Water Changing?

[Chrs]

How would I do a water change on my 20 gallon tall tank? Do I add new water in to the tank and then put water condition in? Do I have to put water in a bucket then treat and put the water in the tank?

 

[greenscooby]

Either way is fine, personally i add to the bucket before re-filling the tank, that way i know my water is safe.

 

[OldMan47]

I always start by draining some of my water out of the tank into a bucket. After that I treat the new water in the bucket and siphon it back into the tank.

 

[AdAndrews]

as above, i would never tip tap water into the tank and then treat, always into a bucket, dechlorinate and then fill

 

[CherryDanio]

Likewise we treat and temp match in the bucket so non-dechlorinated water never goes in the tank.

 

[Tolak]

Most of my tanks have overflows for water changes. I hose it in straight from the tap, matching water by feel. Once it drains to the overflow level I add dechlor.

 

[Hiya70310]

You add tap water in with the fish??? I thought the whole point of treating the water was to not allow all the metals and water ever else I'm treating the water for to be allowed to get to the fish. Anway I have a 20 gallon and I have a plastic container that holds 10 gallons that I fill with tap water I treat the water in that and I make sure the water is the right temp. You guys said you siphon the water back into your tanks how. I have just been scooping the water out of my container with a bucket and then just kinda gently dumping ( as gentle as dumping can be) it back into the tank. Siphoning just sounds alittle less stressful for the fishies.

 

[OldMan47]

It is simple if the bucket is small enough. I lay a board across the top of the tank frame and start the siphon. I actually have a bucket tall enough that I can use my gravel cleaning tube as the siphon. No way I would try to lift 10 gallons of water up that high though.

 

[waterdrop]

You add tap water in with the fish??? I thought the whole point of treating the water was to not allow all the metals and water ever else I'm treating the water for to be allowed to get to the fish. Anway I have a 20 gallon and I have a plastic container that holds 10 gallons that I fill with tap water I treat the water in that and I make sure the water is the right temp. You guys said you siphon the water back into your tanks how. I have just been scooping the water out of my container with a bucket and then just kinda gently dumping ( as gentle as dumping can be) it back into the tank. Siphoning just sounds alittle less stressful for the fishies.

Lots and lots of members just shoot tap water straight into the tank in some manner or another. There are a few factors to consider. If your tap water has ammonia in it then its better to revise your water changes down to being smaller and more frequent, to allow greater dilution of the ammonia when new water goes in. If your tap water tests with zero ammonia then that's not a concern. The water temperature and the "conditioning" (removal of chlorine or chloramine) are factors and the size of water change you are doing makes a difference for these two factors. The larger and more estabished the tank, the less you'd have to worry about smaller percentage changes. The smaller and newer the tank, the more it makes sense to be careful about these two factors. For instance, for a 10% change in a large established tank, shooting in cold, unconditioned water probably wouldn't bother a thing, especially if you don't have any expensive sensitive fish!

For beginner's though, with relatively new tanks, being careful to condition and to temp match roughly with your hand is a really good and cheap insurance. Now personally, what I do is hook up my Python hose to the sink faucet (after half the tank water has been gravel-cleaned out) and I start refilling with temp matched tap water going directly into the tank. Right at the start of the refill I dump in half the conditioner needed to treat the whole tank volume. Near the end of the fill or after its over, I splash in the other little bit of a capful that represents the other half of the conditioner needed. That's just my little habit and it seems to work fine for me. Big water changes are great. I like to think of all that nice fresh water going in there with a fresh supply of Calcium, Magnesium and other goodies in trace amounts, and that's after all sorts of -excess- traces and organics have been removed, which is good.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[Chrs]

perfect, waterdrop!