ichiromariners
Member
everytime i switch my filter pads my tank seems to have a mini cycle anyone got a solution for this?
filter pad changes and resulting cycle
- Thread starter ichiromariners
- Start date
ophiura
Active Member
Can y ou give us (or at least me) more specs on your tank, filter, etc? How long has it been set up? Really this shouldn't happen, but in some power filters, a lot of gunk can come loose in the bottom when the pad is changes. Or, if there is a biological sponge that you take out and replace or rinse in tap water, then you are effectively tossing away your good bacteria. So, need a bit more information on what you have running....
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alti
Guest
need a little more info ichiro. what size tank, how old is it, what type of filter, how much live rock and what is your livestock?
ichiromariners
Member
i have a penguin 330 in a 55gallon tank with around 50lbs. of live rock. a stars and stripes puffer, a koran angel, several dwarf hermit crabs, on blue leg hermit crab, and i had mandarin goby that died about three days after filter pad change. goby was doing fine before filter pad change. tank has been running since may of 2002. would a goby eatting some of my pods cause this? i got the goby in early december. i did my test and ammonia was zero and nitrates were in the middle of my testing chart and nitrites were near zero. my ph was 8.0 so i did a water change.
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alti
Guest
the only way i can see your tank going through mini cycles is if the puffer and angel are big. how big are they? the mandarin had nothing to do with it. he probably starved.
ophiura
Active Member
I think effectively one of the problems is your filtration is rather marginal considering the fish, unless you have that tank packed full of LR. A 330 is skimpy even on a freshwater 55...on a saltwater 55 it is even worse. And with a puffer and big angel...well...those guys can eat a ton. Do you have a deep sand bed? Crushed coral? Refugium? Protein skimmer?
Do you rinse the wheels off? Because you shouldn't mess with those at all. Additional power heads?
50lbs of LR is the absolute minimum, IMO, for a mandarin, and I suspect it died of starvation, and nothing related to the filter.
Your nitrites should be 0, all the time. What does nitrate in the middle of your chart mean? What is the specific gravity of the tank? When you did a water change, did you stir up/vacuum the sand at all?
Do you rinse the wheels off? Because you shouldn't mess with those at all. Additional power heads?
50lbs of LR is the absolute minimum, IMO, for a mandarin, and I suspect it died of starvation, and nothing related to the filter.
Your nitrites should be 0, all the time. What does nitrate in the middle of your chart mean? What is the specific gravity of the tank? When you did a water change, did you stir up/vacuum the sand at all?
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alti
Guest
i was doin my best to be subtle here for once. now it feels like an interrogation room at the K.G.B.!
ichiromariners
Member
my koran is only 4 inches and is going through his color change into adult hood. the puffer is about 6 inches. there is not way the goby could have starved i have had and still do pods all over my tank. i have 45 pounds live rock and 120 pounds of live sand. i was looking to add more live rock. the puffer lived through a cycle caused by a power outage so he is pretty resiliant. i used a ph buffer tonight and am gonna check ph in the morning.
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alti
Guest
sorry dude, but your fish are too big for that tank . the tank and filters cant handle their bioload. you can try to keep them if you want, but i seriously doubt they will survive very much longer in there. the reason you keep throwing yourself into mini cycles is because the fish just produce too much waste for a 55 gal to handle. you are at the limit of what your biological filtration can handle, so when you take out anything that is contributing to the biologival filter you will have excess ammonia that cant be consumed by your nitrifying bacteria. i really hope you will do the right thing and take the fish back to the store and get fish that can realistically survive in a 55 gal tank. good luck.
ichiromariners
Member
i took the koran out and put it into a friends 180 gallon till i get myself a newer bigger tank. will the puffer be ok by himself in the 55 gallon?
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alti
Guest
you made a good decision with the angel. its such a nice and not to mention expensive fish to lose. the puffer should be ok for a while since the angel is gone, but you may want to either upgrade your tank or find another home for him before he starts to get too big. to be honest 6" is too big for your 55 gal, but as long as you dont put azny more fish in there he should be ok for a few of months. i know the inch of fish per gallon rule hints that a 6" puffer should be ok in a 55 gal, but you have to take into consideration that a 6" puffer produces much more waste than 3 2" firefish. for future stocking on this tank i really recommend that you dont get any fish that reach more than 4"-5" as an adult. dwarf angels,gobies,blennies,clowns,small anthias, basslets , cardinals, damsels and pseudochromis are good choices for a tank that size. im really happy you did the right thing with the angel. so many people refuse to accept that their fish will not survive and just wait till they actually die to learn their lesson. good luck.
ophiura
Active Member
IchiroMariners,
Kudos for accepting advice, and addressing the problem so quickly. Really, what a terrific example. Just watch the feeding with the puffer, perhaps consider the addition of some additional filtration, protein skimmer, LR, something...
