View Full Version : Anyone do a filterless tank?
rdmpe
05-28-2003, 10:02 AM
There are some articles around about heavily planted tanks with no filter, just a small powerhead for circulation. Anyone have a healthy tank of this sort?
I plan on reducing the filtration of my 30g planted tank over the next week or so and monitoring the amonia / nitrite levels. I have reduced the stock a lot. I currently have:
2 gourami @ 3" <--- edit - I have two, not three
2 gourami @ 2"
1 weather loach @ 3"
1 SAE @ 3"
1 unknown cat @ 1"
1 oto cat @ 2"
6 oto cat @ 1"
Well, looking at that list, the stocking level is not all that light. However, I'm not sure how much the oto cats count since they are mostly scavenging and eating algea. I think that since it is a well established tank, I will probably be OK.
My primary concerns are monitoring the amonia and nitrite and possible low oxygen levels at night. I think that the gourami will be OK since they are a labyrinth fish, but the loach and cats may suffer if the oxygen gets too low. I add CO2 and it is usually between 15 to 20 ppm.
CHINABOY1021
05-28-2003, 4:05 PM
can i just ask. why do you want to go filterless?
quiet, cheap, peaceful, natural, something new to try, just seems like an interesting thing to do...
mickey
05-28-2003, 5:35 PM
Iwould'nt like to go without some type of filter in a 30g with that amount of fish, a powerhead will do the circulation but it won't help with the waste created by your fish.
Cheers.
Sumpin'fishy
05-28-2003, 7:42 PM
I haven't done one myself, but I've read a bit on them. Personally, I wouldn't even try it with more than 3 of your Gouramis and maybe 5 or 6 Ottos. I would probably keep your SAE also. When they say to lightly stock a filterless tank.....they mean it. You will have alot of pollution being deposited in a tank that won't be able to grow a decent sized bacterial colony to deal with it.
Our filters are able to house a larger amount of bacteria in a smaller space than is normally able to be done in nature. You really need to look at getting things as close to natural as possible before trying to remove filters. Most people are unwilling to have few enough fish in a tank to use this method. You would have to pretty much split your inhabitants into two or more tanks (of the same size) to be able to do this for any amount of time. I also agree that labyrinth fish are a good choice for a tank of this sort. Your Corys are also capable of gulping air from the surface (they actually require the ability to do this) but are terribly messy for their small size. Catfish of all types seem to be heavy polluters.
If you want to get the quiet, peacefull benefits without losing the filter benefits, try using a submersible sponge filter like the Simple 1, 2, 3 or Simple 4 that Hagen makes. I use one on my RFUGF (See enter my tank, below) and it works great.
Chinaboy, if you reduce surface turbulence, you really cut down on CO2/ air exchange at the water surface.
CHINABOY1021
05-28-2003, 10:24 PM
how about closed concept filters. like canisters, or hot magnum?
im sure they're quite
CHINABOY1021
05-28-2003, 10:31 PM
hey matak, just want to ask you.
how is your tank doing? the tank im STILL planning for very similiar to yours. 36L x 12W x XX Height.
120 watts of normal fluorescents.
i love amazon swords and tall plants like vals.
are you having any problems with the plants in your tank? thanks
I think I may remove the two small gouramis which I was planning to do anyway. Also I only have 2 gourami @ 3", not 3. That was a typo. Have to keep the SAE and Oto's since I have 4.3 watts/gallon of CF lights and those fish are doing a great job at algea control.
This tank is very heavily planted and also has a large pile of volcanic rock which is very rough and porous. I realize that it isn't the same as a big wad of filter floss, but the tank may have a strong enough bacterial colony to take care of the ammonia compounds that the plants don't use. From what I've read, plants can utilize raw ammonia more easily than nitrite and nitrate, so they should be happy about it too. I may be wrong, but I have to try it myself in order to be convinced ;)
So my plan is to shut the filter down early Saturday and monitor the water every hour for ammonia & nitrite...
Once a tank is well established there is plenty of bacteria in the substrate, rocks etc. to be functional.
I remember back in the day, a guy who used to breed fish, who had the most beautiful 50 gal. tank that was completely filter-less.
It was the most beautiful tank I've ever seen in person.
