp out of my bathtub faucet... I just adjust as it's running. it goes from 72 to 82 as it fills the bucket. I watch the tank temp and keep adjusting. The end result is within a degree. I add all the necessary (actually I add probably 50% more) dechlorinator (Seachem Prime) to the first bucket, fill it before I start the pump, and run the pump out of the bucket with the faucet filling it simultaneously from there. Seems to work fine.


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## plug (Nov 10, 2013)

I do 2 water changes a week n my 125 gallon tank of approx 40 - 50% of the water each time
The fish do seem stressed at times and sometimes they rub themselves on the sand...but if I raise my hand like to feed them, they all come up to the top...and I have actually fed them a bit during water changes

as I am also learning, I now test the nitrates more so may adjust water changes to match the nitrate levels


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