Newbie Water Change Questions

[Razillyn]

Ty for the link Neelie. As far as I can tell, I'm doing everything right- but I'll be sure to record the temperatures before I start for next time.

Little- I don't have any of those readers yet, but I'll see about picking some up this weekend. I'll probably check into getting a bigger tank but my space is very limited so Phoenix may have to stick with what he's got.

I also read somewhere that it was a good idea to let the new water sit for 24 hours before introducing it. Going to try it, hopping that helps too.

[LittleBettaFish]

Make sure you purchase reagent (liquid) based tests rather than the strips. The strips can be notoriously inaccurate, and even though the liquid tests like the ones by API are more expensive, it's worth spending the extra money.

As to letting the water sit out for 24 hours, I have a two gallon tank that houses a very sensitive betta that was imported from Thailand earlier this year. He lays on the bottom panting whenever I even touch anything in his tank, but even with 100% water changes on a daily basis, the stress of it only lasted a few minutes.

I find if one of my bettas is extremely stressed, an offering of something like a frozen bloodworm or even a pellet or two, is usually enough to distract them.

[jschristian44]

mmm, bloodworms who doesn't like them!

[sjones]

It's okay to run warm water from your tap to match the temperature of your current tank water, If you invested in a tupperware pitcher you could fill it up and make sure the temperature it the same as your fishes water..if you let it sit 24 hours the water will be much colder than your tank that has the heater in it.

As for keeping the tank warm in the winter, I am having an issue as well, In my small 1.5 gallon tanks that just have a hydor mini 7.5 watt heater what i did was move them to the warmest part of the house (but not right in front of the heater, because that will cause temperature fluctuations.
Then, I put a small towel over the top of the tank to keep the warmth in-this increased my tanks temperature by almost 10 degrees!
What temp is your tank now? Bettas like between 78 and 82 degrees..
and in a 1.5 gallon I'd recommend changing the water 100% every 3-4 days, in a 1 gallon even more often..