# Gunk, what am I doing wrong???



## jameson_uk (4 Mar 2018)

Just cleaning the filter again and after moving to an eight week schedule I am still seeing masses of gunk in the filter.





Is what was left at the bottom of the filter but there was plenty of this silty gunk right the way through.

Filter is an eheim 2217 with a few cm of efimech, a corse sponge and then eheim substrat pro.  There is also an eheim pre filter in place.  I rinse the sponges in the pre-filter twice a week and that is always pretty funky but this small stuff seems to be getting in.

What am I doing wrong to create this amount of gunk?  I don't think I am overfeeding (although I have in the past), I am not overstocked and I try and remove any dead / dying leaves as I spot them.  I have also cleaned all the pipework recently too.

I can add some fine sponge / floss which I guess should catch it but it seems others don't get anything like this to start with so would prefer to reduce the source of the gunk.

Filter is now spotless but it will be back like this in a few weeks.


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## tam (4 Mar 2018)

That's normal isn't it - do other people not get it? My tank stays pretty clean, I don't often syphon but that's what it looks like after I rinse my filter pads. It's poop and plant decay. If you've got shrimp/algae eaters they'll be eating constantly and turning it into poop not just what you feed in fish food.


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## ian_m (4 Mar 2018)

This is what I got from vacuuming my bottom this morning... I get this every week, even more if I rinse the filters...


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## jameson_uk (4 Mar 2018)

Is this right through your filter or just what is left when you clean it?  My bio media looked like this right at the top of the filter (and took three rinses to get it clean).  The pic was what was left after the media and sponges had been removed and cleaned (which took a considerable amount of gunk out).  Only thought to take a picture when I was nearly done...

This was cleaning the pre-filter which is like this every time I clean it (I think I was away midweek so this is a week's worth)


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## Gill (4 Mar 2018)

Nothing to worry about, perfectly normal. I tend to clean my external every quarter, unless i see a dip in flow. 
The amount of Gunk(Mulm) that comes from a shrimp tank is insane. Little pooping machines they are.


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## tam (4 Mar 2018)

This is out of my 30L, last cleaned 2 weeks ago (very thoroughly twice) bucket was what I syphoned out of the bottom (a lot of shrimp poop!) and the jug is the sponge filter contents - 100ml of goo.


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## dw1305 (4 Mar 2018)

Hi all, 





jameson_uk said:


> Just cleaning the filter again and after moving to an eight week schedule I am still seeing masses of gunk in the filter.





tam said:


> That's normal isn't it


It is normal, the gunk is the "difficult to decompose" residue from biological filtration.

Basically all the easily decomposed protein and carbohydrates have been biologically oxidised, and what is left are the structural carbohydrates with a very high carbon:nitrogen ratio.  It takes a long time to degrade these because you need an additional nitrogen source and the amount of energy that an organisms can retrieve from them is only fractionally higher than the amount of energy that it expends.

If you put some Shrimps or _Asellus_ with dead leaves (or woodlice in a container with damp wood), after about a year you end up with a few _Asellus_ and a container with a  small amount of very similar material to the gunk you get out of the filter. 

It is fundamentally the same process, the shrimp/_Asellus_/woodlice shred the leaves, but they need fungi to degrade the lignin and cellulose in the leaves/wood before they can eat the growing fungi and bacteria and as they process the woody fragments (they don't really, their gut bacteria do) they produce a smaller volume of woody debris bits.

It is exactly the same process if you just have microbes, they are doing all the decomposing work, the shrimps etc. (detrivores) are just providing them with smaller fragments to work on.

cheers Darrel


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## sciencefiction (4 Mar 2018)

Yep, looks normal to me..


jameson_uk said:


> Is this right through your filter or just what is left when you clean it?  My bio media looked like this right at the top of the filter (and took three rinses to get it clean).  The pic was what was left after the media and sponges had been removed and cleaned (which took a considerable amount of gunk out).  Only thought to take a picture when I was nearly done...
> 
> This was cleaning the pre-filter which is like this every time I clean it (I think I was away midweek so this is a week's worth)





Doing a water change myself right now and I cleaned the pre-filters. Mine barely have anything at all to clean after a week and they can probably last weeks without cleaning and affecting the flow.  However, the tank has no plants inside and the substrate is a thin layer of sand. When I had a planted soil tank, my pre-filters looked like yours...For some reason planted soil tank=a lot of gunk....I wonder if its something to do with soil particles because in my planted sand shrimp tank the pre-filter stays rather clean as well, so does the actual filter media....

