To water change or not to water change?!

Hi just wanted to Know what the pros & cons are off doing water changes and not doing them!
This is because up till a month & half ago i did 25 liter water changes every 2 weeks as advised by my LFS but then i read on here that some people dont do water changes at all! Now i thought this was a bad idea as the water would turn bad & lead to high nitrate & so on. So i gave it a go ( with the idea that if i did see a spike in my levels i would go back to doing water changes to bring them down again!) and its been a months & a half & all seems perfect so how dose the no water change thing work? I guess i should have asked that really before trying it! some people swear that you have to do regular water changes while other do none! i dont get it so anyone with info on this would be great from both sides would be good so i can get a ballanced idea in my head!
Thanks Kiarah

 

not again

there is a thread on here from the beginning of the week i think that has many pros and cons from alot of users and it did get abit heated so might want to search that ;D

 

Ah.. ...dont really want anyone to get all uptight over it, just a general question!
I think its funny if people get angry over little things like weather to water change or not!
I never seem to find what i want when i try & look for a already done thread so that why i started this
;D

 

just in case you didn't see it:
http://www.3reef.com/forums/water-chemistry/water-changes-must-65100.html

the problem is there is no real answer to the question.
Sorry I couldn't be more help.

 

Great thanks , I read it & there didnt seem to be any major fall outs! Ive seen alot worse on hear.
I think if im going to stick to no water changes then ill have to learn more on the dosing side off things as im cluless on that front.
Did all basic test & all were fine so if you dont do water changes what are the main element youll need to dose /replace?
It a bit of a nightmare here as they dont do many testing kits so all i have is ammo, nitrate, nitrite, ph, cal, is it Kh? mag , phos so how do i replace something if i cant test for it? Think this is turning into a chemistry Q!

Anyway id like to give it a go but as i dont fully understand they whole dosing & replacing side off things ill have to go back to water changes till ive got more advice
Cheers all
Kiarah

 

I cant say that I understand how or why either way works. All I know is I didnt change my water for over 6 months with no ill effects I could detect. I just keep a very close watch on my filters. Clean my bio balls at least every two weeks and add calcium iodine trace elements and other religiously. So I guess you could say I spend as much time doing that as a water change would take.

 

Hi Kiarah

my opinion, if you continue to change 10% of your water every other week, you will be doing nothing wrong

if you dont do any water changes , can monitor all the important parameters , make the required additions to optimise conditions , you will be doing nothing wrong

this is one debate, where uniquely, both sides of the discussion are right


Steve