No WC tanks

[PygmyPepperJulli]

Hi all,

(sorry mods if this is in the wrong spot, wasn't sure where to put it)
Just wondering whether anyone here does no water changes, or very few? Accidentally stumbled upon a Father Fish video today (I'd heard of him, but never watched) and while what he said did make sense about nature and no wc, I also understand and practice the other more accepted point of view (wc are important etc.) As I'm setting up a new tank currently (well, fixing it, but I'll get there) was wondering whether to try this method and see how it goes.
The method- basically, never water change, stuff your tank full of plants, get a bunch of leaves and stick etc from the local creek, stuff them in the water, done. Also, never feed your fish because the live organisms from the leaves and sticks and stuff will feed them.

Was just curious to see if anyone had any opinions/success about this method.

Link to the vid (does this contest with rule no. 5? I've broken that one before by accident, so if this is a problem really sorry).

EDIT- and if not this Father Fish method, if putting lots of nitrate absorbing plants in a tank anyway, do you still need to do large wc?

 

[10 Tanks]

Hello Pygmy. This type of tank is easy to set up. There's a book called "Never Change Your Fish Water Again" by D. Crosby Johnson. It steps you through what's called A "Terraphyte" tank. It uses a land plant called a Chinese Evergreen to filter the toxins out of the tank water. If set up correctly, you never need to perform a water change. I kept one of these tanks for several years and never changed out the water. I kept Guppies and a small species of Gouramie in it. The fish were fine. I eventually took the tank down, because the Chinese Evergreen is toxic to pets. Our cats were starting to get curious.

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[GaryE]

These systems often leave out info. You have a very limited choice of fish - only the toughest, and ideally anabantoids or livebearers. I tend to see guys like Father Fish as telling us what we want to hear, which can be very profitable.

How hard your water is, how buffered, what fish you want, how many fish - these are all factors glossed over. It's not a nature based system unless you have swamp origin fish, or fish that have gone into dry season survival mode (you make sure they never emerge from that).

When I was a kid, everyone believed in variations on these ideas, and I did no water changes for years. I had lovely stunted livebearers and short lived tetras galore. I got to buy fish all the time, with only one tank....

 

[Ichthys]

Water changes don’t just remove nitrates, they also replenish trace minerals. It’s a lot easier, and gives you much more scope, just to do he water changes and keep fish properly.

 

[Lcc86]

There's another youtuber, MD Tanks, who goes for minimal water changes (he says because he's lazy rather than following a specific method). His tanks are always incredibly heavily planted and regularly dosed with fertiliser, which I think helps as the plants do some of the work. He does also feed his fish, there's some benefit to having botanicals but they can't make up for things like proteins etc.

I don't agree with everything MD Tanks does but his low maintenance approach may be interesting to you, although doesn't make up for no water changes!

 

[10 Tanks]

Water changes don’t just remove nitrates, they also replenish trace minerals. It’s a lot easier, and gives you much more scope, just to do he water changes and keep fish properly.

These systems often leave out info. You have a very limited choice of fish - only the toughest, and ideally anabantoids or livebearers. I tend to see guys like Father Fish as telling us what we want to hear, which can be very profitable.

How hard your water is, how buffered, what fish you want, how many fish - these are all factors glossed over. It's not a nature based system unless you have swamp origin fish, or fish that have gone into dry season survival mode (you make sure they never emerge from that).

When I was a kid, everyone believed in variations on these ideas, and I did no water changes for years. I had lovely stunted livebearers and short lived tetras galore. I got to buy fish all the time, with only one tank....

Hello. The author kept African Cichlids in a 150 gallon tank for his setup. You can keep whatever fish you want to keep. The best system is a larger tank at least 55 gallons to allow the plant roots to grow. Here's a photo of a 100 trough with a large Evergreen plant. There are 12 large Goldfish in there. No water changes necessary. The plant roots are removing all the nitrogen. You just replace the water lost to evaporation with distilled water. The mineral levels remain steady. There's a bit more to the system than this, but the system works.
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[emeraldking]

Was just curious to see if anyone had any opinions/success about this method.

I can relate to this. For I'm basically like him.

