HOW WELL DO YOU KNOW YOUR FISH
Back in the day when I had fish tanks and didn't really know much about aquarium husbandry I didn't test my water at all. Years later when I first got into African cichlids I learned all about water testing and of it's paramount importance to raising heathy fish. I tested my water at least a couple of times per week without fail. However, I must admit I haven't been as diligent this last little while with my water testing. I have only been testing my water every other week or so. I do regular maintenance keeping my fish healthy with good quality water and have come to recognize many things that may point to the need to testy my water.
I don't recommend skipping water testing until you are seasoned enough in this hobby to recognize when somethings amiss.
Here are some questions to ask yourself
Do you sit in front of your tanks observing your fish for long periods of time?
Do you take time to get to know your fish?
Would you recognize if they change their colours?
Do you know their personality?
Do you know the l
ocation within the tank they prefer?
Can you spot illness or unusual behavior?
Do you pay attention to who's eating well and who's not?
If you can answer these questions with a positive response then you know your fish pretty well.
The next thing you would look for would be signs of unusual behavior. If you do notice something out of the ordinary the first thing I recommend is doing a complete water test on the aquarium. After testing do a 70% water change, wait a few hours and test your water again.
Simple water changes often are enough to make the difference in your fish's health rather than running for medication. If you do spot a fish displaying uncharacteristic behavior then it's time to watch him/her closely for any other symptoms or changes that may point to illness. The next step would be to remove the suspected fish to a hospital tank for isolation and further observation and medication if necessary.
There are a couple reason for this. One is to avoid spreading the illness through the tank in case it's something contagious and the other is you never want to medicate an entire tank for one or two fish. It's a waste of meds, hard on your healthy fish and can cause problems with your water parameters if you don't follow the direction implicitly. Why would you want to medicate healthy fish anyway?
Providing high quality water for your aquarium is not always that simple. Our tank water is actually a chemical compound. It's simple science. The term water chemistry refers to all the properties that come together to make up your water. The alkalinity and acidity which affects your PH level, general hardness and carbonate hardness, ammonia, nitrite and nitrate levels are these properties. Because we all have different sources in the water we use for our tanks and how we treat that water for use, these properties will vary.
Most of us use our tap water to fill our aquariums so not only is testing your aquarium water important but so is testing your tap water or if possible get a print out of the properties from your water supplier.
We test our water's four main properties in the standard test kit PH, Ammonia, Nitrite and Nitrate levels. This is an important practice so you should always keep a test kit handy. How often you test your water depends on your knowledge and whether you know what to look for. The safest bet is to remove the guess work and do the test!