"Richard Sexton" wrote in message
...
In article ,
Altum wrote:
50% water changes a day is great! There is no need to change more - you
might start stressing the fish.

No it won't.


Well.... maybe you guys should add some qualifiers. If your tap water is
_suitable_, then you can work your way _up_ to 100% water changes as often
as you like.

In regards to 'suitability', well water for example, is rarely suitable for
such large water changes without first being air'ed out. If I go above 20%,
my fish do not look happy. Also my well water varies by season, and during
the middle of winter, it's far too hard (gH) to use raw. I'm sure there is
_some_ variation in everyone's water supply, hopefully very little, but a
good thing to check and know.

In regards to the amount & frequency of the change, it depends on the
difference between source & destination. If your tank's have been getting
20% weekly historically, then the source water (your tap) will probably be
softer (gH) and have far lower DOCs. Initially you would want to start
increasing your water changes to make your destination water more similar to
your source (so the fish are exposed to less of a change). For your
average set-up, it would take a couple of weeks to get to 50% changes, and a
month to get to 100% changes (I'm using 100% to indicate as much as you
practically can change in your set-up). At 100%, your source and
destination water should be nearly identical, so the amount/frequency of the
changes are just keeping it that way.

Source water is rarely suitable for huge water changes, unless you're very
lucky (ie: you pump, UV and in-line heat your own river water), or you do
some in-line processing of municipal/well water (ie: carbon or dose de-chlor
for chlorine/chloramines, zeolite for ammonia, iron filter might outgas it,
storage tanks as needed, in-line heating etc).

This is my limited understanding of the topic ), and yes, I hope to retire
living by a river ;~).
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