Dealing with woody poos :) L190s

jacksonsjones

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Jul 5, 2010
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Hi Guys,
Hoping if I can get some advice with the following problems.
Recently, acquired 3x L190s and essentially they are pooing shavings of driftwood all throughout the tank.
I know this is expected, but all I have is a 2217 Eheim filter running a 4 footer. The waste is so large that I have to do water changes every week or so and it is becoming quite labour intensive.

Do any of you suggest another setup that will minimise the frequency of water changes?
Any advice would be welcome.
 

matubula

Retired Staff
May 7, 2009
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Chester, UK
There are 2 ways you can remove Panaque poo. You can either filter or remove it. I do do both on my 2 Panaque tanks.

If you choose to filter it then you need very powerful filtration and fair amount of it. This is so that the filter doesn't clog too fast and can also handle the biological filtration. I achieve this by using a pond canister filter fed by a 6000lph solids handling pump (which is sat where the waste collects). The tank also has a Fluval FX5 and Eheim Pro3 2180 (and Eheim Powerline internal filter). I chose this method for this tank because it difficult to access and the amount of fish. The tank is 150x50x70cm and has had a maximum of 5 x L190 22cm-30cm, 9 x L027 10-23cm and L090 20cm, which all grew well and are healthy.

Or you can choose to remove the waste with regular small water changes so that the filters don't have to. On my 120x60x45cm tank with a 40cm L190, I set up the water flow to push the waste to one side of the tank and position the filtration at the other, as to avoid the filter taking it up. This tank uses an Eheim Pro 2180 and Tetratec ex1200. Depending on me, I will try to siphon waste out as regularly as I can, sometimes everyday.

With either method you will need to do large water changes, around 50%, at the minimum, weekly. I try to them every other day or so. In my ideal world I would set up a large sump with a large settlement chamber and automatic water changer as to provide the best environment for my fish and also minimise the work for me.

IMHO if you find it taxing already then you might want to rethink keeping them.
 

bigbird

Pleco Profiles Moderator - RIP FRIEND
Sep 9, 2010
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I use an external eheim and also a 1200l/ph internal powerhead. I use the filter wool and just replace once a week when I throw out this wool and add new one. Also with weekly water changes syphen out the poo of my L397s. I must say the internal powerhead is great as it also creats a current and set down the heavier poo in one spot where it is easy to syphen out. cheers jk :thumbup::thumbup:
 

Pete

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May 19, 2009
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yep the royals are definately high maintenance you have to keep a good eye out to see that the filter inlets dont become clogged :)
pete
 

ridout

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Nov 17, 2009
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what pond canister filter do you use Matt? I've been looking to do the same but not sure what one to buy? And what is the FX5 like?

Ridout
 

matubula

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May 7, 2009
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It's this one (I think). Although any other similar one would do the same job. I chose this one because it has a 'back wash' and internal scrapers so you can clean it (a bit) without opening it. It does it's job perfectly but a little difficult to adapt for in the house. Give me a PM and I'll tell it's full pros and cons.

For me, and my tank, I don't like the FX5 much. It is a scaled down version of the Laguna filter (fairly literally because they are both from Hagen and use the same range of pumps), but doesn't work as well.
 

Oscar300

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May 8, 2009
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Welcome to the world of panaque keeping ;-). On my 4ft I run two 2028's and a juwel jumbo internal, it houses just the one 14" BES and a couple of little tinkers. Treat yourself to some big externals and reap the rewards of a neater tank, you should still squeeze in those water changes though......;-)
 

jacksonsjones

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Jul 5, 2010
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Sydney
Hi Guys All,
Thanks so much for your advice. You all certainly vindicated all my suspicions in terms of what is required.
The only other thought I was to use an under gravel filter. What I was thinking, is to use the air tubes as a vaccumm source. Weekly I would attach a powerhead to the airtubes and suck all the waste from the bottom out of the tank. The gravel layer is only thin thus the waste should get caught into the undergravel filter.
Do you think this will work?
Obviously I will keep the Ehiem running as well.

Thoughs anyone?

Another question, my rolyals are about 15cm. How long will it take to grow them to say 30cm in a 4ft tank?
 

Brengun

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Apr 22, 2009
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Burrum Heads, Queensland, Australia
I hear you on the woody poop. Your choice of filtration in the Eheim 2217 is excellent.
The trouble is, how do you push all that heavy stuff toward the intake?

I usually add in something from ageofaquariums like an otto 800lph internal filter or even the 1200lph one. Because the poop is so big, I usually switch out the finer sponges out of the suction cups and add in coarser ones. I forget which brand they are but my lfs has them so they must be fairly easy for them to order in.

The internal filter as well as blowing the debris towards the canister intake also takes up some of the debris to its own filter cups. It is much easier to just snap off the filter cups and give them a rinse in water change water than it is to go unhooking all the canister hoses to clean it.

You can even add an internal filter each end but then you might end up with heat friction which is what I found in my 6ft tank and it heats the water too high in the summer time.

