Myth Busted: Why Should You Never Do a Water Change and Filter Cleaning Together?
- May 08, 2022
- Anshika Mishra
- 742 0 0
Don't ever do a water change and a filter cleaning simultaneously. If you do, you will crash the cycle and kill all your fish. It is a general rule of thumb in the aquarium hobby.
Doing a filter cleaning will disturb and kill off some of your beneficial bacteria even if you do it the right way. But if beneficial bacteria do not live in the water column, why would it matter if you do a water change simultaneously as filter cleaning.
Understanding the General Rules
This rule of not doing a filter cleaning and water change simultaneously is accurate and untrue. However, it depends on your maintenance practices and your tank's maturity level.
In general, this rule is directed at the beginners in the hobby or anyone with an immature, new tank setup. When your tank is new, any loss of beneficial bacteria can be detrimental to your fish.
When you are a beginner in the hobby, you tend to overdo things and go above and beyond. Beginners can easily overclean, overwater-change, and over-vacuum, to an extent where they might be killing beneficial bacteria and not even know.
While there aren't any bacteria in the water column itself, there are tons of them on your decor, substrate, glass, and any other tank surface. When beginner water changes or does any maintenance, they can disturb everything.
Beginners will remove equipment and wipe it down, and they will over-vacuum and disturb too much of the surface; they'll remove all the decor and each water change and scrub the hell out of it.
So, when this type of over-maintenance is common for beginners, complementing that with a filter cleaning where you absolutely will love some beneficial bacteria, it will be a recipe for disaster.
For that reason, this general rule exists.
For Mature Tanks
But, now, let's talk logically for those of you who laugh at what; we understand that it is okay for us to do water changes and filter cleaning simultaneously. Because big or small water changes are not going to affect your beneficial bacteria, water changes simply remove the water with high levels of harmful nitrates and replenish the tank with clean, mineral-rich water.
Now, still the same story with filter cleaning. Even if you do it correctly, you will disturb the bacteria. You are taking everything out of the filter, and it will happen. But, in our case of a mature, established tank, that minimal loss of bacteria will not affect anything.
There are so many bacteria everywhere in the tank that you are going to reproduce quickly, and you are not going to get any problem with ammonia spikes, nitrite spikes, or anything like that.
Better Be Cautious
But, staying on the safe side is always the best way to go. So, you should rather err on caution and sleep well at night knowing that all your ammonia produced inside this tank is getting taken care of.
The loss of beneficial bacteria while filter cleaning can be significant for beginners, especially if you are not going it the right way. Any of those are going to cause a crash in your cycle.
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