It had just two large Discus in it, and it was loaded with many varieties of Crypts. As I remember it he did very frequent water changes and that was about it. Very little fertilization. Just a good balance.
Len
Many years ago there was an article on a particular filterless tank in one of te hobby mags, perhaps FAMA, which suggested a long tank with plain gravel and val with White Clouds. No filter, no pump, no heater, little food.
I don't remember what the article proposed, but I did water changes without substrate distrurbance. It was interesting, and certainly minimal care. The final population was higher than the start, but it never crowded, as they were only fed a couple of day per week. I used a thirty long with two single strips. I think they were on a shorter time than my normal 12 hour days.
Originally posted by CHINABOY1021
hey matak, just want to ask you.
how is your tank doing? the tank im STILL planning for very similiar to yours. 36L x 12W x XX Height.
120 watts of normal fluorescents.
i love amazon swords and tall plants like vals.
are you having any problems with the plants in your tank? thanks No probs with plant growing but I did have a few bouts with just about every form of algae out there. My problem is that I just haven't grasped the nutrient equation yet (read: too lazy to bone up on the subject). I probably will when the construction season winds down. At present, I can only run 60W without kick starting the green water
I think you said in a previous post that you live NE of TO, which means you are on TO's water mains. I think that water should give you a good base for plant growing. (8 grains hard, a good amount of KH, 7.5 pH i think)
CHINABOY1021
05-29-2003, 8:54 PM
thanks a lot for the tips!
Well, nothing much to note. After removing the Emperor 400, I had to crank the co2 back to about 1 bubble every 3 to 5 seconds (it was going at about 2 bubbles per second before). After feeding this morning I haven't been able to detect any ammonia or nitrIte all day. I still plan to keep a close eye on it the rest of the weekend and then test it morning and evening for a couple of days, but I think it's going to be fine.
With the water so calm now I can see streams of oxygen bubbles coming off the plants here and there, quite beautiful. I'm very happy with it!
Typical readings:
Am = 0
NitrIte = 0
PH = 7.0
KH = 9.0
co2 ~ 27 ppm
Heady
06-01-2003, 10:03 AM
Of course otos count towards stocking your tank. They eat and breathe, and they produce waste.
I tried this before in a 29 gallon. Fluorite substrate with LOTS of plants and understocked (5 congo tetras). Just used the light that came with the aquarium (20W). Had an air stone in there but no filtration.
This went well for awhile. Then I started getting a serious infestation of algae.... I don't know the name of it but is was very dark colored and attached to things in clumps and had short strings coming off of it. Although I kept cleaning it out, it kept coming back. It was so bad you could not see the fish more than a couple of days after cleaning & water change. The plants were surviving but not thriving by any stretch of the imagination. The fish were fine.
If you had up to 2 wpg and CO2, no filtration might work. But with low light and no CO2, it did not work for me.
thom336
06-01-2003, 10:58 AM
The only filterless tank Im running at the moment is just a 5gal - I do 50% water changes every week, its well planted and lightly stocked. Been going for afew months now. and has been great. But I would imagine it would be a whole different matter on a larger scale.
I find filters so efficient, quiet, unconsuming in electricity and easy to work - as well as not overly expensive - that I dont see the point in trying a tank without them. Also, when you say about people who used to keep tanks without filters and that, you gotta remember that fish are generally alot weaker these days.
superjohnny
06-02-2003, 5:04 PM
Originally posted by thom336
...Also, when you say about people who used to keep tanks without filters and that, you gotta remember that fish are generally alot weaker these days.
Who/what/when/where did this come from?
Iv'e heard this rumor more than once myself. Might make a good topic at General Freshwater (http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?s=&forumid=2)
mickey
06-02-2003, 6:19 PM
Originally posted by Matak
Iv'e heard this rumor more than once myself. Might make a good topic at General Freshwater (http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?s=&forumid=2)
Post it and let the debate begin, should prove to be an interesting one.