I did find a solution, I also add a wavemaker to blow the debris up to the filtering end.
Don't have heart failure, you don't need to get the expensive marine ones, guppys aquarium online and probably some on ebay have a cheaper version which works really well. I have endler guppies in the tank as well, and none of them have come to grief with the wavemaker so its safe enough.

Waterchange once a week is pretty standard with all plecos. They like the nice clean water and they not only poop in it, they pee too which you dont notice but you will in the yellow water that comes out during water changes.

If you don't like gravel vaccing, I wouldnt advise installing an under gravel filter. It is nice for a start to have the poops going somewhere else like in the gravel, but you do need to retreive it with a gravel vac. It doesn't just disappear into nothing and you will see in the front glass that a black line of debris is sinking under the gravel.

You are aware I suppose that a 4ft tank is no where near big enough for 3 adult L190's?

Try putting your tank details and preferred filtration into this fish stocking assessor.
http://www.aqadvisor.com/AqAdvisor.php

I added in your tank as a 48 x 18 x18" tank, if its a 48 x 24 x 24" tank, the result may read different, so have a bit of a play with it and see what tank you will need longterm to keep the 3 panaques.

Here are the results my search turned up:
Note: Royal Pleco needs driftwood.
Warning: Royal Pleco is not recommended for your tank - it may eventually outgrow your tank space, potentially reaching up to 15 inches.
Warning: Your selected species may eventually require 223% of your aquarium space. You may need to deal with territorial aggressions later on. Try removing some of (Panaque nigrolineatus) or get a larger tank.

Recommended temperature range: 22 - 26 C. [Display in Farenheit]
Recommended pH range: 5.5 - 7.8.
Recommended hardness range: 1 - 15 dH.
 

Lornek8

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Apr 21, 2009
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One point to remember is that no amount of filtration is a substitute for water changes. Simply moving the waste into the filters rather than in the aquarium makes no difference if the filters are not cleaned often. Whether the waste breaks down in the tank or in the filter, the results will be the same & that is degrading water quality.
 

dw1305

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May 5, 2009
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Wiltshire nr. Bath, UK
Hi all,
One point to remember is that no amount of filtration is a substitute for water changes. Simply moving the waste into the filters rather than in the aquarium makes no difference if the filters are not cleaned often. Whether the waste breaks down in the tank or in the filter, the results will be the same & that is degrading water quality.
I think Lornek's is a very good point and that unless you have a solids handling pump (like Matubula) or are very rigorous with your filter cleaning (like Brengun), you are better off syphoning the poo out, rather than sucking it into the filter.

The reasons for this are largely to do with keeping good oxygenation in the tank water, there are more details here: <http://plecoplanet.com/?page_id=829>, but I'll try and get the important bits in this post.

Filter
The Eheim Classics are good filters for all sorts of reasons, but in this case it is because the water can't by-pass the filter material (the water goes in at the bottom and out of the top), and the out-put (through the trickle bar) is a good measure of the flow through the filter. As soon as the flow drops the filter needs cleaning.

Poo
The poo itself is not actually very polluting in terms of its potential to produce ammonia (or rich in easily degradable carbohydrates, that would nourish rapid bacterial growth), but it is very large, bulky and slow to break down. When it is in the constricted space of the filter, the wood fibres can inhibit water flow and its limited decomposition will remove some of the oxygen from the water in the filter, before it reaches the nitrification bacteria. The process of nitrification is oxygen intensive and if the water is de-oxygenated (by microbial action, exacerbated by reduced flow speed) the volume of the biological filtration media in the filter becomes irrelevant, as it will be working at a fraction of its potential ability.

Water Changes
As Brengun notes your Panaque is a bulky fish, and its metabolism will produce a lot of ammonia, if you don't change enough water, in a non planted tank, however effective the filter is it will convert that ammonia into nitrate, which can only be removed by water changes (or actively growing plants).

cheers Darrel
 

matubula

Retired Staff
May 7, 2009
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Chester, UK
Although not wood poo (just imagine it's brown :D) it does illustrate the point, and the reason why you need to find a suitable method. For this tank I use a 1200lph Eheim internal filter (actually a pond fountain filter) for aeration and to push the poo to this side of the tank, where I siphon it out and the Eheim filter can also tackle some (and does it very well). The main biological filtration is on the other side where very little detritus enters it.

This is from my 40cm L190 and in all honesty is not that much, his belly is still full of precious little gifts yet to arrive <3

 

dw1305

Global Moderators
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May 5, 2009
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Wiltshire nr. Bath, UK
Hi all,
Brilliant Matt, that is what this thread needed, a picture. Because Panaque spp. are naturally eating wood and have relatively unspecialised digestion (details here <http://www.plecoplanet.com/forum/showthread.php?t=2296>), they need to process a vast amount of "food" to get the nutrients they need to survive and grow and you get a huge pile of poo every day.

Too many huge piles of poo in the filter = problems.

cheers Darrel