Vacuums w/o Water Changes

chichian

Medium Fish
Jun 17, 2005
80
0
0
Las Vegas, NV, USA
#1
Hey all. It seems that my tank is dirty even w/1-2 water changes a week. I try to get up as much gunk as a can, but the hornwort seems to collect a lot, and I can never get it all up. So, I was wondering if anyone had tried any of those vacuums (usually driven by a water pump or air pump) that didn't extract water, so that I can really clean up the debris collecting on the hornwort.

I found this one at Drs Fosters and Smith:
http://www.drsfostersmith.com/product/prod_display.cfm?pcatid=4039&N=2004+113160.
In theory, the concept should work, but in practice, I'm not sure if it's just a waste of my money or not.

Thanks all in advance. :)
 

etres

Medium Fish
Sep 1, 2004
54
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texas
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#2
I tried this and wasn't impressed with the results. Seems the bag is not perfect and all the gunk ended up back in the tank about 1/2 way thru.
I now just use a smaller diameter water vacuum so it doesn't remove the water so fast.
You however, may have better results with the other type.
 

revfred

Superstar Fish
Jun 21, 2003
1,414
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St. Paul, MN
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#3
Yes, a waste of money. As etres says, the bag mesh is not fine enough and the junk goes back into the water. The smaller diameter siphon works well.

Also, if your hornwort is collecting junk and even with 1-2 water changes a week is still dirty, you might want to check the amount you are feeding. Also are you cleaning your filter media regularly as well.
 

chichian

Medium Fish
Jun 17, 2005
80
0
0
Las Vegas, NV, USA
#4
Oh thanks. It seemed like a good idea but if it's hokey then good thing I didn't order it yet :).

I think I'm feeding okay, but maybe I am overdoing it. I feed once in the morning and once a little before the lights go out. Usually a few pinches of flake or a few shakes of freeze-dried bloodworms, 1/3 to 3/4 an algae wafer (I break it into smaller pieces so I can spread them out), and either 2 shrimp pellets or 1 Hikari sinking wafer. Maybe this is too much, but it seems hard to make sure everyone gets enough. There doesn't seems to be much left when I watch them eat--except for maybe the shrimp pellets and Hikari sinking wafer since they don't seem to be that popular and take longer to dissolve... so I don't get to see the entire thing eaten. I wanted the bottom feeders to get protein though, so maybe I just won't put the algae wafer parts in to force them to eat the meaty ones. Then 1-2x a week I feed frozen food (1 defrosted cube). That seems to go pretty quick. When I feed frozen, then I just drop 1 algae wafer in (broken in 2-3 pieces to spread it out), since the bottom guys don't seem to get much if any of the frozen food.

The filter media--maybe not often enough. I normally just look at it once or twice a week and see if it's dirty. When it's covered in gunk, I replace it (normally lasts maybe 1-3 weeks). In the first layer of the filter I have the normal Pengiun filter you buy for them with the carbon taken out and in the second media container some floss.

Thanks again. I will try all the suggestions. I will feed less (of the sinking food, since I don't think I'm feeding too much flake), check and change the filter media more often, and get the smaller diameter vacuum.

Thanks ;)
 

Orion

Ultimate Fish
Moderator
Feb 10, 2003
5,803
3
38
Kentucky
www.thefishcave.net
#6
Sounds like you need to cut back on your feeding if your getting that much waste. Left over food isn't always the problem, but the waste from the fish are. More food=More Poo=More vacuming to get it out.

Fine leaved plants like hornwart are known for getting debris stuck in them.
 

chichian

Medium Fish
Jun 17, 2005
80
0
0
Las Vegas, NV, USA
#7
Cutlass said:
Can't you attach something like a plastic sandwich baggie to the siphon instead of the mesh? Or does it have to allow water to flow through?
Oh yeah, it had to let the water flow through so that only the gunk was collected and it left the water in the tank. I already take out ~20 gallons during water changes, and the flow rate on the vaccum is so fast it seems like there's not enough time to get all the debris off the hornwort. So the idea of getting one of these little water-changeless vacuums was like a way that I could take my time and get all the gunk off the hornwort.

