Water change?

Is there a point where you can get away from water changes? I know my stays pretty decent for a month while I am out of town. Looking around I see some people with 300+ gallon aquariums and wonder if they do water changes or have equipment so its not needed or drastically reduced.

To be completely honest once my pump crapped out on me back in March or so I was not able to do anything because I was out of town. Tank sat with no circulation pump only a power head and a protein skimmer for just over a month. I only lost a Rabbit fish. So I wonder do all these people do water changes weekly or by weekly? I do them monthly when I return home but recently started talking my girl into doing them just have not been home to go through the process with her yet.

If you can get away from doing them monthly or even totally what equipment do you need? As I said I only do them monthly already but have nothing more then a skimmer and a sump.

 

I go about 6 weeks to one time two months (my tanks only a year and a half old though). My new routine is gonna be 6 weeks, I change about 25% when I do change though.

 

I change my water once a month and do only about 16%

There are many people out there who never do water changes....its really what ever works for you. If your tank is healthy and thriving the way you do things, I wouldnt change anything.

You can experiment if you want and go longer between water changes, then test everything and see how it goes....

 

Wow I feel guilty when I go longer then 2 weeks . It depends on what type of tank you have. IMO reef should have a 10% WC each week to put new minerals in the water, assist with water parameters and remove deitrus. FOWLR I think can go 2-3 weeks. In the end it depends on each aquarist to make the decision and if the tank is doing well then your doing something right.

 

I personally do 10 gallons a week in a 75 gallon with a 29 gallon sump. Everything just seems to respond real well after the WC and it gives me a chance to clean the skimmer and glass and other little things. I have gotten the routine down to 1/2 hour and it is nice to just check everything closely while siphoning out old water.

 

I do the same for my 29g FOWLR. 10% weekly WC. I'll keep up with this as I switch over to making it into a reef tank.

 

my gf thinger starts thinking about water changes after i nag her for 2-3 months lol she does 12 gallon changes every 4 months or so in her 55.my tanks are usually ebery 3-4 weeks i do bigger changes about 25%

theres a cmpany that has some equipment that does your wc for you i think they may be a sponsor

 

Isn't it Genesis that has this?

 

On my tank when I redo it I am going to drill an extra hole for waste water to go directly into a bucket.

Tank >bulkhead> pvc> elbow> bucket.

 

Thats how mine is. I love it. If I wait a month though when the water and detrius come out of there it smells like sulphur which scares me. I now do a weekly 5 gallon change.