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How to sterilize

aarhud

Active Member
5 Year Member
Messages
343
Hey all,

Unfortunately, I have had a wild ride of bad fish luck. All of my problems began with some Neon tetras from Petsmart. I only had three tanks at the time and I was an idiot and did not QT. I have had everything from fungus to black marks spreading to all of my fish and I lost several to a bacterial disease. I only have one tank left, a 125g and all of the fish are now gone.

Should I run bleach through the tank and re-cycle or is there some less extreme way to approach it? Once the tank is sterilized I am going to purchase a group of Apistogramma and an easy to breed tetra (glowlights, etc) and practice raising tetras.
 

Rod

Member
5 Year Member
Messages
196
Location
Brisbane,Australia
My understanding is water born bacteria/pathegens....don't live without water
Just let the tank and contents dry....in the Sun if possible
 

aarhud

Active Member
5 Year Member
Messages
343
Let the tank contents and filter components dry completely out? The bleach option may be easier. I'm not keen on lugging the big tank outside!
 

Mike Wise

Moderator
Staff member
5 Year Member
Messages
11,202
Location
Denver, Colorado, U.S.A.
I agree the bleach treatment is easier and more effective. Water born micro-organisms can go dormant while drying out. I don't know any organism that can survive chlorine for long. Just be sure to rinse everything well, dechor heavily, and rinse again.
 

aarhud

Active Member
5 Year Member
Messages
343
Thank you,

I'll probably try a mix of the suggestions. The driftwood and rocks will be left outside to sun bake, and I'll bleach the tank, substrate, and filter components. Is it too risky to keep a cycled sponge filter to avoid having to start from scratch? The filter was exposed to the bacteria at one point.

I don't get how you guys that are constantly bringing in large quantities of fish keep everything under control. I assume that is where disinfecting nets/containers comes into play. From now on I'll set up the QT tank no matter how much of a pain it is. Easier to leave a small tank in the kitchen floor for a month than to drain, empty, and wash a 6-foot tank and all of its contents...
 

Mike Wise

Moderator
Staff member
5 Year Member
Messages
11,202
Location
Denver, Colorado, U.S.A.
Sterilize the sponge and any other biomedia, too. Otherwise you might need to do it all over again. Once sterilized, sponge filters are easy to inoculate, if you have another healthy tank. Just heavily gravel clean the healthy tank and fill a bucket with dirty water and debris (grunge). Then add sponge filter and allow it to circulate the dirty water until the water is mostly clear. Squeeze out sponge and it's innoculated.

A quarantine tank is the cheapest insurence anyone with a large tank (or several tanks) can have. All you need is a small bare tank, some hard hiding places (I use pvc pipe), a sponge filter w/air pump and a heater. You only need to set it up when you bring in new fish.
 

aarhud

Active Member
5 Year Member
Messages
343
I have most of the substrate out. I'm going to fill the tank up and siphon out the last bit of sand. Then spray a 10% bleach solution and wipe everything down. The sand is in a RubberMaid tote, hopefully filling it up with a water/bleach solution and occasionally stirring will be enough to sterilize it. I have an extra tote for the sponge filters, filter media, etc. Sadly the 125g I am bleaching is my only running tank. I bought a little stand to go beside it that will hold a 10g for breeding tetras. So I'll have to roll old school and do the 4-8 week fishless cycle.

Only concern is the wood. I have a ton of it and bleaching it all is going to suck.
 

themountain

Active Member
5 Year Member
Messages
172
Location
Mallorca/Spain
Well..not so much "old school" is necessary :D ...as Mike said before : get a whole lot of sludge from a good running tank , wait two weeks, make some water change once in a while and test it and you will be ready to go . Works all the time for me :)
 

gerald

Well-Known Member
5 Year Member
Messages
1,491
Location
Wake Forest NC, USA
For the driftwood and empty tank, how about applying the bleach with a spray bottle? You can put the wood into big garbage/leaf bags, spray them thoroughly while inside the bags, then close up the bags and let them sit for a day before rinsing, so the bleach can soak down into the wood. Make sure to spray the tank up underneath the inside rim. Certain bacteria (including Mycobacterium) grow in the film that accumulates around the water line and under the tank rim. And good luck finding pathogen-free fish, plants, and water to restock with!
 

aarhud

Active Member
5 Year Member
Messages
343
Thanks Gerald! I did actually spray the tank down, but I will give the wood a spray down as well. I will go back over the lip of the rim as well. I have some large construction trash bags that should do the job nicely for the wood.

Honestly, I don't know where to source fish anymore! Im tempted to just stick with wild fish (tetras, apistos, etc) as I have had the least amount of trouble with wilds. Most of our local stores have given me issues, specifically bacteria related. But I suspect some of my issues have come from trying to keep centrals in my soft tap water (wild type swordtails specifically).

Im looking forward to restarting. Im going to add a DIY spray bar to my canister filter (after reading how important oxygen content is). Im looking at using a large diameter pipe and filling it with lava rock to create a sort of drip filter powered by my fx5 canister.
 

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