How Often Shud I Clean My Filter Out?

[raptorrex]

Why does my filter always reek? I change it more than twice a month. I'll change it, then the next morning it will smell awful again. Why?

What do you mean by 'change it'? Can you attempt to describe the smell; I know it's not easy, but have a go, it would help

add to the above question.. is the light close to the filter?

 

[Seshat Odair]

Why does my filter always reek? I change it more than twice a month. I'll change it, then the next morning it will smell awful again. Why?

What do you mean by 'change it'? Can you attempt to describe the smell; I know it's not easy, but have a go, it would help

add to the above question.. is the light close to the filter?

It will smell nasty almost like rotten fish, or nasty rotten fish water. I know that doesn't but make much since but it is hard to explain,, just smells nasty... By changing it I mean taking out the filter part (it is a blue square filter with charcole on the inside)
Plus my water usually stays cloudy, the guy at my LFS says I am feeding to much so I cut down and it did help a little but my fish seem to be eating up all the food and could eat more(if I would put it in.) I do water changes every week about 40%. What is my problem?

 

[fluttermoth]

It sounds like over-feeding to me.

Fish don't have any mechanism for telling them their stomach is full like we do, so they will just carry on eating and eating.

Remember that a fish's stomach is only the size of it's eye, so only feed them as much as they will eat in one or two minutes, once a day.

I expect your cloudy water is also related to over-feeding; or possibly you might be disrupting the bacteria that live in your filter.

Do you completely change the square part, or do you just wash it in tank water?

Do you use a gravel cleaner when you do your water changes? and do you remember to de-chlorinate every time?

Also, how big is the tank, how long has it been set up and what fish do you have?

The more information we have, the better we can help

 

[Harlequins]

only clean the filter media in aquarium water, the rest can be cleaned with sof detergent or notmal tapwater as these do not carry any filter bacteria

Never use detergent or tapwater to clean any part of the filter,has mentioned the filter inners contain a bio-film of micro-organisms and cleaning these out with the above mentioned will destroy them causing mini-spikes...

 

[raptorrex]

Why does my filter always reek? I change it more than twice a month. I'll change it, then the next morning it will smell awful again. Why?

What do you mean by 'change it'? Can you attempt to describe the smell; I know it's not easy, but have a go, it would help

add to the above question.. is the light close to the filter?

It will smell nasty almost like rotten fish, or nasty rotten fish water. I know that doesn't but make much since but it is hard to explain,, just smells nasty... By changing it I mean taking out the filter part (it is a blue square filter with charcole on the inside)
Plus my water usually stays cloudy, the guy at my LFS says I am feeding to much so I cut down and it did help a little but my fish seem to be eating up all the food and could eat more(if I would put it in.) I do water changes every week about 40%. What is my problem?

could you tell me what colour this "smelly" stuff is?

 

[Seshat Odair]

Why does my filter always reek? I change it more than twice a month. I'll change it, then the next morning it will smell awful again. Why?

What do you mean by 'change it'? Can you attempt to describe the smell; I know it's not easy, but have a go, it would help

add to the above question.. is the light close to the filter?

It will smell nasty almost like rotten fish, or nasty rotten fish water. I know that doesn't but make much since but it is hard to explain,, just smells nasty... By changing it I mean taking out the filter part (it is a blue square filter with charcole on the inside)
Plus my water usually stays cloudy, the guy at my LFS says I am feeding to much so I cut down and it did help a little but my fish seem to be eating up all the food and could eat more(if I would put it in.) I do water changes every week about 40%. What is my problem?

could you tell me what colour this "smelly" stuff is?

the "smelly stuff" is my filter. When the filter is dirty and needs changed it is brown(when clean it is blue.) Am I doing something wrong, or what is the problem here. Usually filters dont stink after a day, i hope...

 

[raptorrex]

Why does my filter always reek? I change it more than twice a month. I'll change it, then the next morning it will smell awful again. Why?

What do you mean by 'change it'? Can you attempt to describe the smell; I know it's not easy, but have a go, it would help

add to the above question.. is the light close to the filter?

