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Re: Changing Water

Changing Water, now that's one I can get my syphon into. 

	How much rainfall is there in the area of native habitat ? From all the collectors I have spoken with and the weather reports, it appears that three to 5 meters of rain per year is not unusual in the rain forest habitat. Streams are usually small and ever flowing. So if we were to mimic the natural habitat, our water changes would come very often and on a regular basis. 100% daily would be optimum. In practice that requires very large storage of chlorine free water and a lot of work for the hobbyist. 

	When I am interested in making a lot of fry from a breeding group of fish, I change all the water in the breeding tank once a week. I keep a 55 gal plastic drum of treated water ready for use all the time. 55 gallons changes about half my fish room. Once filled and treaded I am ready to change the second half of the room. 
	If you take Ed Warners advice, once a week the fish and/or fry are dumped into a net and the holding tank is rinsed and refilled and the fish are replaced. I leave the mops and plants etc. in place, just  syphon out the water, collect the fry and refill the tank. Big breeders use very large reservoirs of cleaned, filtered water for re-circulation through their systems.

	If one leaves the water in the tank too long and the pH drops very much say to around 4 or less  - a complete fresh water change will likely kill all the fish in the tank -  leaving the pH 4 water in the tank for long will kill the fish also, decaying excess food and fish waste generates a progressive acid environment. Nothing said about ammonia, it isn't important, it is the lowering of pH that causes the problems. 

	The solution  -   Change as much of your water as often as you can!
and the water which one has most of is the best water to use, because you will use it more often. Hardness and dissolved solids come in a long second to FRESH!

Back to change some more water. . . .

Charles Harrison



>
>Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2000 22:30:11 -0800
>From: "Mark Francis" <fishes at lynx_net>
>Subject: changing water
>
>Just how much water should you change in your killifish tank.
>Also , how offen should you change the water.-once a week or month.
>

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