Aquarium and Pond Care with EcoBio-Block

You’ve spent a lot of money and time picking out the right fish for your aquarium and you think you’ve got it just right. Then you start losing some valuable fish. How does this happen and what can you do to prevent this tragedy?

There can be a lot of reasons why your fish are dying. Generally, it happens when a fish tank is new. It pays to buy an aquarium water test kit to determine how much ammonia, nitrites and nitrates are in the aquarium, and how high or low the pH is. These are the four most important tests for your tank.

In the nitrogen cycle of the fish tank, an important biological cycle, the fish give off nitrogenous wastes when they eliminate and these products break down into ammonia, which is very toxic to most fishes. In aquariums, this nitrogen product can build up into levels that are harmful to your fish. When you measure the ammonia level, it should be negligible.

The nitrogen cycle, is the process of getting rid of ammonia using nitrifying bacteria that convert the ammonia to nitrite and then to nitrate, which is not as hazardous. The cycle goes from ammonia to nitrite to nitrate. These bacteria are present everywhere and establish themselves eventually in your fish tank as soon as the ammonia builds up. It is a slow process, however, and you can lose fish in the meantime.

One way of improving the nitrogen status of your aquarium is to purchase an EcoBio-Block Products that contains the nitrifying bacteria within the block. You rinse the block and soak it in chlorine free water over night before placing it in your tank. Normally, in a few weeks or so, you can have your ammonia levels drop followed by drops in nitrite levels. You can safely put your fish in then and expect that they will survive.

The other thing is to take a couple of hardy and cheap fish and put them in your tank. Don’t overfeed the fish. More food means that more ammonia will build up. For freshwater fish, try some zebra danios or some barbs. For saltwater tanks, use damselfish. Don’t use feeder fish for your tank as they can introduce unwanted diseases in your tank. The initial cheap fish you put into the tank get the nitrogen cycle going and you can then add more delicate and expensive fish to your tank.

Use your test kit to determine the ammonia, nitrite and nitrate level in your tank and use this as a guide for how healthy your tank is. It takes time for the bacteria to develop unless you are using a EcoBio-Stone to speed up the nitrification process.

Poor pH can also be a cause of a loss of fish. The pH is a measure of how acidic or how alkaline a fish tank is. Ideally, the pH should be around 7.0, which is “neutral”. However, fish can generally tolerate pH of 5.5 to 8.0. You can get a test strip to measure the level and if you need to change it, look at ways to change the pH slowly.

If your water contains buffers, you will not be able to change the pH very easily. Remember, too, that fish can tolerate a wide range of pH levels but do not tolerate sudden changes in pH.  Sometimes it’s better to leave the pH alone as long as your fish are thriving.

If you still think you need to adjust the pH, one way to lower it slowly is to add some driftwood to your fish tank or to the tank. A cleaned off seashell or coral skeleton will gradually increase the pH of your aquarium. The downside of both these solutions is that they will stain the color of the water brown or yellow for quite a while, but it will alter the pH in a safe way.

Maintain your tank well and you can have a healthy, happy fish population.

Avoid overcrowding and keep your fish healthy

Being an aquarium owner is one of the most rewarding hobbies ever! There are so many different types of fish to choose from, and watching your fish with their striking colors swim about the tank is a pleasure you can enjoy every day.

Some aquarium owners are unaware of the need to prevent overcrowding in their fish tanks, and are unable to tell if their fish are ready for a larger tank.
A novice owner can commit this no-no easily. The fish that they purchased when first starting out in the aquarium hobby may have become too large for their original tank. Enthused about this new hobby, the newbie may have also added more fish than the size of the usual beginner 10-gallon tank can handle. No matter what the circumstances, it does not take long for an overcrowded tank to begin to show signs of trouble as the level of toxins in the water rise.

A high toxin load in your aquarium is definitely going to stress out your fish, and can even kill them if it is allowed to continue for too long. You can try to keep up with partial water changes, which can help the condition of the tank water, but that can be a lot of work.

The overcrowded aquarium requires much more oxygen than the aquarium that is properly stocked and well maintained. This means that the fish in a tank that is too small to house them properly are deprived of the oxygen they need.
If you are dealing with an overcrowded aquarium, then ammonia and nitrite levels should be monitored frequently.

Another aspect of overcrowding is the fact that any diseases or parasites your fish may have will affect every fish in the aquarium in a very short time. All fish have parasites and bacteria on the surface of their bodies. When fish are stressed, they are much more apt to fall victim to either or both.

It can be simple to take care of one or two fish that have developed some sort of fungus, or who are spotted with Ich. However, having a small aquarium full of sick fish is not a pleasant scenario. By the time you are able to get all of the fish out of the aquarium and into a safe place, well over half of them could be dead or dying.

You may think that a larger tank is out of your budget. Ask friends if they have or know of anyone with a spare aquarium in their garage. Watch the classified section of your daily newspaper for used tanks, or even better, look around the online classifieds for your area. You may be lucky enough to find the exact type and size of tank you need

Once you have located what you think would be a suitable tank for your fish, make sure that you have found the size that you need. Freshwater fish will generally need about a gallon of water for every inch. Saltwater fish need one square foot for every three inches, so do keep the proper figures in mind as you shop for a larger tank.

Your larger tank will be a lot of fun to accessorize, but why not make one of those accessories a highly functional one? Placing an EcoBio-Stone L in that new to you, larger aquarium will help to keep the water beautifully clear. This product also gets rid of any funky odors the tank water may have, and can really cut down on the frequency of water changes.