bogwood coloured water

[shymonkey]

Hi all, i put some bogwood that i have been soaking in my tank the other day and it has sent all the tank water brown , is there anything i can use to help clear the water apart from doing water changes, i don,t have a carbon filter just one that uses sponges. thanks

 

[gadazobe]

The brown colour is tannin and the only way to remove it is water changes. It's not harmful for the fish, in fact some people like it. Just know that it takes ages and ages to stop leaching colour. Maybe your best best is to remove the wood and soak it for a few days, changing the water every day, and then replace it in the tank once most of the colour has come out.

 

[Dragonslair]

Tannin also does add a little acidity to the water, just to beware.
If you want to rid the colour you will need to invest in some good high quality grade carbon. This is then placed in a net bag after following the cleaning instructions and placed in your filter. It will keep on working for a few weeks and slowly clear the colouring.
However gadazobe is right in saying soak it for a few days.
Another method is to place the lump of wood in a deep saucepan and cover it over with water, add a couple of tablespoonful of salt and boil it for 30 minutes and then place it in a bucketful of water overnight.

 

[Aquascaper]

The more you boil the wood the faster the tannins will leach out.

HTH

 

[K-Holed]

if you have a canister type filter you can get a poly filter. It just looks like a flat piece of hard fome. These remove prety much everything from the water. My "friend" put red food colouring into his dad's 6' discus tank when drunk and I used one of these on it before his dad got back. It took about 24 hours ... kinda funny in retrospect.