On Apr 22, 7:45?am, "Rich" wrote:
"Erin (Eugene)" wrote in message

oups.com...





I went to a movie at around 9:30 PM. My fish tank is near our door (a
sin, I know, but anyway...). When I walked in a bit after midnight, I
immediately noticed that the filter wasn't running.

I'm assuming that it was running when I left--I believe I would have
noticed, and anyway, I think I recall seeing water movement when I was
glancing over there earlier. I remember because upon seeing the
movement, I checked to make sure my loach wasn't bothering his arch
nemesis (a neon) again.

Anyway, so that means that most likely, the filter was off for three
hours or less. The tank has a few plants in it. The water temperature
and whatnot is fine, so it's just the filter that broke.

Anyway, we immediately removed the old filter (though some water
spilled out of it) and turned on the airstone. After a quick trip to
the 24hour walmart for a new filter (Tetra Whisper, anyone used it? I
haven't heard much and our normal brand is aquaclear, but we didn't
have much choice and will check the LFS tomorrow) we now have a
complete tank again. I'm worried about the following:

a) The bacteria. I'm worried the ones in the tank died.
b) The bacteria. I'm worried that by changing the filter stages all at
once, there's going to be an ammonia spike
c) the bacteria. I'm worried about the crap water that spilled out of
the old filter when I removed it.

The answer hopefully is in C above. The "crap water" would have actually
been full of the micro organisms that convert ammonia to nitrite, and
nitrite to nitrate. This would have given a boost to your new filter.
Personally, I wouldn't do a water change. Others here may disagree.......

--
Richhttp://www.richdavies.comhttp://www.richdavies.com/tropicalfish- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

RIch,
Actually the nitrifying bacteria do not float about in the muck in the
filter, the debris in the gravel, or float about in old tank water (as
many once thought). This has been recently learned (within the last 10
yrs or so) and they also learned that these bacteria are not only
sticky, but are pretty hard to shake loose from the spot they have
adhered themsevles to.
They are very sticky and adhere themselves onto all surfaces.
Your advice about *not* doing a water change because the debris would
give a boost to her new filter wasn't correct.
Actually she should do a water change. Especially after a filter
mishap (shut down and then spilling debris into the tank).