Something smells fishy

[Harrison]

Am I right in thinking that these days with modern filters, if everything is monitored and done correctly that you shouldn't need to ever empty the tank completely to clean it?

We've always had fish at home, but only external ponds, not aquariums. Dad still has two ponds. One is a large gold fish pond, and the other is a deeper one with Koa Carp. That takes quite a lot of work to keep as he is constantly removing any weed build up from the sides of the pond, and cleaning the filters out and checking the UV filters are working.

The two ponds are also connected by a stream which he damns up in the winter, and in the summer a large pump takes the water from the bottom Koa pond and pumps it into the big filter at the top of the waterfall of the gold fish pond, so during the summer months the water gets constantly circulated from the top pond, down the stream and into the bottom, and also gets passed through two really big bacteria based filters, as well as UV filters and other filters he has in series.

[Submeg]

that sounds very complicated!

[Buleste]

Aquariums generally do not have the means to break down all the fecal matterexcreted by the fish so all though the water may look clean theres a lot of poop in the gravel which is why cleaning is important. Outside ponds/pools should have the right ecosystem to break down these deposits so need less maintainance.

[Tiago]

If you change 20% water every week, you avoid major problems in water.

For your 30L aquarium, a 5 liter botle should be fine.
When removeing the water, dont remove from top of aquarium, but do it from bottom/depest possible so that you can clean it at the same time.

[J T]

I personally will think a lot less of you unless you have an opening treasure chest, a skeleton with the sword in it's chest that sits up and down, and the rising-falling UFO as decorations in your tank (they run off air from the pump).

Also, a castle.

[toomanymikes]

I personally will think a lot less of you unless you have an opening treasure chest, a skeleton with the sword in it's chest that sits up and down, and the rising-falling UFO as decorations in your tank (they run off air from the pump).

Also, a castle.

I was thinking along the lines of a sunken galleon, opening treasure chest with a skull in it, volcano for the bubbles and a scattering of dubloons along the bottom. Forget the fish - their boring!

[Harrison]

Definitely. And with that plan you should never need to clean the tank!

[v85rawdeal]

I personally will think a lot less of you unless you have an opening treasure chest, a skeleton with the sword in it's chest that sits up and down, and the rising-falling UFO as decorations in your tank (they run off air from the pump).

Also, a castle.

I was thinking along the lines of a sunken galleon, opening treasure chest with a skull in it, volcano for the bubbles and a scattering of dubloons along the bottom. Forget the fish - their boring!

Yeah, every fish tank needs 'Mount Wanahokaloogie'