Hey y'all!

I had a problem with one of my tanks and a recurring disease (long depressing story :roll: ) and thus I got my fish drunk and put them to sleep, and bleached out the tank.

40 litre tank, filled it with water and dumped in 1 liter of bleach, left it to soak.

Today i pulled it out and started to flush the bleach out - I ran the hose through the tank, gravel, equip etc for about 3 hours, then emptied it out to dry in the sun.

Question is: did I flush it out for long enough, and how long should I leave it in the sun before even thinking about setting it up again?

Any help would be fantastic!

Did you really use a liter of bleach :lol: .You would have killed those bugs for shore Three hours of flushing would have taken the bleach out.Just give it a stir around with the hose running and it will be ready to go.A cup would have done the job.Good luck

I use bleach to clean up the coral rock in my African tanks. I rinse them afterwards for half an hour by piling them up in the shower. I then leave them outside for 24 hours. If I can't smell the bleach I reckon I'm good to go. With a smooth non-porous surface like the glass of a tank I'd say you've done plenty already and you can go ahead and set it up.

thats a lot of bleach - the sun should have removed what the rinsing missed anyway. if you can't smell it it will be okay. if you can rinse it again and use the sun to dry it (thats if theres any sun down there today! lol)

I did use a liter of bleach - I was so upset and angry at the stupid disease, I wanted to make sure I got all the greeblies first time I had to kill off 85 fish, and it was my first time, so it sucked big time.

Sunshine...hmmmm.....we've had it all week, but because Ive decided to dry my tank (and replant the vege garden) the skies have conspired against me to bring rain my way. It's not raining yet but it's supposed to all weekend. :roll:

I think i might do another flush in the shower, just be to be sure, and dry it out for a few days next week when the weather clears.

Thanks for the help and advice guys!

Update: went to take the tank put to dry in the beautiful sunshine (so much for the rain :roll: ) and got a wiff of bleach. I guess a litre was a bit excessive :roll: :oops: :lol: so it's back out having another rinse.

Hopefully it works this time!

What did you have that made you put down so many fishes?

I'm not 100% but it was either the Hennaguya wasting disease, or fish TB.

I had it once, it went away, but it came back. I only had guppies in the tank, but every new batch born got the symptoms and died, as did any small guppies I introduced in to the tank.

I'm not 100% convinced it was TB though, even though it is a very likely possibility - it only seems to have affected my guppies, none of my other fish in other tanks, or any other fish i put in as clean up crew, like cories or bristlenoses.

It sucked doing it, but better to be safe than sorry.

I'm sure if I bought a male and female guppy, I'd be back up the same numbers again by the end of the year

im sure you can use vinegar to neutralise the bleach, then you'll just have a vinegar smell to get rid of. (if theres no sun about)

Hi imsweet, what kind of bleach did you use? I assume you're talking about chlorine bleach: sodium hypochlorite. Did you make sure you got one with no added perfumes etc? If so, rinsing the tank repeatedly and leaving it in the sun will eventually get rid of the chlorine smell.

Personally I prefer not to use chlorine bleach on aquarium gravel or other porous material. I prefer to put it in a big pot on the stove and boil it to sterilise it.

Another type of bleach you can use is hydrogen peroxide. It is an "oxygen bleach" rather than a "chlorine bleach" and the residue is much less toxic. You can't smell the residue from it the way you can with chlorine bleach, so you just have to rinse until you think it's all gone.

Hydrogen peroxide is the bleach hairdressers use to bleach hair - hence the saying "peroxide blonde."

Thought about just buying a new tank?

Hey Guys.

I used the Budget brand bleach with no perfume or flavour - I think it has worked and the small has gone, just need to get it dry. Weather down here is a bit iffy at the mo.

As for buying a new tank - it's a really good tank that I've had for a little under a year, and seen as i was made redundant about 4 months ago and still haven't found a job, I can't really afford to replace it.

Hopefully it will be dry and set up again within the month got the design drawn up already, just need to decide what fish I would like to have now....

Does any one know of an alternative safe way to dr ut the tank without sunlight?

The weather down here has been dismal to say the least, so I can't dry the tank in the sunlight as planned.

Can you stick it in the hot water cupboard or use a hair dryer or something?

I know it sounds dumb, but I'm getting desperate to start the tank up again to grow out my molly fry, then try and breed celestials.

It should dry fine indoors. Use paper towels if you need to. Any bleach must surely be gone by now. Can you still smell it?

Nup. No wiffy smells in that tank now... I just have to deal with the smell of the hand lotion my 4 year old put in the axolotl tank 2 days ago :roll:

That's some good news I needed on a bad day - thanx! :bounce: :bounce: :bounce: :bounce:

Wow, sorry for all the troubles. Now, how are the axolotls?

Caper

So far so good - the bleached out tank hasn't been set up yet as I had to order replacement sponges etc, but I'm nearly there and can't wait to get it going again!

The axolotl is fine, he hasn't shown any ill effects of the hand lotion saga, but my daughter knows now that NOTHING goes in the tank, full stop.

Hopefully all the drama is over for now, just having problems finding room to grow out all the molly fry I have :roll: