Some thoughts on my sump

[ScorpiosWife]

After tiring of cleaning detritus from my sump every week, I'm searching for a better solution. I've spent the last hour & a half reading what I Googled about what different people have done to dispose of it but they're mostly reef people and most of what they do doesn't apply to my little freshwater world.

I'm not sure if there's not enough flow in the sump or if there's just nothing to catch the small particles that make up this pile of dirt that if I don't stay on top of, over time will turn into a nightmare. I'm leaning toward there's nothing to catch the small particles.

Some use sponge filters to catch them (but where do they put the sponges & where do you buy them so that you can cut them to size?), some use powerheads (don't wanna do that cuz I don't want the trash back in the tank), some use filter socks (huh?), some use snails (I didn't think snails ate poo), some use shrimp (I'd have to have an entire colony), some use pods (and I'm not quite sure what those are aside from bugs), etc. My brain is now on overload because I don't understand half of what I'm reading & there's no one to explain it to me in dunce language.

My attention span with things & people I'm not attached to is like that of a fly. That said, my ADD kicked in, I closed my Google window and ended up here to air out my thoughts & get yall's opinions, experiences & input. Yall know I'm a big dummy & to use small 4 letter words with me, lol.

This is the Oscar tank I'm referring to. I've tried putting different HOBs in it but with the low level of water in the sump it's useless no matter how many different HOBs I try (there's 4 lying in the floor at the moment, 2 brand new). What I've been doing is dragging the shop vac, the syphon hose & an 18 gallon tub of new water in and sucking it all out. I gotta replace the water at the same time, so it tends to end up looking like I've wrapped myself in various hoses for some kind of fetish party. *ta-da!*

Also, what exactly does a UV Stablilizer do? What does a skimmer do? The fish in this tank are dirty fish so I have to wonder....do I need these things?

I'm starting to invision tying tiny feed bags to their little heads.

[CRUSHER]

try an inline filter of some kind.. DIY just saying

[troy tucker]

Dawn you don't need a skimmer or a UVS. the spunge you want can be found at most LFS. small fish or shrimp in the sump will help. If you want to put a filter on you will need a can.filter.
How are your shrimp doing? they will be a colony sooner or later.
Don't over think this...

[ScorpiosWife]

Crusher, I don't know what an inline filter is, lol.

Troy, I like the sponge idea, just don't know where to put it exactly. Do I put it in the column, in the bio balls? On top of or below? I use the blue filter material on top of the bio balls currently in the sump, but not in the column. We have access to that stuff by the case so I have an endless supply. I do keep some guppies in the sump, but they don't eat poop, lol. I can do a can filter... DOH! Never entered my mind. Trying not to over think it, don't wanna be drastic OCD about it, but with the poop from a foot long pleco, 2 10" oscars & 2 parrots the weekly sump clean up is a bit like having to clean a porta potty.

The top of the water in the sump seems to not move much at all. Is everyone's like that? Water shoots into the tank out of the jets at a really good rate so I know the pump is working. Should I be concerned that the top water is sitting still?

The shrimp are doing fabulously fine in the nursery tank. I think they're too small to put in the sump though. I'm afraid they'd end up getting sucked into the tank or get killed in the process.

[ScorpiosWife]

Ack! What are the 1/4" long worm looking things I'm just noticing? Are they bad? Too small to get a picture of. Don't appear to have a head or tail, they resemble a really short piece of living hair. They look like this l but they wiggle.

[CRUSHER]

lol ok, forget I mentioned it :)
Not to high jack your thread.... Every time I want to start a shrimp colony my darn fish eat all the shrimp... :(

[ScorpiosWife]

Troy keeps endlers with his & mine are in with my guppy & molly fry. These worms are really freaking me out.

[troy tucker]

Do you have a overflow box on the back of the tank? if so the sponge can go there but it should have a sponge befor the water gets to the pump. That sponge should keep anything from getting back to the tank. as well as keep fish or shrimp from being chowed by the pump.

[troy tucker]

co-pods?

[ScorpiosWife]

I've had guppy fry make it from the sump into the tank. Apparently no one wants to eat them, so I fish them out & stick them in the fry tank. I figure they made it through, they deserve to live, lol.

The tank has a column in the middle that the water flows into, filled with bio balls, then into the sump where there is a blue filter pad covering more bio balls. The detritus is always on the floor underneath where the bio balls are. It's very fine but the quantity of it is enough that it looks like little underwater islands after about a week.

[troy tucker]

post a picture of the sump....

[SunnyHouTX]

The best way I've found to keep my sumps clean:

http://www.houstonfishbox.com/vforums/showthread.php?51127-How-I-set-up-floss-on-my-wet-dry-filters

No other sponges or whatever.

I would like to add that human OCD is not always healthy for fish. Please leave that sump alone for at least two months (preferably 6) at a time between cleaning or else you're not gonna let it mature and perform well. Detritus in the sump is not a bad thing and from the looks of it the only thing I can see is that you don't like to look at a "dirty" sump. Easiest fix is shut the doors to your stand and don't look at it. Even if you see it, remind yourself that what you find visually unpleasant does not hinder the function of the sump. Also remind yourself that the more often your mess with your sump the more you're adversely effecting the home of your fish.

[ScorpiosWife]

Troy, everything I've read on copepods seem to be reef tanks & seem to be a celebrated thing. Mine is freshwater. So, is it bad or good? I don't want my fish to have bugs & get sick. :( They literally look like 1/4 inch pieces of swimming hair.

[Totenkampf]

crusher might have been talking about inline prefilters. they are basically a canister filter with no pump. i dont think this would work since you wouldnt want to but anything that can clog up on your overflow line to your sump. a clog here means water on the floor. putting one after your sump pump wouldnt help much either. i think the best thing to do would be to get a high flow cansiter filter and just stuff it with mechanical filtration. you could also lower the flow through your sump so its just handling bio filtration (keep the prefilter pads though), which is more effective with more media to water contact time. this would allow more water change cycles through the mech filter and thus most of the debris end up here. i believe this is how some of the cichlid fans like sunny do it.

[HERM]

Ack! What are the 1/4" long worm looking things I'm just noticing? Are they bad? Too small to get a picture of. Don't appear to have a head or tail, they resemble a really short piece of living hair. They look like this l but they wiggle.

I've had these small reddish brown worms ,pretty heavy when I had my Oscar tank , This might help .

http://www.fishchannel.com/fish-health/freshwater-conditions/camallanus-worms.aspx