Water staining from mopani wood

[Onyx!]

Edit: OK I feel like a real dummy now. Only after posting did it occur to me that I could use the "search" feature for similar topics. Apparently there is nothing other than water changes and carbon filter changes that will help. Both of which I've been trying for a couple of months now I guess I'll just have to wait it out!

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Hello, in the past few months I've just started keeping an aquarium again for the first time in several years. I like to use natural wood in my aquariums, but of course then you get the yellowish staining of the water. I know that having tannins in the water is beneficial, but even though I boiled the wood that I currently have in my tank and then soaked it for a week, it still stains the water really badly. The wood I have is actually not mopani (I can't remember exactly what the package said... for some reason cypress springs to mind) but it stains the water the same way that mopani does.

I don't mind a bit of a tint to the water, but right now it's really making my tank look awful :/ Is there anything I can do to help clear the water?

-Onyx

 

[OrangeCones]

Welcome, Onyx!

The fish won't mind the tannins, and you found the way to remove them. It just takes time and lots of water changes

What size tank do you have? What kind of fish? Got a picture to share?

 

[Onyx!]

No my fish won't mind, only I do It's hard to enjoy them when they look like they are swimming around in tea! And it always irks me that on water change day the water ends up looking worse, not better, because I apparently stir up more stuff from the gravel that stains the water even worse.

I just have a 15 gallon bow front, planted with wisteria, rota and moneywort. For fish I have a female betta, a sword, two variatus platys (though after I got them home I realized they kind of look a bit... deformed :/), a panda cory, a peppered cory, two long finned zebra danios, and a dwarf gourami. And, the star of the tank, my crazy female guppy and her squad of monster offspring. Whom I'm going to have to set up another tank for pretty soon, I think.

I've got an aquaclear filter that's good for up to 30 gallons and it currently has the sponge insert, a carbon insert and a zeolite/carbon insert. I usually change the carbon insert once a week when I do the partial water change. On top I have two light strips, with lifeglo bulbs. I kind of wish I had got a longer and lower tank rather than this one, which is taller and shorter. The light seems to have a harder time reaching the plants, especially with the tannins in the water, and while the ones I have currently are growing well the cabomba and sword I tried didn't thrive (though this was before I added the second light).

I don't have any pictures, sadly :c I don't actually have a camera, though I keep meaning to pick one up one of these days!

Anyways that's enough about me for now