SSSSooooooo, ive done some searching on here looking for answers and general info. However i still have some specific questions about my situation.

Today i was given a 5 year old tiger w/ HITH.

He has a 55gal tank w/ a HOB filter that has mechanical, charcoal?, and Bio pieces in it. The guy who brought him over changed the charcoal and the mechanical filters. I was thinking i should also change the bio one after the looks of the other filters that came out of there.

His previous owner had him at a friends for awhile and when he would do water changes, he never cleaned the rocks. so theres pretty gnarly build up of junk under the rocks. He also mentioned the HITH has gotten considerably worse since he was at his friends.

So here are my questions... ive read that these charcoal and/or carbon filters are bad. should i take that out? or should it be left in for a few days to help clean out the the matter that was stirred up when dumping new tap water into the rocks?

How long do you suppose i should wait to do a water change, to clean some of that junk out? And how often after that? I dont want to stress him out too much etc.

If and when i get a new bio piece. do i leave the old on in there for a bit so it can inhabit the new piece? I was also thinking about getting another one of these HOB filters since the tank isnt setup for a canister. If i do that, will the bacteria from the already established filter, inhabit the new bio peice?

My last question is... how long after water changes do you get accurate water test results?


Thanks for being patient. I want to make this poor guy healthy again.

Hi, sounds like you have been reading all the right stuff from your questions..I will try to go through them all with you.

1 charcoal isnt needed so may as well come out. i would add more media like floss or bio balls. can you tell use what type hob it is?? make/model so we can gauge if its a suitable size for your 55g tank.

2 you should be changing around 25% of the water each week. before adding any tap water you must add dechlorinater to remove chlorine from the water. you say you added some tap water already? did you remove chlorine 1st????

3 you should only clean out a small part of the filter at a time again 30% is good enough. your filter must have some of that gunk inside for it to work. never get tap water in your filter, always wash it with old used tank water.

4 a canister will work with any tank and is no problem to set up, in fact it may be easier than the hob in the long run.

from what i read i would change 30% of the water now, then do the same every week. remember to remove chlorine. I would buy filter floss then remove the carbon and replace it with the new floss. wait a a few wks before cleaning the filter any more.this will give the new floss time to build bacteria. This is dependent on the filter size you have. don't worry about the HITH at the mo, a good clean tank will hopefully sort this out. the rocks can be jet washed with water. or scrubbed then reused. i would also buy a water test kit if you don't have one.

You can remove the junk under the rocks when you change the water

Get a canister filter, there are great filter. If you another filter (either sort) run both together, you cant overfilter. Dont get rid of the old one but if you have to then have them both running for a couple of months

The best testers are the liquid ones. They give accurate results for the water tested, so as long as you have good enough filtration you just have to wait for the new water to mix in well with the old. Give it 10 or 20 minutes after a water change to test. Just for fun test your water before a water change and then after to see the difference

Good luck with your oscar

pristine water and varied foods will heal your fish.
most common mistake is wrong and untimely cleaning of the filter
marcus and delboybully got you covered.

Foods for oscars, good quality cichlid pellets (i use hikari cichlid gold), maggots, worms (nightcrawlers), defrosted prawns, krill, muscles, mealworms and any insects from the garden (make sure they are not poisionious).

Lots of people feed their oscars small fish. This is not necessary and if you do it a lot your fish will get sick and even die (oscars cant process the fats in fish properly). Oscar mainly eat insects in the wild

marcus wrote:


On the top of the filter it says, "AquaClear - 70" . SO maybe get another one of those to help.




The guy who brought him over had me put in a cap full of "API StressCoat - Fish & Tapwater Conditioner" For every 5 gallons i dumped in. We didnt let it sit or anything, he just dumped the fish in once it was filled up enough for him.



OH snap. maybe i should reread the info on canisters. i was thinking there had to be holes in the bottom of the tank for tubing.



delboybully wrote:


Ya, he gave me this vacuum water sucker deal. he demoed how to use it.

If i got another HOB thats what i was going to do, is run both at the same time.

He also gave me this water test kit. Its..... Freshwater Master Test Kit . However, its in a box not that plastic case. Either way, its that brand.

i ALSO forgot to mention he also told me to put in a tablespoon of this aquarium salt per 5 gal.

applying pure salt and increasing the temp to 80 deg F will help
but without attaining good water condition, those things would not
help at all.

please remove all carbon from your system as oscars and carbon do not mix !!!!!!!!!!!! IMHO ..

Oh, but your getting there!
I can only agree with all the advice given.

biggamehunter wrote:


Well.. i removed the carbon filter and a ton of black "stuff" got released into the tank. Hopefully thats OK.

K.Krsntsn wrote:

i'm afraid your carbon bag had been broken and those black stuff were
carbon themselves. nevertheless, it won't matter anymore. just keep
an eye on your water maintenance.....