Unreliable Eskom.

Good day Tasa members.

I need some advise. I live in Bronkhorstspruit and since yesterday 17:00 we were without electricity (Damn Eskom). I did water changes of about 5% of the tank volume every two hours. So still no electricity and luckily my wife is a teacher and she does the water changes while I'm at work. It has now been 15hours and still no electricuty. This morning my fish were gasping at the surface.

Am I doing the right thing? Any help will be appreciated. Can anybody help me please. :sad2:

Lappies

 

you can buy a battery operated air pump (9volt) . I will PM you the address of a LFS In PTA that sells those or you can try the small LFS across Pick and Pay in Bronkies (Don't know if they have). Water changes are going to change your temp a bit fast (In my opinion). What you can also do is just take a bucket en keep on filling it with tank water and pouring it back in.

 

Thank you very much for your reply. It is much appreciated.

I know that our LFS in Bronkies doesn't have those Battery operated air pumps.

Will it be sufficient to pour the water back into the tank that we take out? How often must we do that? I'm at work in Pretoria and my wife is doing only what I'm telling her.

 

Depends on how much load is on your tank (number of fish + size). I tried the pouring thing but you get really tired after a while. The pump is just 500 times more efficient. Our power was off for a few days once and that pump kept running on the same batterys for about a week.

 

Okay, thank you very much. Dont want the wife to exhaust herself with it because she is expecting.

Thank you very much for your help.

Lappies

 

You can also use some Nitrite/Amonia removers

 

I will definitely do that. I just heard that the electricity is going to be off untill Wednesday evening.

I am most certainly not impressed.

Thank you for the advise and help. It is highly appreciated

 

dont feed.... no food in = less ammonia out... go look at fish tackle shops for the battery air pump,the sometimes sell them as well...

 

Petstop has the 12 volt air pumps
And I think so many water changes is not good IMO
Take a spare wheel or trailer wheel, Pump it 3 bar connect to a pipe with a lock valve and airstone for air ,I used this two years ago when load shedding was in place it worked well
Well good luck
I am special crazy at DIY

 

Something we all overlook. DON'T FEED. Fish will be perfectly fine without food.

When power comes back on... you can assume with 100% certainty that the filter is now dead. Use this opportunity to give your filter a good clean... no better time than now... and get Microbelift Special Blend to put into the tank. Works like an absolute charm.

(My Fish's box of chemicals never runs short of this product!)

 

No, I know not to feed the fish @azurekoi because the Amonia will spike like crazy if food is given now.

Wow @Corne, that is a very good idea but I'm goiing to buy two battery operated airpumps this afternoon.

I'll be pouring the water I take out of my tank back into the tank, so it is not actually water changes (Thanks to @Franna )

I'm planning on giving my cannister a good clean this afternoon while it is still light otherwise I'll be having a very romantic candle light cannister cleaning and we had a little too many of them as you read before. I'm going to be a Pappy.

Thank you for the tip on the Microbelift @Zoom. Will get that when I get my airpumps this afternoon.

Thank you everybody for your advise and help. That's what make this forum the best.

Have a great day everybody.

 

@Lappies
If you have the battery operated pumps why don't you put a air driven sponge filter in(like @azurkoi has ) ,then your bacteria growth won't die with power failures and you can chuck the sponge into you canister when the power starts up
Won't this help getting the canister to cycle faster
Just an idea ?

 

That is a good idea. Thank you very much @Corne

 

Thank you to everybody who helped me in my dilemma. I went to buy the battery operated airpumps and got them connected to a spunge filter. Good surface movement and the oxygen in the tank is sufficient.

My fish seems happy and they are up to their normal mischief and swimming around without gasping.

Thank you very much @azurekoi, @Corne, @Zoom and @Franna.

Kind regards

Lappies

 

Thank you to everybody who helped me in my dilemma. I went to buy the battery operated airpumps and got them connected to a spunge filter. Good surface movement and the oxygen in the tank is sufficient. My fish seems happy and they are up to their normal mischief and swimming around without gasping.

Thank you very much @azurekoi, @Corne, @Zoom, @Khalid and @Franna.

Kind regards
Lappies

 

Glad we could help you save your fish.
My GF family lives in bronkies so I'm there allot. I would like to come see your tank at some stage.

 

That is a good idea and I will appreciate it alot. PM me so that we can get into contact and make the arrangements.

 

That makes two of us! And do not forget the Microbelift GFCI when you start from scratch! Just wish Henk would do a better job of stocking the LPS ! Hi Henk! :ciao:

Hehe, GFCI stands for Gel Filter Cartridge Inoculant.

 

If you want to I can borrow you my inverter so you can get your canister started..............!!

 

Now there's true membership assistance. +1 dude!