Retirement and forum shutdown (17 Jan 2022)
Hi,
John Howell who has managed the forum for years is getting on and wishes to retire from the role of managing it.
Over the years, he has managed the forum through good days and bad days and he has always been fair.
He has managed to bring his passion for fish keeping to the forum and keep it going for so long.
I wish to thank John for his hard work in keeping the forum going.
With John wishing to "retire" from the role of managing the forum and the forum receiving very little traffic, I think we must agree that forum has come to a natural conclusion and it's time to put it to rest.
I am proposing that the forum be made read-only from March 2022 onwards and that no new users or content be created. The website is still registered for several more years, so the content will still be accessible but no new topics or replies will be allowed.
If there is interest from the ITFS or other fish keeping clubs, we may redirect traffic to them or to a Facebook group but will not actively manage it.
I'd like to thank everyone over the years who helped with forum, posted a reply, started a new topic, ask a question and helped a newbie in fish keeping. And thank you to the sponsors who helped us along the away. Hopefully it made the hobby stronger.
I'd especially like to thank John Howell and Valerie Rousseau for all of their contributions, without them the forum would have never been has successful.
Thank you
Darragh Sherwin
Did first water change this morning
- dolf_peeters (Dolf Peeters)
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I did my first waterchange this morning, it went as follow:
filled my 70Lt bucket with 37-38Ltrs of tap water,
added 1 cap(5ml) of 'Nutrafin Water Conditioner' as per instructions on bottle
added 2 caps(10ml) of 'Nutrafin biological aquarium supplement' as per instructions on bottle
added 2.5-3Ltrs of boiling water
checked temp 25C
Powered off pump and heating element
using a small container(havent got a vacium hose thingy just yet), scooped 2 buckets of water out of the tank
using same container, fed the new water back through the filter
Powered off pump and heating element.
Did I miss anything?
I did notice that the white cotton element ontop of my filter is already the colour or milky coffee, is this normal after only 12 days?
Dolf
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- Fishowner (Gavin fishowner)
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Gavin
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- sheag35 (Seamus Gillespie)
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Seamus
Fishkeeping the Only way to get wet and wild
currently 25 tanks, and breeding is the aim of everything i keep
location:Limerick
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- tm2204 (Thomas Maguire)
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Juwel would have us changing all the filters media every few weeks if you were to believe them....
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sponges i find soften in time and their ability to work is reduced thus need to be changed but this will differ from tank to tank as a lot of variables will be in action here eg numbers and types of fish would be a perfect example of these variables.
the only concern i would have is putting water directly in to the filter i would prefer a plate placed in the tank and the water poured over it. thus any any chlorine that has not been treated fully will not damage your bacteria growth.
Mickey Wallace & Cath Woods
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- Fishowner (Gavin fishowner)
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In fairness when it gets very dirty I do find a big difference in the tank when I replace them. I replace mine once every 2 or 3 months if possible and it does the business.(esp if you have plants and sand as substrate which stirs up easily,esp with two randy golden rams digging away!).
Gavin
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- dolf_peeters (Dolf Peeters)
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- Fishowner (Gavin fishowner)
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Also would do what Mickey says,put it into the tank nopt the filter,no need for the plate I find,slowly into the water and it will be fine,esp a deep tank like yours. Just dont pour it too quick or aggressively as it will push the substrate away or the fish. I put mine over a rock that I have in the tank and its fine,doesnt disturb anything.In fact the corys love the new water changes,they use it as a rollercoaster!
Gavin
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- tm2204 (Thomas Maguire)
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What I do is use my siphon hose (the one I use to siphon out the water) to siphon the new water into the tank. Stand your bucket ontop of the aquarium and siphon it in. Easy & safe...
Some of the fish love to swim directly into & stay in the new/fresh water. I used to find it was often a stimulus to get fish to spawn...
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- dolf_peeters (Dolf Peeters)
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03/11/2008 ~ 0 ~ 0 ~ 20 ~6.5(tap water)
03/11/2008 ~ 0 ~ 0.1 ~ 10 ~ 7.5 (Tank)
05/11/2008 ~ 0 ~ 0.1 ~ 20 ~ 8(Tank)
06/11/2008 ~ 0 ~ 0.1 ~ 20 ~ 8(Tank)
09/11/2008 ~ 0 ~ 0.1 ~ 20 ~ 8(Tank)
12/11/2008 ~ 0 ~ 0.1 ~ 20 ~ 8(Tank)
13/11/2008 9am water change
14/11/2008 11pm ~ 0 ~ 0.1 ~ 20 ~ 8(Tank)
14/11/2008 11pm ~ 0 ~ 0 ~ 10 ~6(tap water)
all still reading same after waterchange yesterday AM ?!?!? might take a sample to the petshop sunday incase I'm little slow and am doing the tests wrong

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