Hey all, I'm still hangin' around! :)

Just wanted to ask a question. I have my 100gal indoor tank sustaining my pond fish for the winter. It was seeded with water and filter material from the pond back in October and everything has been fine in the chemical and clarity department. I do my weekly 10% water changes and a 50% change every 4 weeks along with alternating cleaning (replacing the carbon if needed) the filter material in the 2 filters during the 4 week change (changing one each change, then the other the next). No fish problems, and even the few pieces of anacharis from the pond are doing quite well.

Over the last 3-4 weeks, the water has been getting that "pond" smell to it. I don't mind it outside because it's usually quite faint if detectable at all. Indoors however it's noticable when you walk past the tank and seems to hover in the area constantly. My other, smaller tanks never had this problem so I was thinking that it's something that came in from the seeding materials. The problem with that is that I put the entire pond filter and lots of pond water in a tub with my water lilys to winter them over inside and there's no smell from that at all (my cat even happily drinks from the tub, though the 3 little comets in it spook him from time to time :lol: ).

I can't figure it out. Any thoughts would be appreciated.

What type of filters are you using? How many fish? what types of fish? How big are they? what are the water parameters? Good to see you again Mike.

The smell can come from a few things: organic accumulation (fish food, waste, dying plants or animals, etc.), gases produced during anaerobic decomposition (hydrogen sulfide and/or methane for example), and probably other things. Do you do gravel vacuumings or do you not have gravel? If you have gravel, be sure to stir it up some with a gravel vacuum, sucking up debris and gases. More/larger water changes will help some. The addition of good bacteria should help as well. I use BZT from united-tech.com in my tanks and ponds. To help with organics in the water column itself and resultant smells, put a lot of fresh activated carbon in the filter. Trash it after a week or so and put in fresh again. Carbon will absorb a lot of things. There are air fresheners (not sprays but stable ones) that contain carbon to help absorb odors. I love Citrus Magic's fresheners. They smell like oranges and have carbon in them too. I keep one by the litter pan. Their site is http://www.citrusmagic.com
You want to be sure not to actually spray air freshener into a tank though which is why I suggest the stationary fresheners, only the natural ones (no toxic chemicals) with just carbon and citrus. That will help cover the smell and the carbon will actually absorb some of it until you can get the tank back on track.

OK let's see water parameters:

Ph high 7 range (those color charts are annoying, you never know exactly what the Ph is, just that it's close to a number), the fish are fine with it since the pond was usually right around 8.

Ammonia is zero after water changes, just slightly above zero before (I used the ammonia level change to gauge my water change interval).

Salt is at .08% to .10% because of the anacharis in the tank (supposed to keep it lower for plant tanks) or it would be around .20% like my other tanks.

Nitrite isn't always zero, but it barely registers on the color chart I have with my test kit.


Since nitrite and ammonia tend to rise a little with the tank's biological cycle, I haven't taken any action on the minimal levels that appear here and there. The fish don't seem stressed at all, show no signs of disease, and eat normally. I have 6 3"-4" shubunkins in there with a pleco (he was 1.5" when I got him, but quickly went to about 5" in the last 4 months, I love plecos :D ) and two 1" cory cats. I have also seen a small snail in the tank that must have come along with the anacharis from the pond (local snail to my area in New Jersey, there were a few in the pond and the largest one I ever saw was smaller than a dime). Between the cats and the pleco (and apparently the snail) the tank stays visually nice and clean. I only have a mild clouding of the water right before the water change, otherwise it's crystal clear.

As for the filters and water changing, I use a vacuum when I do the water changes and stir up/vacuum as much of the gravel as I can without totally wrecking the decorations (my wife wanted them, I prefer sparse decor myself to make vacuuming easier, I lost this time).

I have two filters on the tank. A "hang-on-tank" filter (Aquaclear 110) as the primary and a secondary cannister filter (Fluval 104 only made to support a 25 gallon tank normally but I had it in a closet not doing anything anyway) that is there to help with the overpopulation of the tank. The Fluval is a few years old, so I might just get a 404 and retire the 104 to a smaller tank. It's pumping up about 4 feet anyway, and it doesn't quite have the power for that.

I read in another thread that Robyn uses a python to clean her large tank. I wish I could do that. All of my tanks are in my basement (except a 5 gallon tank with 2 bettas in it, divided of course, which doesn't count hehe) and I don't have a sink down here. I've been trying to find a way to put a "slop sink" in, but the septic line enters the house about 1/2 way up the wall and I'd need one of those drain pumps to get it to work properly. So until I figure it out, I'm doing the 5 gallon pail carry up and down the stairs for every change. On a full set of 10% changes on all 3 tanks, that's 8 trips to drain, and 8 trips to fill. You can't really carry 5 gallons of water in a 5 gallon pail unless you want to spill a gallon on the trip. :(

I will try changing the activated carbon more often in the filters as Robyn suggested. I also moved a Glade "plug-in" scented oil fan air freshener thing to a nearby socket and that took care of the lingering odor in the area. We'll see how it goes.

