Reptile & Amphibian Forums

The water in my tank looks bad. I just did a partial water change and put a new bio-bag in the filter. I'm using a Tetra wisper filter to get by until the fluval 304 arrives (in about a week). My question is, when the new filter gets here, do I just do a partial water change again, slap the fluval on and let it go to work or should I take all the water out and start from scratch? I hope the fluval works better than the filter I have now!

I finally put some polished river rocks in the bottom of the tank as well as a log and some fake plants. I think the turtle was confused when I put him back in!

Just my opinion and I am not up on the filter differences.. however I would take this opportunity to do a complete water change and tank cleaning.

I agree, you might as well do a full clean out, get any algae scum of the tank and really do a good clean. Generally it is not a good idea to do complete water changes as you need beneficial bacteria in your tank to keep your water going well, but it wouldn't hurt to do it since you are changing filters anyway. But if the water isn't too icky, you could probably just do a partial water change. Fluvals are great turtle filters and should clean up all the mess for you. If you do do a complete water change dont be scared if the water turns cloudy a day or two after the complete change, that is normal.
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I thought I posted here yesterday. I disagree about complete water changes. You are going to start from scratch again and in no time have ICKY water again. I would do around a 50% water change and then hook up your Fluval and run it as well as keep your whisper filter running. Then in 2-3 weeks remove the whisper filter. Do 1/3 - 1/2 water changes weekly and once your water is nice and clear you do 1/3 changes weekly. Starting from scratch in NOT the best thing to do. If you want remove some of the things objects from the tank, clean those and replace them into the tank but a 100% water change is not a good thing to do. You are just prolonging the sucessful cycling of your tank.

Steve

Thanks to everyone who replied. I appreciate the advice. I've never had an aquarium bigger than 2 gallons and they only had fish in them so this is all new to me.

I did a partial (1/3) water change this weekend and again tonight. The water was so murky I felt sorry for the turtle and couldn't wait until next weekend to do it again. I left the turtle in this time while I did it since its pretty easy to do and doesn't take very long. Is it okay to leave him in their during a partial water change?

I think its a good idea to leave both filters running for a few weeks. I think part of my problem now is that I had a smaller Whisper on the tank and when that didn't seem to be doing the trick I yanked it, took it back to Walmart, and replaced it with the biggest one they had, losing any beneficial bacteria I had in the old filter.

Anyway, I'm going to post a separate question on the fluval for anyone that has one and can help me with that so I'm prepared when it arrives (hopefully soon!).