how long has your tank been set up? if it looks like someone dumped a glass of milk in it, it could be a bacteria bloom. bacteria blooms are indications that a tank is cycled and the nitrobacter and nitrosomona is established in the gravel bed. bacteria blooms will not harm any occupants of the tank. some people will not experience bacteria blooms though.
have you done anything to the tank to send it into a mini cycle? adding alot of fish at once or doing a drastic water change or vaccuming too much of the gravel could send the tank into a mini cycle which could give you a bloom.
it looks like some ones put ilk in it. and i just added 8 feeder fish that my needlenose gar was going to eat but he has not ate 1 thought? will that harm my fish?
putting that many feeder fish at once in the tank could have given you a mini cycle. the milky color is usually a bacterial bloom. the bacteria colony has increased to handle the additional bio load on the tank. waht size is this tank? ime you experience more significant blooms in smaller tanks than in larger tanks.
as long as the cloudiness is not green in color, you should be fine. have you tested your water? that could be an indication of what is going on witht he tank.
you need to check the ammonia, nitrite and nitrate levels of the tank. i take readings of them every day and when they start to raise i do a water change. if they are all okay i do a water change every saturday. so they do get changed once a week. you also want to make sure that during water changes that you do not stick the vaccuum into the gravel too deep. just skim the top for the waste that accumulates there.
any lfs. test kits come in two types. one with the drops that you add to vials that you fill with water from your tank and test strips. test strips are dipped into a sample of the tank water and compared to the chart on the bottle. the test strips are easier to use. they are available at any pet store that carries aquarium supplies. some lfs will check your water for free also. make sure that you get the test results though.
