Arghhh Power Cut

[andyM]

Since 10 o'clock last night my power has been out. It has been nearly 12 hours so far and the leccy company reckon another 3-4 hours yet. I'm not to worried about the temp as its very warm and the tank has been running slightly over temp for the last week any way. What does worry me is the filter, its an external canister. How long can the bacteria survive with no water flow? Any thing i can do to help them survive. The tank is the 25g in my sig, and has been running now for about 2 years.

 

[bigfish]

Wot a bummer!!! just make sure the pads stay moist and do not dry out. Might be handy to add a bacteria culture to the tank when the power eventually comes on. Oh and don't feed your fish until power does come back on otherwise you will experience nitrite spike (becoz obviously the filter will not remove waste when its dead)

Hope everything goes well.

Good Luck

 

[andyM]

Thanks for the reply bigfish. Yes the filter media is still wet, the canister is still full of water. I had already fed them a while b4 the power went so i won't feed again. Any ideas how long the bacteria can survive with no flowing water? The leccy company told me 3-4 hours from 10 last night and it;s still off, so i don't trust them to have done very quickly today.

 

[appleblossom]

when transporting filter media you should bag it up with tank water, add some poo etc from a gravel vacuum and add some of those little white oxygenating tablets to give the bacteria a supply of food and oxygen.

Maybe you can do something similar in the water surrounding the filter media in your cannister to try and keep the bacteria alive? With no water flow they wont have any food supply or oxygen getting to them so you can try and do that for them.

 

[fruity]

It must be this horrendous rain, I arrived at my in laws house to collect my son last night and my brother in law was at his neighbours - another power cut (surrey). When he spotted my car, he came back and dragged me round to this house as the power cut was caused by rain water getting in the sockets and they have a massive fish tank!!! (the owners on holiday for another week)....

We managed to get hold of a sparky who dried out some wiring in the loft (rain coming in) and got power back to the tank within about 4-5 hrs.

I am going to pop round with an ammonia kit (bought this morning) and test their water tonight.

Didnt feed the fish last night or this morning (I remember reading that in a book, thank god!!!)

Fx (off to invest in a generator for my house!)

 

[FishDan]

Your bacteria are fine, so long as they are wet. They will probably survive mostly intact for about 48 hours. After that, they start to "hibernate" but a die off begins at about the same time. Most of your bacteria will survive just fine, assuming they remain wet. The bacteria in your tank will also do a good job of supporting your fish. In short, unless your power is going to be out a very extended amount of time (several days) I would not even start to worry about the bacteria.

\Dan

 

[andyM]

Thanks for the replys all, power cam back on after about 15 hours in total. Fish all seem fine.

 

[nightlife20]

i was going to advise a water change... but im not sure that would be a good idea...


all i can suggest is monitor you water parims to catch anythin before it gets to high.