OllieNZ
Member
Can you easily get hold of pond dechlor? It works out cheaper for larger tanks.
or a hma filter ?Can you easily get hold of pond dechlor? It works out cheaper for larger tanks.
You can simply just run an air stone in the bucket you're going to change over night. That will get rid of the chlorine not the chloramine. You could simple do a water change every day rather then them all at once.
I wash the filter sponges etc under the tap as well, but I use rain-water for the water changes. I asked a microbiologist (with the proviso that is area of work is food safety), and he was fairly sure that there wasn't enough chlorine in the tap water to cause any problems with rinsing the sponges in tap water.Guys, there isn't much chlorine at all in our water. As for the beneficial bacteria, nothing happens. I've been washing my filter media under the tap for years.
EDTA would work for heavy metals, because they are strongly bound ions, but Fe EDTA won't, this is because iron (Fe) is the most strongly bound ion and won't be replaced by any other ions.Well, I read many dechlorinators use EDTA to squeeze the metals. So dosing some micros fert may help the issue. Since usually there is an amount of excess EDTA in it. For example, this liquid Fe-EDTA contains a minimum of 10g/litre of excess EDTA.
I asked a microbiologist (with the proviso that is area of work is food safety), and he was fairly sure that there wasn't enough chlorine in the tap water to cause any problems with rinsing the sponges in tap water.
cheers Darrel
Yes, I think it is to do with the time of exposure and the low levels of chlorine (less than 1 ppm in the UK). Chlorine definitely will kill those micro-organisms that it contacts. Details here <"Scientific American: How does ....">Does it come down to exposure time? If we wash the sponges in tap water are they not exposed to the chlorine for long enough to have a detrimental affect?
No use whatsoever. This is the report showing that your water company is complying (well some are 92% compliant) with EU set maximum contaminant levels. If you are using dechlorinator with heavy metal removal it will remove the residual heavy metals in your water as well. There is no definite proof that heavy metals in UK water are high enough to cause fish & bacteria any issues. If worried (??) just use an HMA filter.I can't even figure the amount of chlorine from that report?
????then I can't measure it
Darrel,
Does it come down to exposure time? If we wash the sponges in tap water are they not exposed to the chlorine for long enough to have a detrimental affect?
I would assume that the chlorine level was high enough to kill bacteria or why add it?
What is the damage if I do that long term?
I've been doing large water changes without dechlorinator for the last 4 weeks on two tanks. That's because I ran out of dechlorinator and I kept the last bits for my big tank so my small tanks have been water changed without any at all. In one of them I accidentally did 70% as I forgot the python draining and the tank is small, takes a few minutes to drain it.
Those two tanks contain corydoras, kuhli loaches, shrimp and ottos and they are absolutely unaffected during or after.
Today I ran out of dechlorinator altogether and my big tank just took a 60% water change without any dechlorinator.
A few months back I did several weeks water changes on one of these same tanks without dechlorinator to test as I had noticed that in the past in the rare cases when I forgot to put some, fish were ok. Those fish were and are still fine that I put through the test. I just started dosing back up so I don't worry about it, not because it made any difference.
From the limited info about our water I know it's treated with very little chlorine. I don't know anything about heavy metal content.
I know it's safer using dechlorinator because the water companies may flush the system and such but under the current circumstances buying Prime for multiple weekly water changes cost me way too much.