Tip to clean sponges: Don't squeeze the sponge. Put it under strong running water and start shaking it without any squeezing. It will preserve the life of the sponge and it will stay intact for longer, plus it gets the gunk out better.


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## Rob Wilkinson (4 Mar 2018)

Hope you anti-bac that water faucet after dabbing it in fish poo 

Mine looks like this every week.


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## Angus (4 Mar 2018)

Rob Wilkinson said:


> Hope you anti-bac that water faucet after dabbing it in fish poo
> 
> Mine looks like this every week.


All contributes to a strong immune system...


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## jameson_uk (4 Mar 2018)

Just would have figured the pre-filter would have stopped more of this entering the filter in the first place.  I reckon flow is starting to be affected after about six weeks so couldn't figure out how some people were saying they only clean their filter media every quarter or six months.


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## Angus (4 Mar 2018)

I don't use any fine grade sponge, i tend to clean my filters quarterly to 6 months, not had a problem with flow to be fair, but maybe thats because im using like pp10 or 20 not pp60 sponges, i see the same brown gunk when i clean my sponges, just not as much, i think a lot resides in my substrate.


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## a1Matt (4 Mar 2018)

I DIYed a prefilter to be the longest length that I could still easily remove. It consists of a pipe dremelled to have slots it's entire length with foam wrapped around it.

It clogs slowly from top to bottom.  If I clean it every couple of months the bottom 2/3 is still fairly clean. Takes 6 months to get fully dirty. I clean it somewhere inbetween, usually when the pump on the attached canister starts getting noisy.

Fry and shrimp adore it (except for a couple of weeks straight after cleaning where it gets ignored).

I still get a dirty filter but it's very fine mulm.

Only downside is it's pig ugly. I covered it in moss once, it attached fine, but was a pain come cleaning time.


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## Gill (4 Mar 2018)

what I like to do is attach the Inlet pipe to a Sponge Filter with a little super glue, or just push fit it the size matches.  And it works great, and means that it is a huge prefilter. and does not need rinsing out for a long time.


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## tam (4 Mar 2018)

a1Matt said:


> Only downside is it's pig ugly.



You could colour coordinate your cable ties - you can get brown or black on ebay


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## a1Matt (4 Mar 2018)

That's on my todo list  I did grow copious amounts of bba on them, they blended in nicely then  The snails then cleaned it all off (Tarebia Granifera ftw).


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## doylecolmdoyle (5 Mar 2018)

Looks normal to me, I only clean my filters every 3 months and generally see a lot of this stuff sitting in the bottom of the filter, personally I would remove the fine filter pad / floss they restrict to much flow.


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## Millns84 (5 Mar 2018)

It's just a sign that your filter is working properly, nothing to be concerned about in my opinion.


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## jameson_uk (5 Mar 2018)

doylecolmdoyle said:


> Looks normal to me, I only clean my filters every 3 months and generally see a lot of this stuff sitting in the bottom of the filter, personally I would remove the fine filter pad / floss they restrict to much flow.


No fine pad is in there.  This is what confuses me though !!!  I would expect to find this sitting in the bottom but I have a whole 6l of filter which is like this right up to the pump.

I might up rinsing the filter media to every six weeks but I guess it is the nerites and amanos which are poop monsters.

What PPI sponges do others use on their pre-filters?


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## Angus (5 Mar 2018)

> What PPI sponges do others use on their pre-filters?



10


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## Fiske (6 Mar 2018)

jameson_uk said:


> nerites ... which are poop monsters.



Can confirm.
They are monster poopers.


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## jameson_uk (27 Mar 2018)

Just wondering whether filter floss is actually beneficial?  The reason people seem to give for not using it is that it clogs and slows flow through the filter.

I have a gap under the pre-filter where I could fit another compartment and wondering whether putting filter floss in there might help keep the tank a little cleaner.  I figured that even if it did get clogged then the other two compartments would flow just as they do now anyway.  The pre-filter gets rinsed weekly so wouldn't be any effort to replace floss.

Just wasn't sure whether there is actually any point?


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## sciencefiction (27 Mar 2018)

jameson_uk said:


> What PPI sponges do others use on their pre-filters?



The picture is a bit upside down but you get the idea. Its a rectangular sponge with a hole in the middle where the inlet goes. Mine is quite coarse. That's the type I like to use as my filters are 2000l/h on average. That sponge is over a year old and I clean it weekly but it can last many weeks without being touched. I just have the habit of flushing them when I do the water change.











jameson_uk said:


> The pre-filter gets rinsed weekly so wouldn't be any effort to replace floss.



