hi all hope someone helps me i start from beggining ok. i got two tropical tanks with fish from my grandad not able to look after em anymore.first Q my water levels drop all time so i refill them with boiled and cold water mix is this right and if so y does the water get less/Q2 i have a under tank filter but the one for pumping oxygen is noisy irritating the top tank always seems ok and really clear i have 3 big fish in top one bottom tank as about 12 smaller fish catfish in each the gravel on top tank looks dirty can i clean it or not i do clean filters and replace with new carbon but not sure how often i should do this also is this all i do besides clean water which not sure about prev said so, got lights in both which i turn on at night and leave off in day i get more scum on bottom tank than top which as no underground filter and i got heaters in each what temp should they be i leave anymore questions out for now until i get help up to now .. if anyone helps i thankyou now yours JD

Hi JD and welcome to the site and the hobby!

Before we can answer your questions we need to ask a few of our own.

1. What kind of fish are in the tanks?
2. What size tanks are they?
3. Do you have a water test kit? You will need one that tests Ph, Ammonia, Nitrates, Nitrites.
4. What kind of filtration do the tanks have?

You can be sure that others will chime in with more questions.

As for your water going away, it's from evaporation and is perfectly normal.
As for topping off your tanks you should not need to boil the water, you do need to use a Dechlorinator to remove chlorine and chloramine, I prefer a product called Prime.

I'm not sure if you are reffering to an Under Gravel Filter, cannister filter or a Hang on Back power filter, each has different maintnence requirements.

As for the lights, your fish, like all other living things need a sleep/wake cycle so the lights should be off for a period of time every day or night.

The way to remove the dirt and crud from your gravel is by doing water changes with a gravel vac, you vaccume the dirt from the gravel and remove 15-25% of the water at the same time and replace the water with dechlorified water.

MY GOD, i know this guy! i know him from Halo, he's in my clan! And i didn't reccomend the website to him.
{IW}Snowy

( you are the same judge dredd from {IW} Ice Warriors, right? )


Well, dtroup here probably can wrap things up here. but if you have anymore questions contact me via Xƒire (kingoflullaby)


if you ain't anybody i know. We offer plenty of help on here.

Catfish are dirty, dirty little (ha!) fish. Like the poster above said, frequent water changes are necessary. Evaporation happens all the time, and I remedy that by pouring about a gallon in everytime my tank looks low. I recommend siphoning, or vacuuming the bottom of the tank, because it removes waste, old food, and other harmful detritus from the tank. See the nitrogen cycle sticky, it's VERY important.

Also, they have timers that you can set to turn your lights on and off automatically.
they work very well, and you can buy one at most pet stores.