Tank Maintenance

[sdlTBfanUK]

Up until now I have been doing weekly maintenance which includes rinsing the 2 sponges from the filter in the removed tank water. The past few weeks the rinsing of the sponges  turns the removed water (which is discarded anyway so not important) really really dirty/grimey. I changed one of the sponges in case that was part of the problem but that hasn't made any difference. The only thing that I can put this down too is that I am over-run with shrimps, so I may need to up my culling each week (2 at present).

The tank water looks fine and the parameters are still perfect/stable but I obviously need to do something.

I am thinking of rinsing the sponges half way between the weekly maintenance but don't want really to change anything in the tank that may cause a problem or stress, so I was considering getting 2 litres of TAPWATER (unfiltered but dechlorinated) to literally just squeeze the sponges in and then discard the water. Is this going to be safe for everything, bacteria etc, even though it is different water to the tank water - I would squeeze out as much of the then dirty tap water as possible before putting the sponges back in place in the tank so it shouldn't affect the water parameters/TDS etc as there won't be any changed water in the tank? 

The shrimps are breeding too well I guess so I am going to have to start culling more I guess, but that I will think about separately over the holiday period to start in the new year..........

All thoughts/advice will be gratefully received.

Simon

[jayc]

The answer is upgrade your filtration to a canister filter. Clearly an air sponge is no longer enough.

Edited December 22, 2018 by jayc

[sdlTBfanUK]

Thanks JayC, not sure I want to go that route (have looked at what my supplier has) as a bit too much involved, but I will mull that over the holiday period. I have 2 of the cheapie sponge types in the tank at the moment and I see dennerle do a 'hang on' type of filter but by the size of it I am not sure that will be any better (filter media can't be any bigger) than what I am already using? I guess it would be easier too keep the media clean as it isn't in the tank but that would come back to my original concern at using dechlorinated tap water to clean the media in????? A big unit is impractical as I don't have anywhere near the tank to keep it so would mean moving the whole tank etc, and thats not happening!

Tomorrow will be the half way between maintenance so I will probably try what I was proposing and just keep my fingers crossed that rinsing the sponges in dechloirnated tap water won't cause any problems with the sponges bacteria etc. I guess I shouldn't be too nervous about experimenting as I wouldn't have got this far without it? I will plan to up the culling in 2019 and hopefully that may also help! Friend is coming sunday so maybe I can give him a load to feed his fish..............

Simon