Cheers.
brianfl
06-02-2003, 6:23 PM
Before we were married, my wife ran a 55 gal filterless for over a year. No casualties. All she had was a 40 watt light and an airstone. She cleaned it about once a month, probably 50% or more. She was poor and couldn't afford a filter when her's went out. The lfs didn't give her any info at the time. She had 3 rainbow sharks(3"), 1 plec(8"), 1 rosey barb(he came in as a fry on a plant), 1 black shark(6"), and 1 rafael cat(3"). It was lightly stocked and she had no problems. Now of course we do things much different , but it is interesting how it worked. All those sharks aren't supposed to get along and barbs should be in shoals (actually the barb hung out with the big black shark) and no filter to boot:) She had a few plants as well. We wouldn't go back to that again although probably because of a great deal of luck it worked very well. The one thing I did glean from that was how upset I get when the lfs's don't let people know things, they just sell.
The filterless tank is a 30 gallon with 130 watts from 2x65 power compact 50/50 bulbs (I like the blue look), co2, etc. The plants are _really_ thriving and the algae has not been a problem. The SAE and ottos are keeping it under control.
It is much quieter than with the E400 on it. I could go with a nice quiet canister filter but it doesn't seem to be necessary. So far everything is fine, I have not had any detectable Ammonia or NitrIte, PH is stable, etc.
Latest on the filterless tank:
30g
heavily planted
silica sand substrate
4.3 watts/gallon of 50/50 lighting
co2 system
30% water change every two to three weeks
1 pearl gourami 3"
1 weather loach 3" <--- edit - forgot about this little guy!
1 oto cat 2"
6 oto cat 1"
1 SAE 3"
1 unknown cat 2"
10 cardinal tetras 1"
~100 Malay trumpet snails
~20+ ghost shrimp
Ammonia, Nitrate and Nitrite = 0
snails and otos keeping algae at low level, however I do have to clean the front glass once every two weeks or so
Last check showed KH=12 and PH=6.6 which indicates CO2 of 90ppm !! I hadn't checked it in a while, so I immediately cut the bubble count in half. Haven't had any fish deaths, and I've read that the 30ppm toxicity guideline has little to no actual data to back it up. In any case, my experience of running around 90 ppm CO2 for possibly several weeks was no noticable problems with the inhabitants. However, I am going to get it down to around 30 ppm since that should be more than enough for the plants.
This tank is generating enough growth to supply more than enough plants for my 55g, 30g and 10g "non-planted" tanks.
Faramir
07-08-2003, 8:17 AM
I doubt you're really running 90ppm CO2 - you have to remember the equation assumes no buffers other than (bi)carbonate, and no acid other than carbonic. I suspect there are other organic acids involved.
Could be... There is a bit of aragonite in the substrate which I kow is a carbonate, but I haven't added any non-carbonate buffers or any other PH adjusters. The rocks are red lava rock. No other decor. I don't know what types of acids the tank might generate on it's own. My tap water is about 7dKH and 7.8 PH. Before I had heavy plants and CO2 my PH was very stable in the 7.8 range.
After having this tank overstocked and hardly planted for almost a year and battling the associated high nitrate levels, I am feeling really great about seeing zero nitrates (although the plants may not be so happy about it)!
esox48
07-08-2003, 3:21 PM
I have a very large tank, and maintance was becoming a hassel. buying feeder fish was getting expensive. So removed all the large fish, I had three large arawana's, two plecos, and some other exotic gobies. Kept the tank running for a week. Then I planted a ton of plants. I think I am up to 45. So far everything seems to be good, all I added was a bottle of liquid fertiizer. I want the plants in there for a month or so before I start adding fish. Thinking about putting in 20 golden barbs and 20 rosey barbs and 20 guppies. I think the volume of plants I have will be able to handle the nutrient load these guys will generate.
rdmpe
07-08-2003, 10:18 PM
Were you planning to add all of those fish at once? :eek:
I think it's interesting having a filterless tank. However, I do have to have a powerhead going to run my CO2 reactor, and the gentle water flow seems like a good idea. The powerhead only has a strainer for large debris though, not even a sponge on it. I'm going to add at least 10 more of those cardinal tetras this weekend...
Will the barbs eat the guppies? I had 6 tiger barbs once that would eat guppies that were not all that much smaller than they were. It was unbelievable. I finally had to get rid of them (back to the lfs).
I agree with rdmpe, esox48. It mgiht be catastrophic to add a large bioload without cycling the tank first.