cloudy water???

[lodeke10]

so, here's my story:

i have a 10 gallon tank with small 7 tropical community fish.
recently, the gravel started turning brownish orange.
yesterday, i changed about 40 % of the water, vacuumed the gravel, replaced the filter cartridge and added a new plant.
after doing all of this, the aquarium looked beautiful again, and apart from still some dirt on the gravel, the aquarium was Cristal clear.

when i came home this evening, the water had gone cloudy, so i tested the water using my test kit (DUUUHHH!!) and these are my results:

no nitrite
5.0ppm(mg/l) nitrate
no ammonia
and the PH was 6.6.

please help:help: !
thanks in advance.
:goldfish: :fish: :spam:

[rookie]

what type of fish do you have in there

[lodeke10]

nothing special, an upside down catfish, some neon fish...

[douce101]

Has the tank been properly cycled?

[lodeke10]

what do you mean by cycled?
i have had the aquarium and the fish for several months if that's what you mean?

[Lolita]

Does your filter only have the one cartridge in it? It could have something to do with the new cartridge...

Maybe a mini-cycle or bacterial bloom? Anyone else have any thoughts on that?

Is it a white cloudiness?

[Lolita]

what do you mean by cycled?
i have had the aquarium and the fish for several months if that's what you mean?

Cycling a tank is building up the beneficial bacteria that keeps your aquarium healthy by eating up ammonia and nitrites. The bacteria mostly lives in your filter media.

[domjd05]

in a relatively new 10 gallon setup I'm sure a 40% WC and a filter media change would kick a Mini cycle, no worries its quite a common mistake. What happened is by doing the WC and replacing your filter media you've taken out more beneficial bacteria than you should have, and as a result your tank had a small buildup of most likely ammonia.

The white cloudiness is probably the bacteria re-establishing itself, and by the looks of your water test (showing no ammonia) it HAS re-established itself and it should clear up in roughly 24 hours if not sooner.

[bushwhacker]

sounds like a small bloom to me it should be fine keep an eye on the parameters and next time dont toss the cartriges just rinse it out in some tank water when you do your water change. replacing them when the company reccomends is just making more money for them

[violet]

I would invest in a mini canister filter if I were you... I love um... love um I say lol... should be fine though just watch closley

[VoidParadigm]

We've only replaced the filter media in our goldfish tank four times in three years. And once was only because they spawned, ate all the eggs, then overloaded the bacteria's capabilities. A few hundred eggs'll do that. :lol: Our water parameters in that tank have always been stable and healthy.

As long as none of your fish look sick or are dying don't worry about it, it'll re-establish itself soon... or it might have already.

I don't know what others think of the matter, but I personally only poke around the filter if it's making weird sounds, has stopped allowing water through, or a disease has hit the tank and may have gotten into the media.

[lodeke10]

the cloudiness has disappeared on it's own.
thanks for the help!
only one problem left though, the gravel is still very dirty. should i take it out and clean it?

[violet]

I wouldn't suggest taking out the gravel, I'd just take a gravel vaccume to it :11:

[bushwhacker]

the brownish color on the gravel is probably diatoms.. happens in almost all tanks at one time or another they too will go away as the tank matures

[lodeke10]

i have already tried to vacuum it, but it made barely any difference.

bushwhacker, are you suggesting that it will go away on it's own?

[violet]

If it is exactly what BW is saying then yes it will go away thumbs2:

[lodeke10]

about how long will it take before it goes away? few days or a few weeks?
what exactly do diatoms look like? on the pictures i found on Google, it looks like it's sticking up a little, but in my tank it's more like a small layer of paint.

[violet]

I'm not sure how long exactly but from what I've read it wont hurt your tank and it can even be benifical to your aquarium

[lodeke10]

OK, i will give it a week or so...
thanks!!!:22: thumbs2: :thankyoublue:

[Mith]

If I leave my lights on too much, my sand will start turning brown.

I just screwed up my cycle and my water got cloudy. I got a bottle of that bacteria and dumped the whole bottle in (because the bottle treated 40g and I was dumping it in a 50g) and in one day after adding the bacteria, the water cleared right up.