View Full Version : metal in water
Hunter2001
02-18-2003, 1:06 AM
I have a 29 gallon aquarium which has been up and running for almost 2 months. Everything has been fine so far, all my fish seem healthy and my water looks great. I am constantly thinking of ways to enhance the look of my aquarium. I have a nice piece of driftwood which I would like to add to my aquarium. The problem is, I have had the piece of wood for a number of years and it has dried out and now floats. Would it be alright to tie a small piece of metal to the wood to keep it submerged?, or will the metal cause water chemistry problems. I think if the wood stays submerged for a while, it will eventually take on enough water and sink by itself.
Any insight would be greatly appreciated.
pinballqueen
02-18-2003, 1:29 AM
I would first give a shot to soaking the wood in a big bucket, just to see if you can waterlog it. After that, see if there's any part of it that could be easily buried under the gravel or a big rock. Putting metal in a tank is not the best idea, because it can play with your chemical balances or leach into the tank. It does depend on the metal though. Iron would obviously be a bad choice because it will rust into the water.
I don't know if everyone will agree with me, so see what everyone else says before you make a decision. My two cents goes on trying other options first.
wetmanNY
02-18-2003, 3:09 PM
It'll take a while, but it will sink.
Meanwhile, make a sandbag with aquarium gravel and water in a zip-loc baggie, with no air. Or a couple. Drape them over the wood to hold it in place, and be patient.
corvettekid82
02-19-2003, 1:18 AM
You could also sink some plastic screws into it and attach suction cups. I had to do with with a piece of wood in my turtle tank because he likes to do his own redecorating.
As someone who works often with waterlogged wood (mostly from an archeological context), it can take months or longer to rewaterlog a piece of wood. wetmanNY is right and you could just easily attach a sack filled with something heavy. Unless you have a large hunk of stainless steel or gold then I wouldn't add any metal to the tank as all metals will corrode to a point and release their ions into solution.