Water Changes: Straight from the hose?

Hi all,

I have been keeping Julidochromis Regani in my 3 ft for about 2 months now. I am finding it annoying lugging buckets to and from the bathroom to Do water changes and I've seen a good deal of fishkeepers adding their new water for water changes directly from the garden hose. As my water is so soft, I add cichlids salts.

If i dosed the required decholrinator and salts into the tank and then piped the new water in via the hose would it stress the fish?

Thanks for your input,
Rory

 

Hey Rory. I hear you, the bucket brigade can be very annoying, and when it comes to bigger tanks it is downright back-breaking.
If you go the hose from tap route Id recommend using Prime. You need to dose for the full volume of your tank, not just the water that you're replacing. Essentially my Prime lasts me half as long by doing it this way, but in my mind it's an acceptable compromise. Be sure to add the full dose of Prime to the tank before tapping the new water in.

In terms of the cichlid salts, I once dry dosed by adding a few pinches of the salts by hand, letting it slowly dissolve from between my fingers. Noticed that the salts seem to have an immediate reaction with the water, started heating up between my fingers! Long story short, I'd not recommend dry dosing this stuff, or adding it rapidly in too concentrated a form. Just my experience

 

I have to be honest, I do it from the hose with a Y connector to regulate water temp from hot and cold water. I will be getting a 500L drum though that will mature my water next year. I am able to keep my pH at 6.9 and when I do a water change it only goes to about 7.5 so it's not too harsh on the discus. I do this purely because I currently do two x 500L water changes a week and with buckets I will go cray-cray.

 

For smaller tanks the bucket works well, but on larger tanks where a slight temperature variation isn't critical I use a garden hose.
Seachem Prime is added at half dosage for the full tank before water is added, and a half dose for the full tank again after.

 

I full straight from the tap, also keeping tangs like you and never had a problem. Although my water comes out the tap at 8.0 so I don't need to buffer. I add prime to and top up the tank, I do 30% a week.

 

Thanks for the input!
My water is pH 8.9 kH 2 dkH and GH 4.8 dGH (weird that it's soft yet alkaline) so pH won't be an issue, just hardness.

If I were to mix the buffer as a stock solution and then add it whist I was filling up from the hose would that be safer?

Also, why does Prime require you to dose for the whole tank?

 

Would expect kh so be high too, what test kit are you using?not sure how that would work, but perhaps add to tank gradually?im moving over to seachem safe-much more cost effective and efficient.

 

Put the water through a carbon block of sorts..

I like Pure's kit, but even the cheap carbon filters you get at the LFS if better than directly from the authorities.

I run my and my indoor tank's water via these ...

Activated Carbon Block Filter with Silver and Microban
and
Pure Polymer Bacteria Filter

I have used one of the cheaper carbon blocks - actually just replaced it hmmm I will stick with pure for as long as I can get them.

Later Ferdie

 

@scotty_88 I used Sera's kH and Nutrifin's gH test kit- I'm sure it's right, I've tested it before and it's been soft.

@f-fish how will the carbon block affect the water and how does one it set up?

 

Depending on your tank size, you could keep a water drum in a nearby room and just buy a submersible pump and pipe. It could cost between R1000 - R1500 which might be a bit costly for some.

 

Yeah or just use a large bucket placed at your tank, pull hose pipe and full it up and add prime,lake salts and heater until right temp then get submersible pump and place in bucket and pump water back into tank.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

You might not even need a pump if you can place the bucket on a surface that is higher than the tank, the power of siphoning!
Might even be fun to build a DIY pulley to pull up the bucket if it's too heavy.

 

See ... http://www.tropicalaquarium.co.za/threads/water-changes.6847/page-3#post-132622

 

I used the hose but only on my Guppy tank. when dealing with water changes in my Kilifish tanks I used buckets and also made sure that the water I used was dechlorinated before doing a water change.

 

I did a 50% water change with the hose from the outside cold water tap yesterday. Water was coming out whitish. Dosed with Prime for total tank volume (3caps). Temp dropped from 28 to 26 and woke up to this (pic) this morning.

 

Thanks @MariaS . I've been waiting for them to spawn and was hoping a cold water 50% water change would do the trick and it did. Now need to convince the wife I need a tank for the fry.

 

Nice one man, and people say you will kill the fish direct from the hose, looks like the total opposite has happened. What is is with water changes that makes fish breed?is less nitrates or natural behaviors? Lake Malawi and tanganikya are some of the worlds largest lakes, temps change as per depth and up rising of colder waters from the depths, these fish deal with rapid temp changes in the wild too, so what's to say the aquarium is any different?