Ever have a tank get cloudy?

I think everyone has experienced this at one time or another. Most recently, I had a really bad snail outbreak in a 90-gallon tank, so I removed the fish (which I was selling anyway) and bleached the tank. After 24-hours of snail-killing  bleach, I stirred the sand substrate and siphoned out as much debris as I could. Then, I refilled the tank.

This is where the "cloudy" happened. After filling the tank and re-starting the filter, the tank was cloudy with very fine sediment. Usually, the filter will remove this in 24 hours. but after a week the tank was still cloudy. What to do?

Accu-Clear to the Rescue

I was a bit stumped at this point, but then I remembered that I had won a goodie bag at one of the GCCA Meetings in the raffle. Inside, was an 8 ounce bottle of Accu-Clear from Aquarium Pharmaceuticals. This, I thought, is worth a try.

Using the product is simple. Just dump in 1 teaspoon (5ml) per ten gallons of water. The cap offers a convenient measure built in.

Bonus! Within 24-hours my tank water was sparkling clear!

How does it work?

Accu-Clear is a flocculant. The chemicals in the product bond to particles in the water a bit like glue and aggregate them. The result is that the particles fall out of the water column to the bottom of the tank where you can ignore them (I did) or siphon them out.

Although I didn't have fish in the tank at the time, you can use this product even if your tank is stocked.

Final Thoughts

What else can I say?

This product does what it claims to do. An 8 ounce bottle will run you $7 to $10 and will treat 480 gallons of water. I think this is a good product that every aquarist ought to have on hand. 

GCCA's Auto-magic Report Writer is an online, fill-in-the-blank tool that allows you to easily create a spawning article for the Cichlid Chatter or other aquarium publication. Instead of having to write an article from scratch, you can save time by adding in a few key facts. The Auto-magic Report Writer then creates the report for you.

When we migrated to GCCA's new website about a year ago, we didn't migrate this tool. Since we made the move, I've had a couple of folks point out that it was missing. Today, I received another from the Capitol Cichlid Association, so I thought it was time to bring back this tool.

Anybody is welcome to use this tool for free.

How it Works

Start by clicking Article Writer.

Fill in the blanks in the form:

Click the Make my BAP Report link at the bottom of the form.

Your report will then open in a new window:

Over 55 GCCA Chatters available online to up date members.

Finally a use for my Ipad other than my daughter playing games on it. I find these are great to read on my ipad.

Some sample articles from our 2012 Chatter -

- Cheap and easy low tech water change system

- Walter Worms

- Breeding the Red Cap Lethinrops Itunga

Or read some great blasts from the past articles such as

Read more: Over 55 GCCA Chatters available online to up to date members.