What canister media?
bottom=eheim noodles, middle=eheim substrat, top=cut white padding, quilting, or bonded filter sheets trimmed to fit
Change out the media and clean?
white padding every two months at filter cleaning, other media-- not yet, less than 1 year old
Do you ever clean the hoses?
Yes, at filter cleaning I drain water from the tank through the hose and this cleans a lot of debris from the hoses. This water is shot into a bucket and I rinse the media in that water. The fluval I have to clean about every 4th month or 6th month for it does not clear when I drain water through it. The Eheims clear better, I did clean them at about 6 months but it wasn't that necesary.
How often do you do water changes and how much water do you change?
Planted tanks--50%/week for higher light/higher fertilizer tanks. Lower light planted tanks (low fertilizer additions) get skipped ocassionally and get at minimum 50% every other week. Heavily stocked cichlid tank (big fish) gets 50% a week and alternate week gravel vacs or sometimes weekly depending on my time. Heavily stocked juvenile discus tank (heavy feeding) gets 20% water changes a day, plus 50% every 3rd day or so.
Do you have any algae problems?
Heavily planted tank is 100% clean, I wipe glass once a month maybe, only if I notice something near the lights. Snails and otos and shrimp keep it clean.
The lower light tank has some brush algae or used to but I can't see the driftwood anymore so I'm not sure and it has a bit of green algae on the glass on the side near the gravel but I only clean glass every month or so now so it is very mild algae. It has otos and snails and shrimp also. 2 Eheim filters.
The big cichlid tank has some brown algae on the side facing the window that I wipe every few weeks. No snails or otos or shrimp there. Lights only on afternoon to evening so I can enjoy them. 2 Eheim filters.
The discus tank has no algae, but I wipe glass every week of brown algae. No snails or otos or shirmp. Lights on 10 hours a day. I've seen the discus try to suck on the glass but their mouths are not the right shape, I think they'd eat algae if they could. HOB and sponge filters.
I have another lightly planted low light tank with only albino bristle nose plecos and shrimp that are cleaning up the brown algae I got in that tank when I started keeping the light on for the plants I added. It is very clean now. It will have discus eventually. 2 eheims.
There is another Q tank with wood and plants and some snails and it has a bit of algae when I remember to feed the plants some fertilizer. Not canister filter.
There is another planted tank that I ignore mostly, it has no algae, few fish, only plants I keep to sell. Not canister filter.
