This guy preaching not using tank water to clean media

[duanes]

A few bidbits
To me it should be every aquarists responsibiliy to know their locations average chlorine (chloramine) residual for many reasons.
Its easy eough to get strips that give "ball park" individual assessments. And these tests shoud be done at minimum seasonally, because doseages change seasonally at your fish house.

Spring thaw and fall turn reservoir over, usually requires more dechlor.
Winter less.
Summer heat waves more.
Florida may require more , than pure lakes in Minnesota. There is no 1 size that fits all

If you live far from the water plants injection point, you may need much less dechlor during a water change.
I suually underdosed

The squares above of a strip I used, that say Total Chlorine , mean Chloramine

 

[RD.]

Thanks for the kind words, John. There was a time when I didn't pay a lot of attention to any of this either. When our city changed to chloramines I started paying much closer attention to the fine details.

 

[skjl47]

Hello; An interesting thing is regular water changes (WC) are sort of a gospel among aquarium keepers. Some with chloramines in the treated water use agents such as PRIME, SAFE or something similar and send tap water straight from a tap into a tank. I have some of the stuff on hand myself. Yet in this thread for post after post a high degree of concern over the potential danger of filter parts being rinsed with that same tap water. Not soaked in a bucket of the tap water to be sure. Rinsed and allowed to drip off. The sponge like media is squeezed to remove as much of that dreaded tap water.
OK some small amount of the tap water will cling to the rinsed parts. Can it be so much different that a 50% WC to use some PRIME or SAFE? In fact, I tend to do any filter cleaning at the same time I do a WC. Still even if the filter is cleaned on a different schedule a small dose of SAFE ought to take care of the dreaded residuals.
Still worried, put some PRIME/SAFE in a bucket and run tap water in that. Drop the rinsed filter parts into that bucket for a few, then reassemble and be on your way. Probably other ways to get around the worrisome issue. I have mentioned some already.

A few have ventured into the benefits of a clean filter/ filter media. The dogma of lightly swishing dirty filter material in a bucket of also just siphoned out old and still dirty tank water and then putting the gross and only minimally cleaned filter stuff back is use is not one I follow. Not sure what disaster I am supposed to be courting, but I have been cleaning my filters with a hose for a few decades now. I do not do a deep clean every month. Usually replace the "pillow stuffing" with new and check the reusable filter parts to see if they are clogged up. I only go the hose and deep clean route when needed.

The issue remaining is what % of BB colonies are lost. I do not have a number to throw out. As stated before there is not a biological mechanism I know of that restricts BB colonies to only filter media or even only filter parts. My take is any surface with a bit of flow touching it can hold BB colonies. I , the last few decades, tend to run a low-density stocking in my tanks. I get that BB adjust their populations to their nutrient source available (ammonia). I also get BB are not rapid reproducers as some other bacteria are. Again, if ammonia levels are a concern there are strategies we can use. We can get short term ammonia spikes simply be adding a bio load of new fish or not discovering a sizeable dead fish for a few days.

A few times I have had to break down and sanitize entire setups. Soaking tanks, gravel filters and all other equipment in a Clorox solution. Even with a lot of rinsing some Clorox remains. When I set the tank up again it gets dosed with SAFE/PRIME or the like. Seed the new setup with BB from another tank to get it up and running. Just do not see the need for all the hand wringing over using a hose to clean a nasty filter.

 

[RD.]

FYI…… when adding reducing agents such as Prime/Safe, while filling a tank with chloramine treated tap water, if one is dosing the reducing agent at a proper level, the reaction is instantaneous. I take that a step further, as I know does duanes , and add said reducing agent at different fill intervals while the tank is being filled. Not all at once. The chance of chlorine exposure to my fish will be zero. That’s the difference.

 

[RD.]

The hand wringing typically starts when someone who doesn’t understand the science involved, wipes out his/her bio bacteria and sends their tank into a bloom, or worse, wipes out their prize fish. I have personally seen both, with chloramine treated tap water, @ a level of 2 ppm.

 

[skjl47]

Can it be so much different that a 50% WC to use some PRIME or SAFE? In fact, I tend to do any filter cleaning at the same time I do a WC. Still even if the filter is cleaned on a different schedule a small dose of SAFE ought to take care of the dreaded residuals.

when adding reducing agents such as Prime/Safe, while filling a tank with chloramine treated tap water, if one is dosing the reducing agent at a proper level, the reaction is instantaneous. I take that a step further, as I know does .avatar--xss { width: 21px; height: 21px; line-height: 21px !important; margin-right: 2px; } duanes @duanes , and add said reducing agent at different fill intervals while the tank is being filled. Not all at once. The chance of chlorine exposure to my fish will be zero. That’s the difference.

Hello; You spell out a way to do a WC with little risk to the fish. Using my example of a 50% WC this would be add a little SAFE then some tap water then some safe and so on. I get it. Since the subject of the thread is rinsing filter parts with tap water are you still contending that detoxing a small residual of tap water is more difficult that detoxing half a tank of tap water?
Put another way. If a fish keeper does a deep clean of the filter and in an abundance of caution decides to do a WC at the same time. The PRIME/SAFE or other agent should detox the tiny residual of chlorine/chloramine.
I have read many WC threads here. Some just dose the whole amount and add water. Some may do the stages. Point here is the dose, as i understand it, is not always precisely calculated. Put 50 gallons of tap water into a 100 gallon tank during a WC and you seem intent on the notion maybe an ounce or less of residual tap water on rinsed filter parts will throw the whole thing into crisis.

 

[RD.]

Like usual, I have no idea what you are asking, or referring to. None of what I have explained is difficult, or at least shouldn't be, if the hobbyist is aware of what their tap water disinfectant residual is, and acts accordingly.

 

[fishdance]

This is yet another one of the useless long winded MFK threads where only a few remaining members post, no one learns anything new and I am reminded why I visit less and less.

 

[jjohnwm]

Well, I learned a few things, and got confirmation on a bunch of other things that I have long believed. I thought it was an interesting read, and I suspect that a lot of younger, newer members could and would have learned a great deal from a thread like this if they bothered to read the whole thing.

If every post I read on here was a treasure trove of new-to-me wisdom, then the take-away IMHO would be that I must be a slow learner.

On the other hand, I have belonged to a couple of other fish-keeping forums in the past where it became apparent that there was literally nothing to be learned...so I just dropped them.

 

[FINWIN]

Easiest way to tell the power of Prime? Sanitize decor in a bleach solution. Rinse. You'll still smell some up close. Put in Prime and the chlorine smell is gone without a trace, even if you stick your nose up close. happens as soon as it hits the water. Reminds me of ion boxes that convert ammonia into water for environmental air purification. I had a job were the press room would clean the plates like clockwork ar 2:45 PM. By 2:46 the joint smelled like a chemical hazard factory from solvents. Ion boxes knocked all that out in seconds to water vapor.