But great decision, without the typical denial. I think your fish will be much happier, and you will have fewer headaches.
Kudos for accepting advice, and addressing the problem so quickly. Really, what a terrific example. Just watch the feeding with the puffer, perhaps consider the addition of some additional filtration, protein skimmer, LR, something...
But great decision, without the typical denial. I think your fish will be much happier, and you will have fewer headaches.
newbiesalttank
Member
Typically, you don't really want to change your pads--it will create a mini cycle since the new pads will need to re-build your bacteria. I made the same mistake until I got some advice from more experienced reefers who said to just take some tank water and just rinse your pad out in the water and presto! you throw the water out and put the pad back into the filter. It should avoid and serious mini-cycles.
Good Luck!
Good Luck!
dreeves
Active Member
When you change your pads...you are taking nitrifying bacteria out of the system. Get pads in which you can rinse, and just rinse them in saltwater...freshwater will kill the bacteria.
Also you can add an additional filter for the sole purpose of augmenting the primary filter...i.e...an aquaclear 300 or 500 with only bio-balls in it...something to that effect, additionally, you will have some protection in the event of primary filter break down...
Also you can add an additional filter for the sole purpose of augmenting the primary filter...i.e...an aquaclear 300 or 500 with only bio-balls in it...something to that effect, additionally, you will have some protection in the event of primary filter break down...
ophiura
Active Member
Yes. It is to clean out the gunk.
And it really depends on the style of filter. Things like aquaclear pads should not be replaced, IMO. But things where there is a filter pad with carbon in it, as in the case of Whispers or Penguins which have some sort of other biological filter (the biowheels, the sponge biofilter in newer model whispers and tetratecs) are different, IMO. At least in whispers, you can replace the carbon and really clean out the filter sleeve (in old tank water). But penguin filter cartridges are really not meant to stay in the filter indefinitely, unlike aquaclears, and I have rinsed them and then cut them open, and my, there is a lot of gunk in there that remains. The biowheels are the primary biological filter on those.
Realistically, however, in most tanks of this size that are not overstocked, the LR can handle a good deal of the ammonia production, and simply changing a filter pad should not result in a measurable ammonia spike, IMO. I believe the filtration on this tank- the penguin + LR- was marginal for the stocking/feeding going on, and so the loss of even a little bit of bacteria (on the filter pads) resulted in an ammonia spike.
When you consider all of the surfaces in a tank that grow bacteria, and they all will, you can see where replacing two filter pads (which are designed to be replaced), causing an ammonia spike is not typical.
There are people with 55g tanks with 50 lbs of LR who don't run a filter like this at all without problems. And thankfully some of the bioload of this tank is also reduced.
And it really depends on the style of filter. Things like aquaclear pads should not be replaced, IMO. But things where there is a filter pad with carbon in it, as in the case of Whispers or Penguins which have some sort of other biological filter (the biowheels, the sponge biofilter in newer model whispers and tetratecs) are different, IMO. At least in whispers, you can replace the carbon and really clean out the filter sleeve (in old tank water). But penguin filter cartridges are really not meant to stay in the filter indefinitely, unlike aquaclears, and I have rinsed them and then cut them open, and my, there is a lot of gunk in there that remains. The biowheels are the primary biological filter on those.
Realistically, however, in most tanks of this size that are not overstocked, the LR can handle a good deal of the ammonia production, and simply changing a filter pad should not result in a measurable ammonia spike, IMO. I believe the filtration on this tank- the penguin + LR- was marginal for the stocking/feeding going on, and so the loss of even a little bit of bacteria (on the filter pads) resulted in an ammonia spike.
When you consider all of the surfaces in a tank that grow bacteria, and they all will, you can see where replacing two filter pads (which are designed to be replaced), causing an ammonia spike is not typical.
There are people with 55g tanks with 50 lbs of LR who don't run a filter like this at all without problems. And thankfully some of the bioload of this tank is also reduced.