Habitat - Indoor :: How long until I give up

[snazzy]

on my filter?

Here is the history. I got the tank 4 months ago or so. It came with a submersed pump and filter. The filter portion (and maybe the pump - don't know - read on) was horrid. The water was piped above the tank to three different baskets. Each basket had one teeny tiny black filter thing that was about 3" by 6" by 1/4 inch thick. Needless to say that didn't work. I added the white floss stuff to each but even with that it would go green. I also added charcoal because of the smell (that worked!). Well, I have given up on this configuration as the water turned green (and no- not near a window) within three days.

Recently, I rigged up another filter - like a skippy pond filter - to go above the tank which I filled with scouring pads and a bit of the white floss using the pump I had (1200 liters/hour for a 190 liter tank). It waterfalls back into the tank through the charcoal and a thing of ammonia absorbing stuff. Still, the tank is turning green. It is a bio filter basically, so I have left the filter bucket alone although I have backwashed it a few times (read, every time I turn the pump off it empties because of gravity). I recently stopped feeding the greedy monsters in there so to reduce the bio load on the filter so we will see how that helps.

Today I did about an 80% water change (with conditioner) and I always add bacteria when I do any sort of water change. I don't know how long this will keep it clear. How long should I wait until I pronounce the filter I rigged up a failure?

And since I know it will be suggested. My tank is 40 gal for two 2 inch turtles. I am trying to re-home one of them (so far unsuccessfully) so I do not want to buy a bigger tank yet. We also may be building an outside pond (still working on convincing my husband that this is a good idea) so I don't want to invest in a bigger setup. No, a canister filter is not an option as there is no space anywhere near the tank to put it. The only space I have is above the tank.

[RunninWideOpen]

I'm a little unclear on what you have rigged up. It doesn't sound as though the water is forced through the scoring pads, but I may be wrong.

Are you sure you are not dealing with new tank syndrome? What bacteria are you adding when you do a water change? If it's after about 3 days, it sounds like a plume. Have you tried waiting it out for a few days to see if it goes away on its own?

I have very successfully used 2 cascading filters on a 55 gallon tank. These are the filters that hang over the side of the tank with a tube sticking down into the tank for input.

The idea is you need filtration rated for twice the size of your tank. So, I had 2 cascading filters rated at 60 gallons each. This worked very well. I still have to clean the bottom of the tank regularly to capture debris, but I only have to do a water change about every other month. I monitor the water quality with a kit and even after that long, the numbers are still good.

[RunninWideOpen]

PS: hehe, i saw your avatar. Your turtles will eat your pleco....it's just a matter of time. I had a couple pleco's last about 8 months before the turtles finally decided to eat them.

[marisa]

I'm not sure I'm understanding your Skippy clone----what are you using for biomedia (ceramic rings, lava rock, whatever)? The scouring pads would provide the mechanical filtration, the carbon would give chemical filtration, but you didn't say anything about biomedia...

If your water is chlorinated, then the dechlorinator is fine. But why do you keep adding bacteria to the water when your not doing a complete water change? It seems like overkill to me...

[snazzy]

The skippy wannabe works like this. Water is pumped into the bottom of a bucket. The bucket has a dead space for large debris to fall out, then it has scouring pads, then white floss stuff. The water enters at the bottom of the bucket is forced through the media and then overflows the top. I'd say the dead space is about 1 inch, the rest of the media is about 6 inches deep. As far as the media, the bottom layer of scouring pads and the dead space would be the mechanical, I guess. The white floss is also mechanical for the really small stuff. But, the rest of the scouring pads are biological since they don't get any sizable debris on them and all the bacteria can colonize there.

I might be overkilling it on the bacteria - just not sure what I am supposed to do. The box said to use 10 mils for every water change - I didn't know it was only for complete water changes.

So I am confused - is an algae plume a part of the tank cycling process? How long does it usually take a tank to cycle?

Thanks!

[marisa]

I briefly looked at the directions for making the Skippy. From what the description says, it take 4-8 weeks to cycle and the water can go from green to clean. How recently have you rigged up the filter?

[snazzy]

very recently - I saw that too on the skippy site - just wasn't sure that applied for a tank. Still, I am leaving the skippy wanna be alone for a while. This water change it has done better so maybe it is coming around. Still though, I am limiting the light to the setup to see if it makes a difference.