Well it sounds like things should be okay. Sometimes we can't find the source of things. I use a Python hose to clean my aquariums. I have a tub pond in the basement and have to bail to change that water so I know what you mean about the pain of doing that! If my tanks were down there, I'd probably do a poor job caring for them.

Well, I got a second AquaClear 110. That should do the trick. If it doesn't, at least I know it's only through this winter. In the spring we're opening up the pond to about 1000gal and 3ft. deep. They shouldn't have to come back in next year. I just hope switching to tropicals in the tank won't keep the problem. I'll give it a REAL good cleaning first of course. :)

While I was at Petco (they had a sale on the filter), one of the guys there and I got talking. He said he had his tank in his basement and the python didn't work for him either (I have one from when I had tanks upstairs, the suction wasn't enough to pull up there). He recommended I try the Lee's Ultimate Gravel Vac. He did say he still has to do a few buckets for gravel vacuuming, but that it generated enough suction for water changes. Turns out he's right. It's slow, but it works well enough. I got about 40 gallons out in 25 minutes. I did have to attach a garden hose to it to get it long enough. It also fills nicely as you would expect.

In any case, 2-3 buckets upstairs is much easier than I had to do before. :D

Your making the 100 gallon tropical? that would be cool.

Yes, once the pond fish are back home in their nice new 1000 gallon pond sometime next spring. My wife likes tropicals, I like ponds, so she was more than happy to let me get a new tank for the pond fish to winter over inside in. She knew she'd get a nice big tropicals tank eventually.

The pleco and cory cats are staying (I put those two kinds of fish in every fresh water tank I have ever had, tried and true cleaning combo), but she isn't sure what she wants besides angel fish otherwise. I like the less aggressive gouramis myself, but that's what I have in one of my other tanks. I might move them over anyway and make the gourami tank salt. I have a brackish tank also and I got the hang of maintaining it pretty well now (harder than fresh, easier than salt). The next logical step is to have a fresh tropical (100g), the brackish (60g), and convert the other to a marine (76g). :D

I have to get rid of some of my old tanks. I can use the 20 and the 30 for extra biofiltration and an isolation tank for the marine, but I have too many small tanks in a corner doing nothing. How I ended up with five unused 10 gallon tanks I'll never know. :blink:

True plecos and cories are a great combo. Angels would be nice, you can also do dwarf cichlids, a large school of larger tetras, more cories and more. Whats in your brackish tank? im saving up for a similar sized salt water tank. what are you planning on stocking it with?

Hey Dudes !!
I spent hours & hours looking at gourami's on the internet the other night deciding which ones I wanted... I ended up deciding on the pearl ones & also the flame ones altho there were no flame ones available right now but I managed to get a pair of pearl gourami's... I didn't realise there are so many types & that you can get massive ones ( a photo I saw of one was so butt ugly that you couldn't help but love it... )
I saw something when I was looking for gourami's which really disturbed me... I did a google image search & saw one that was white with purple spots on it, I thought to myself that looks weird so I went to the site & had a bo peep... On the site were animals & fishies that had been dyed different colours which is very cruel & also kills them, it's illegal over here & really it didn't look nice at all !!.
BTW I'm getting a huge ass tank for communal fishies very soon & was wondering about what sort of plants to use for planting it out, it is going to be heated & also have a light & not sure which filter just yet... I want it too look really natural, I plan on keeping my female paradise fishies in there when they're not breeding & other peaceful fishies like gourami's etc when they are not breeding plus a few cleaners, one or two bumble bee gobies & am open to suggestions about other communal fishies that would go well with these & also that I might look at breeding at some stage...
Thanks dudes
Ciao Meow

naughty fish please stay on topic! Anyway Mike have you thought about rainbow fish? they would look nice in a 100 gallon.

Naughty Fish, those are "painted" fish. They inject them with dye that eventually works out of their system and the color goes away. They do that mostly with glass fish since it shows up best. It doesn't usually bother the fish overall, but 4-6 weeks later the kids that got them don't like them anymore and let the now colorless fish die. That's the real tragedy.

Back on topic, Tommy, my wife is picking the tropicals for that tank in the spring once the pond fish go back outside and the tank gets cleaned and cycled through again. I'm just going to make sure she does it right. You know, like if she picks a schooling fish, she gets at least 5 so they school nice, make sure she doesn't pick "bad neighbors" and such. Otherwise, it's not up to me. :blink: I figure it'll be mostly for angels (she loves them and I used to breed them in the early 1990's so I'm used to taking care of them) and maybe a few other interesting looking compatable fish. :D

What fish do you think she will pick? personally i would go with a nnice school of dwarf rainbows, that would look nice with angels.