Orion said:
Fine leaved plants like hornwart are known for getting debris stuck in them.
Yeah! The marimo balls hardly collect anything and those were supposed to get dirty too. The biggest problem seems to be hornwort nearest the filters. I think the filters are trying to get up all the gunk, but as the water passes by the hornwort, it does the job for them. The pieces that are further away from the filter intakes aren't really that messy. The substrate too really isn't that bad. It's just those giant pieces of hornwort that are threatening to take over the entire tank that are near the filters :)
 

NoDeltaH2O

Superstar Fish
Feb 17, 2005
1,873
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SC
#8
Also, you may want to feed with a turkey baster, especially with the frozen foods. With the frozen bloodworms and frozen brine shrimp I feed, I use the turkey baster to shoot food around where everybody can get some, that way I don't have to overfeed the top fish to get food to the bottom fish.
 

Cutlass

Large Fish
May 16, 2003
217
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Galloway, OH
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#9
chichian said:
Oh yeah, it had to let the water flow through so that only the gunk was collected and it left the water in the tank. I already take out ~20 gallons during water changes, and the flow rate on the vaccum is so fast it seems like there's not enough time to get all the debris off the hornwort. So the idea of getting one of these little water-changeless vacuums was like a way that I could take my time and get all the gunk off the hornwort.
hmmm. I'm not sure how the vacuums work, but if it's driven by an air pump maybe run the air line through a gang valve so you can restrict the airflow and perhaps slow down the vacuum rate.
 

TLH

Large Fish
Jun 27, 2005
703
1
0
Northants;England
#11
I don't like Air Vacuums either.I have just the normal syphon vacuum.You can just syphon into a bucket,leave it for an hour or two,to settle,then jug the water back into the tank being careful to leave the crud on the bottom.
 

chichian

Medium Fish
Jun 17, 2005
80
0
0
Las Vegas, NV, USA
#13
Thanks again for suggestions.

I've already cut back on feeding. I decided when I feed frozen, I'm only feeding once that day too.

I will get a turkey baster soon and try that for food distro and spot cleaning (good idea!!!). I don't like shopping much, unless it's to a pet store or online, but I'll try to make it to Walmart or Target this week (unfortuneately, I'll wait until the house shopping list gets bigger).

RE: Food Distro via Turkey Baster
Does this actually work? I normally dump in the defrosted food in little dumps and let it fall to the bottom (in a bunch of different places), while it's falling of course the tetras, swords, and betta get some, but a lot does make it to the bottom. Today I noticed the SAE's are pretty good now at getting some when it falls to the bottom 1/3 of the tank. The loaches and corys however, even when it's on the bottom don't seem to find it easily (even when it's right NEXT to them or IN FRONT of them) before the super-speedy-greedy swordtails!!! I'll still try to turkey baster, but it seems it's more a matter of speed than area. The swordtails are FAST when it comes to food!!! Luckily the tetras don't eat off the bottom, and at first the betta didn't, but now he's stooped down to looking for defrosted yummies in near the bottom (caught in plants, or on the substrate). The greedy betta is pretty slow and graceful though still, so he's not stealing that much from the corys and loaches.

... ah if only the swordtails weren't so pretty

TLH said:
You can just syphon into a bucket,leave it for an hour or two,to settle,then jug the water back into the tank being careful to leave the crud on the bottom.
You know, I never thought of this. That's a pretty good idea. I think I may be too impatient though to wait :). Perhaps instead I could get a piece of cloth and use that to filter the gunk out when I dump it back in.... or hey, maybe I can just take some floss and swirl it around in the bucket... or swirl it directly around the hornwort!!! Sorry... thinking out-loud.

etres said:
Would that really qualify as clean water?
Not fresh water, but I think it would count as your own "mechanically filtered" water :).