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How to keep a tropical tank cool in summer


R32GOTMLK

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I have had to resort to putting a bottle of frozen water in the tank, I got home the other day and it was sitting at 32.

I can lift the lid as we have one of those things for the flys and insects that releases a squirt every 7 mins or so and I am worried that it will poison the fish

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I have had to resort to putting a bottle of frozen water in the tank, I got home the other day and it was sitting at 32.

I can lift the lid as we have one of those things for the flys and insects that releases a squirt every 7 mins or so and I am worried that it will poison the fish

turn it off for a while

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The bottle of ice trick works really well in smaller tanks but when you're looking at 800L it's no good. I once tried ice to drop my 1200L from 32'C down to something more respectable. 22 bags of ice later it was down to 28'C.

The evaporation method works very well if you only need 2-3 degrees drop.

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I came home on Monday and my 8 tanks were all sitting between 32 - 36deg. I don't know how the fish didn't cook, but I guess over filtration and crazy surface agitation helped. All my heaters are unplugged (at first I thought I had a heater malfunction, but then I realised that it's pretty unlikely on 8 tanks :oops: ), and I've put all the canister filters into insulated boxes with ice packs. The water temp in the filters is 20, so the bacteria will be ok, and it does an amazing job at keeping the temp stable. It only took about an hour to bring the temps down to 27. Not sure if it's just a fluke, but while it works, I'll stick with it. And keep the curtains closed!

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I bought a minimum-maximum thermometer from the Warehouse yesterday like this: http://www.partshelf.com/minmaxrecthe.html They are $10 each.

My original purpose was to track the temperature of the room, which is rather handy to know when battling the temperatures in your tank.Each thermometer has a little blue stalk inside which gets pushed around by the mercury and stays where it is left to tell you where the temperature extremes got to. It is reset with a little button.

I pulled it apart to see what is inside (the back levered off). It is just a long flimsy thermometer in a U-shape. Not entirely sure how it works, but it does....

Anyway, it looks rather innocuous and could potentially be submerged in a fish tank! This would help track the minimum and maximum without constantly staring at it....

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I came home on Monday and my 8 tanks were all sitting between 32 - 36deg. I don't know how the fish didn't cook, but I guess over filtration and crazy surface agitation helped. All my heaters are unplugged (at first I thought I had a heater malfunction, but then I realised that it's pretty unlikely on 8 tanks :oops: ), and I've put all the canister filters into insulated boxes with ice packs. The water temp in the filters is 20, so the bacteria will be ok, and it does an amazing job at keeping the temp stable. It only took about an hour to bring the temps down to 27. Not sure if it's just a fluke, but while it works, I'll stick with it. And keep the curtains closed!
'

Whats the use in unplugging heaters? They only turn on if the temp drops below what its set to

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'

Whats the use in unplugging heaters? They only turn on if the temp drops below what its set to

I thought they were malfunctioning, so I unplugged them, and just haven't plugged them back in. You're right, having them unplugged isn't making any difference.

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Well, all my tanks (ranging from 22l to 215l) read about 29C when I get home from work each day at the mo, but since the fish all look fine and dandy, I've left them alone. How hot would it get in their natural environments, anyway? Or, for example, in the big outdoor breeding ponds they use in Asia (Thailand for e.g.)? My feeling is that the fish can cope with some degree of variation. I do add cold water when I do my water changes though, although that doesn't really have all that much effect on the temperature! Has anyone actually had any stressed/sick fish as a result of this heat so far?

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