Aquarium Maintenance Tips

Many people love to keep an aquarium in their house. While the addition surely looks beautiful, it also involves much effort on your part, in terms of installation as well as maintenance. In fact, any mistake under any of the two heads and you run the risk of grave harm to the fish. Talking about maintenance of an aquarium, you mainly need to clean wastes, check chemical balance, and sustain the right water pH. Want to explore some more tips on aquarium maintenance? Go through the following lines and find your requirements fulfilled.

 

 

One of the key steps in maintaining an aquarium comprises of changing the water on a regular basis, at least once in a month. However, at a single time, it is advisable not to change more than 25-30% of the total water. This quantity of fresh water will help dilute the harmful chemicals, such as nitrites, nitrates and phosphates, which have accumulated in the aquarium. While replacing the water, make sure that the fresh water has the same temperature and pH level as the water already in the aquarium, in order to avoid any adverse effects.

 

As a part of the maintenance procedure, you also need to make sure that the temperature in the aquarium is at the optimum level. Here, you will have to keep the type of your fish in mind - tropical or cold-water. This is because tropical fish is comfortable in temperatures around 25ºC, while cold-water fish prefers to remain in much lower temperatures. At the same time, you also need to make sure that the aquarium temperature is maintained at a constant level. A sudden change can lead to fish-shock and even cause diseases.

 

It is very important to maintain proper lighting inside the aquarium. You will have to make use of a combination of natural light and artificial light for the purpose, keeping in mind the fish as well as the plants. Remember that presence of optimum light now only makes the aquarium as well as the fish look much more beautiful, but is also necessary for suppression of harmful algae and planktons. In this context, it is advisable to make sure that the aquarium gets enough lighting for somewhere around 12 hours in a day.

When it comes to maintaining an aquarium, it is necessary to make sure that the pH levels remain in balance. Though neutral (7) pH is the perfect level for all the fish, they can easily tolerate any pH in the range of 6.6 to 7.4. You can check the pH level by testing water hardness. It is advisable to do this on a regular basis, since fish cannot tolerate a fluctuating pH. One of the best ways of maintaining pH is to clean the aquarium water regularly. This helps get rid of wastes and algae, in turn keeping the pH at the right level.