[davesnothere]

I decided that I need better substrate for my new 10 gallon planted aquarium. So I tore down the old one, transferred fishes and about 5 gallons of water to a holding bucket, water used to be crystal clear. Washed and put down about 2 inches of flourite and after about a100 gallons of water and umpteen water changes, I decided it was OK for the plants to go in as the water didn't look like Mississippi in Louisiana any more. So I filled up the tank, part with the 5 gallon of the water from the holding bucket. I figured it has all the good bacteria and the goodies and would help my new tank. The moment I did the water turned extremely cloudy. I did transfer the fishes along with it to the tank. Fishes seem to be doing alright as of now. The filter is running. Do I need to do another water change ? Will that reduce cloudiness ? Are my fishes going to be OK ? Do I need to do anything else but wait ?

Please help !!!

 

[gheitman]

Just be patient and your filter will remove some of the cloudiness and the rest will settle out. You can do another water change and siphon out what has settled to the bottom. Your fish should be fine until then.

 

[jmontee]

Did you keep the old filter media and what kind of filter are you using? One thing you want to be sure of is that you have enough plant to combat any ammonia spikes since you will have to go through another cycling process. It may not be as long as when it is first set up but it will happen. The fish will most probably be fine but I would definitely test for ammonia and nitrites in the next few days. Any spikes and you can do a 50 water change to make sure that everybody does fine.

How many fish do you have stocked in the tank? I might also go very easy on the feeding in the next few days.

 

[davesnothere]

Everything looks good. Water is still a little cloudy, hopefully in a day or so that should go away. Plants are doing excellent. Kleiner bar stalks are at least an inch longer than they were last night when I turned the light off. I put down a few Crypt Wendtii roots with no stem ( that's how the plants came, just root ), most of them have at least one leaf growing. The fishes survived and seem to be doing great.

Gheitman, I did a 50 percent water change after my first post, that seemed to help a lot in clearing up.

Jmontee, I am still using the filter media from before, I just replaced it a week ago. I surely have more fish than I should in a 10 gallon tank Took your advice and going easy on the feeding.

Time to buy a water testing kit. Thank you guys for all your help.

 

[freydo]

one thing to do to reduce the cloudiness when using flourite is taking care when filling the tank with water. if you're using a bucket, i usually pour it slowly against the side of the tank in front of me, instead of just pouring the water in. or if using a hose, point the nozzle towards the glass, and not downward. you'll reduce the amount substrate disturbance, and with it the cloudiness.

i've had times where i couldn't see any fish at all when rescaping without any ill effects to the fish.

flourite can be real difficult to clean, i know, i spent a couple hours cleaning 7 bags of flourite black. each bag still resulted in hazy water, which is the best i could hope for