25% Water Change

[derekgsw]

I have just carried out 25% water change as an ammonia reading was .50 at the same time i put in a under water filter which has a sponge filter the filter that is built into the tank has a filter like a thick piece of felt about about 18cm long and i washed that out in the old water.
I am telling you all this as it is my first water change and im just praying its ok

 

[KittyKat]

You would be wanting to do more like 50-75%, if the reading was 0.5 ppm to start with. Ammonia should be kept as low as possible and never allowed to rise above 0.25 ppm.

Yes, it is fine to rinse filter sponges in old tank water, that is how all of us clean them. If you clean them under tap water, you will kill the bacteria.

 

[derekgsw]

You would be wanting to do more like 50-75%, if the reading was 0.5 ppm to start with. Ammonia should be kept as low as possible and never allowed to rise above 0.25 ppm.

Yes, it is fine to rinse filter sponges in old tank water, that is how all of us clean them. If you clean them under tap water, you will kill the bacteria.

Thank you for your advice

 

[Caprichoso]

Ammonia present=75% water change 2x per day every day until ammonia is at 0.
No ammonia= weekly water change of 50%.

If you follow this with weekly gravel vac/filter rinse, you will have much success with your tank.

 

[KittyKat]

Ammonia present=75% water change 2x per day every day until ammonia is at 0.
No ammonia= weekly water change of 50%.

If you follow this with weekly gravel vac/filter rinse, you will have much success with your tank.

Still, the vast majority of fishkeepers have equal success with different maintenance schedules.

 

[drobbyb]

Maybe so, but for beginners this guideline works. After you get some experience you can experiment to find what works for you and your tank. Each tank is different so it's always better to change too much water than too little.

 

[Bignose]

You would be wanting to do more like 50-75%, if the reading was 0.5 ppm to start with. Ammonia should be kept as low as possible and never allowed to rise above 0.25 ppm.

Yes, it is fine to rinse filter sponges in old tank water, that is how all of us clean them. If you clean them under tap water, you will kill the bacteria.

I disagree with both of these statements, or at the very least, both statements are incomplete.

0.25 ppm is not some magic number where all of a sudden it goes from okay to not okay. The concentration of ammonia that is dangerous is a strong function of pH and a weak function of the water temperature. See a more in depth discussion here: http/www.fishforums.net/index.php?/topic/154313-of-toxic-ammonia-charts/

I am not saying that 0.25 ppm is meaningless. Any level of ammonia exposure does seem to permanently weaken a fish's immune system (see a citation in the above link). But, 0.25 ppm in water of pH of 6.0 is significantly different than 0.25 ppm on ammonia in 8.0 pH water.

Also, if there is ammonia in the tap water, one could have 0.25 ppm or more even after a water change. If the tank is healthy, and more specifically is the bacterial filter colony is healthy, the bacteria should be able to process 0.25 ppm rather quickly. In this case, most people shouldn't have to get worked up about it.

And that leads to washing the filter with tap water. If the colony is healthy again, the concentration of chlorine or chloramine in the water is so very low that unless you run water over the sponge for a long continuous time, it isn't going to kill off a large percentage of the bacteria. The numbers of bacteria in the filter are going to be pretty large -- the chlorination is not designed to kill off that large of numbers of bacteria in the water. If the water company gets that large number of bacteria, they shut down.

This is further evidenced by the number of members here who do water changes without using any conditioner at all and have zero problems doing so. There is a very good discussion on this topic in the Scientific Section if you want more info.

All that said, water conditioner is cheap, and if you don't want to take any risk, rinse the sponge out only with tank water. It is the safest option, but the risk from not doing this is very small, in my opinion, and again if the tank has a good history of good health, all the better.

 

[KittyKat]

You would be wanting to do more like 50-75%, if the reading was 0.5 ppm to start with. Ammonia should be kept as low as possible and never allowed to rise above 0.25 ppm.

Yes, it is fine to rinse filter sponges in old tank water, that is how all of us clean them. If you clean them under tap water, you will kill the bacteria.

I disagree with both of these statements, or at the very least, both statements are incomplete.

[...]

All very fair points, you made there. Now, I will explain why I said what I did

I use 0.25 because it is a number which seems to cover the vast majority of cases (regardless of other factors involved), and as you say, any ammonia at all can harm fish so it makes sense to be on the safe side, especially since we do not have any details about the set-up.

For the tap water, I realise that the bacteria concentrations are high in the filter [and even I do not always use dechlorinator for smaller water changes], but we are talking about an unestablished filter here and one which could potentially consist of a 1*1*1 inch sponge, for all we know. And to be fair, rinsing a 1*1*1 inch sponge in a bucket of chlorinated water will probably kill a large proportion of bacteria on it (for example, unlike on a large sponge from an external filter). So again, I am trying to be on the safe side here.

The reason I do not go into such detail immediately, is because anyone who does enough research will come across it eventually, while anyone who doesn't, is probably best off not knowing that some of the boundaries are quite as liquid as they are and some of the rules are extremely flexible. Everything depends on the individual situation.