If you're rinsing it weekly, it shouldn't be an issue what you use. I don't open my filters that often. In my shrimp tank I opened the filter after about 8 months and I closed it down, zilch to clean, the sponges inside were not dirty/brown at all.  I've never seen such a clean external...I think the shrimp are getting to the stuff in the pre-filter sponge on the intake before it gets into the external. On my other externals I have the usual gunk at the bottom and brown on the internal media/sponges but that's after a long time....I think pre-filter is the key, plus not using the filter as mechanical filtration. I rather siphon it out, not a big deal.


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## a1Matt (27 Mar 2018)

Just to give a contrasting opinion... I have a huge prefilter (as posted earlier in this thread), and my canister is 3/4 full with floss. Nice clear water and substrate. Takes 3 months for dirt to reach the top of the floss.

I run low tech, so flow isn't crucial. If I had co2 I'd probably lose the prefilter and run the canister half empty to maxmimise flow.


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## Sweded (29 Mar 2018)

Pleco + wood in the tank will create a large amount of that darker gunk. Like a lot. They need wood in their natural diet and poop it out in droves.


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## Angus (29 Mar 2018)

Sweded said:


> Pleco + wood in the tank will create a large amount of that darker gunk. Like a lot. They need wood in their natural diet and poop it out in droves.


Nerite snails too, they are wood eating and pooping machines.


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## jameson_uk (29 Apr 2018)

Just rinsing the media again and I am still amazed at the amount of gunk.  Really should have filmed it but only thought about that as I was putting it all back together.  

Given I have a pre-filter in place is there any value in adding a second corse sponge or would that not do anything?


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## jameson_uk (26 Apr 2020)

So an update on this whilst doing a water change this morning.

I have recently replaced a small powerhead I was using with an little All Pond Solutions Skim 2.   This has a tiny bit of filter floss and I am still amazed at how much gunk it is picking up.

The jug is the result of squishing out the filter floss after I did this three days ago.   I have the eheim pre-filter, two coarse sponges in the filter and a sponge filter that is there in case I need it in another tank (the orange bucket is the result of squishing both sponges).

I do 50% weekly water changes and I am not particularly well stocked (6 Sterbai Cory, 5 black neon tetras, 5-7 Otos, 9 amanos and two zebra Nerites) and the pre-filter gets a good clean every week and the sponge filter every other week.

On one hand this level of gunk seems far too much but on the other hand the tiny bit of filter floss and the sponge filter are the only fine filters I am using.   Is this level of gunk just normal and the only reason I am even seeing it is because of the fact I have added some filter floss or should I be doing something to increase mechanical filtration?


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## dw1305 (26 Apr 2020)

Hi all, 





jameson_uk said:


> Is this level of gunk just normal


I wouldn't worry at all, all tanks are going to be different. What has settled out looks like the remains of the <"complete oxidation process">.





jameson_uk said:


>


That would be similar in amount to what I'd get out of the pre-filter sponge on a tank with both plants and fish. I clean these every week or fortnight depending on how busy I am.

cheers Darrel


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## jameson_uk (26 Apr 2020)

dw1305 said:


> Hi all, I wouldn't worry at all, all tanks are going to be different. What has settled out looks like the remains of the <"complete oxidation process">.


So that stuff would take a long time to break down (like the stems of leaves) or will it only realistically leave the tank by getting stuck in a filter or via a water change?  I am presuming this is going through the filter and just circulating around the tank?  Is there any harm in this stuff hanging round and building up?



> That would be similar in amount to what I'd get out of the pre-filter sponge on a tank with both plants and fish. I clean these every week or fortnight depending on how busy I am.


That doesn't include the prefilter!  The amount on the prefilter isn't wildly different to the video in the first post.


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## dw1305 (26 Apr 2020)

Hi all, 





jameson_uk said:


> So that stuff would take a long time to break down (like the stems of leaves) or will it only realistically leave the tank by getting stuck in a filter or via a water change? I am presuming this is going through the filter and just circulating around the tank? Is there any harm in this stuff hanging round and building up?


Yes, there will be an amount of structural carbohydrate that will remain, but it isn't really polluting. You can only really get rid of all of it via physical removal, via mechanical filter media or syphoning.

You know when you keep shrimps or snails you get those <"little black faecal pellets all over the sand">?  That is because the shrimps etc. have taken all the goodness out of the leaf, algae dead leaf etc. they've processed and just left the bits that are really difficult to get much goodness out of.

cheers Darrel


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