 

[10 Tanks]

Hello again. Here's the "Terraphyte" tank setup in a small 45 gallon tank. This one keeps the roots in small spa baskets and leaves room for larger fish. As in the larger tank, there's no need for a water change, the roots of the terrestrial plant are using the dissolving nitrogen as soon as it becomes present in the water. No ammonia or nitrite and nitrates are below 10 ppm. The small bacteria colony uses the nitrates at night when the plant rests.

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[GaryE]

Many of my tanks look a lot like that terraphyte set up above water. I always allow for open water for the big picture of the tank though.

The fundamental assumption I make may be a radical one to people here. And that is that the API test kit is too limited to be important. It does what it does well, and measures what it measures well. But it has created a false sense of what matters within the hobby. There's a test kit tunnel vision at the moment.

The nitrogen cycle is just one process in a tank. How about fish communication hormone build up? Minerals that come with fresh water?

And so, I merrily change water in tanks with as many plants as that. I focus on designing tanks so that water flows as I want it to, so that fish behavioural needs are addressed and so that the plants inside the tank are as healthy as the ones on top. That terraphyte tank in the photo is made for the test kit, and not for the fish. It looks like Shrek is going to swim by any moment. It may have lovely water when it's in a tube with reagents, but it doesn't look like an environment I'd keep a fish in.

 

[Byron]

Here we go again...the individual is just plain wrong when he says water changes do not occur in nature--where has he lived all these years? No fish in any tropical stream lives in the same water from second to second. The flow however small changes the water. Nitrates have nothing to do with it. Water becomes less and less clean every second. It has to be replaced.

 

[10 Tanks]

Hello again. Technically, the water is being replaced, but only the water lost to evaporation. The oxygen content is constantly maintained by using air stones placed under the plant root system. The roots take in both macro and micro nutrients directly from the water as well removing all three forms of nitrogen. The fish live in near pure water conditions. The plant receives all the nutrients it needs from the fish and maintains livable conditions for the fish.

One item I do need to mention. The tank is open to accommodate the leaves growing up to the light source, so there's a considerable amount of evaporation. I would keep several gallons of distilled water to ensure the tank stays full.

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[GaryE]

Mentioning your top ups would have to be with distilled water is key info for any new aquarist stumbling across this posting and dreaming of their own swampy puddle.

It's simply silly to push these no WC systems to anyone who has made a habit of observing water in nature. You might be able to convince yourself of this if you live in a desert, but if you are surrounded by water, it pays to observe it.

 

[PygmyPepperJulli]

Sorry if I touched a controversial topic

Was only wondering because I like the idea of no/few/smaller water changes in my new (if it works) tank, but also didn't want to murder/ruin the lives of my fish and wondered if anyone had had success with this method. Going from the responses, I really want to try a combination of both- still do water changes, but smaller as I'm planning on heavily planting it and going riparium style with emersed plants anyway, and less frequent. Opinions? I had ideas on the ideas behind both POV on this topic, but wanted to ask the experts

PPJ

 

[10 Tanks]

Hello Gary. Yes, I understand your skepticism. I've heard this a lot. But, mostly from those who've never researched this type of aquarium, nor ever set one up. They're great tanks that definitely have their place in the hobby. It's mostly popular with those of us who like to work outside the box and research terrestrial plants that will adapt to an underwater environment. In particular, the Aglaonema from the rivers of the northwestern US. This area has some the purest rivers in the world and is the home to the "Ag" plant or Chinese Evergreen. I wasn't hard to convince of the possibilities of using this land plant as a natural filter and found after keeping several of them over the last 10 years or so, that they're so interesting and believe it or not they work.

To each his or her own.

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[CaptainBarnicles]

I think people who don't want to do water changes should choose a different hobby. I would prefer to drink fresh, clean water instead of just topping up and sipping from a glass I've had on the go for a year or more. Passing it through a filter, adding conditioners and a pothos for luck doesn't make it any more desirable. I'd prefer it from the natural spring but fresh from the tap will do. It's unfair to deny living creatures the same.

Youtubers like MD don't have their tanks set up for the long term like we do, his tanks reach their peak very quickly and then ripped out for the next project, he's a content creator after all. Just because it can be done doesn't mean that it should