It will smell nasty almost like rotten fish, or nasty rotten fish water. I know that doesn't but make much since but it is hard to explain,, just smells nasty... By changing it I mean taking out the filter part (it is a blue square filter with charcole on the inside)
Plus my water usually stays cloudy, the guy at my LFS says I am feeding to much so I cut down and it did help a little but my fish seem to be eating up all the food and could eat more(if I would put it in.) I do water changes every week about 40%. What is my problem?

could you tell me what colour this "smelly" stuff is?

the "smelly stuff" is my filter. When the filter is dirty and needs changed it is brown(when clean it is blue.) Am I doing something wrong, or what is the problem here. Usually filters dont stink after a day, i hope...

asking about the colour, was to see if you had a algae problem (same with the light possition question). that's green (ish) and smelly.

brown and smelly. perhaps you might look at getting a filter, with a bigger capacity? there may be, just, too much load.

 

[Seshat Odair]

Alright, I got some new(better) filters to try out(the old ones were cheap) and some water clarifier. We will see what happens, Thanks

 

[Aqua Tom]

Your problem is definitely overfeeding. I used to feed twice a day but have cut this to just once. Dont feel guilty about the fish still wanting more food as they will always want more no matter how much you feed them (like my kids).


Tom

 

[Seshat Odair]

Your problem is definitely overfeeding. I used to feed twice a day but have cut this to just once. Dont feel guilty about the fish still wanting more food as they will always want more no matter how much you feed them (like my kids).


Tom

I have two young discus 1 bala shark 3 tetras adn 2 dwarf gouriami's. Will one frozen nutrition cube be enough daily?

 

[Smells a bit fishy]

Your problem is definitely overfeeding. I used to feed twice a day but have cut this to just once. Dont feel guilty about the fish still wanting more food as they will always want more no matter how much you feed them (like my kids).


Tom

I have two young discus 1 bala shark 3 tetras adn 2 dwarf gouriami's. Will one frozen nutrition cube be enough daily?

How big is your tank? Bala sharks need to be kept in groups of 6 minimum, and grow up to 35cm. Minimum size tank is 6'x2'x2'.

And to answer the question, is the block bigger than their eyes put together? As that is all they need, I feed my fish a small pinch of flake, and I have far more fish than that

I would also highly suggest you rehome the bala and discus, as discus require great knowledge in fish keeping, and are one of the hardest fish to keep because of their demands. They need to have the absolute correct PH Gh and Kh not sure what they are off hand. And I really do hope you did a fishless cycle, if not these will die very very quickly

Oh also up the number of tetra to 6-10 as they are a schooling fish

 

[raptorrex]

Your problem is definitely overfeeding. I used to feed twice a day but have cut this to just once. Dont feel guilty about the fish still wanting more food as they will always want more no matter how much you feed them (like my kids).


Tom

I have two young discus 1 bala shark 3 tetras adn 2 dwarf gouriami's. Will one frozen nutrition cube be enough daily?

How big is your tank? Bala sharks need to be kept in groups of 6 minimum, and grow up to 35cm. Minimum size tank is 6'x2'x2'.

And to answer the question, is the block bigger than their eyes put together? As that is all they need, I feed my fish a small pinch of flake, and I have far more fish than that

I would also highly suggest you rehome the bala and discus, as discus require great knowledge in fish keeping, and are one of the hardest fish to keep because of their demands. They need to have the absolute correct PH Gh and Kh not sure what they are off hand. And I really do hope you did a fishless cycle, if not these will die very very quickly

Oh also up the number of tetra to 6-10 as they are a schooling fish

the tank is 60L!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! about enough room for the tetras and gurami. no progress here till the problems below are sorted.

over fed , over stocked and under filtered. probably not, fully, cycled either. as the OP refuses to confirm, or show water stats.

 

[fluttermoth]

60L!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! about enough room for the tetras and gurami. no progress here till the problems below are sorted.

over fed , over stocked and under filtered. probably not, fully, cycled either. as the OP refuses to confirm, or show water stats.

No, the OPs tank is 60l; Seshat hasn't told us how large their tank is (yet; let's hope they come back with some more info).

 

[Seshat Odair]

My tank is 36Gallons, I have one filtering system that came with the tank. The bala shark can go to a friends tank when he outgrows mine, No i did not buy this fish with intentions of giving it away, the pet store didn't tell me how big it would get so now im stuck with it. The Discus should do fine in my 36 along with the gouriami's that don't get very large. Also have 4 snails to keep algae down. The water has gotten much clearer since I did a 50% water change. And bought better filters.

 

[fluttermoth]

You should really re-home the bala shark now; how will you know whether it's being stunted or not? They should also be kept in a group as they are a very skittish fish.

36 gallon is not large enough for discus, plus both them and the tetras should be in shoals of 6+

Did you move the old filter media when you bought new filters? What temperature are you running the tank at?