Hi

1. Remove all large ornaments and/or plants that get in the way.

2. Using a gravel vacuum, remove all waste and food from the sand or gravel. I like to shove the tube into the gravel quickly so it’s stirred up and waste gets knocked loose. I continue to do it, driving the tub into the gravel up and down until I’ve gone across the entire tank. Don’t stop until 25 - 50% of the water in your aquarium has been drained. The water will be very dirty, that’s FINE! As long as you get the big stuff from the floor, the fine particles that are floating around will settle and/or go through your filter.

3. Fill a bucket full of water (chlorine removed) and rub your hand across each filter until all of the heavy “slime” is off of it. Do NOT use any type of cleaner on the filter and don’t use tap water directly out of the sink (it has chlorine!) You can get it clean enough with your hand believe it or not. You just want to get the heavy stuff off, that’s all!

4. Use an algae scraper to remove the algae from the aquarium walls. It would be best to leave it, but it’s just not impressive for guests to visit you and see a green fish tank and it’s not that big of a deal, as the tank as a whole will still have some algae and bacteria.

5. Use a brush to clean all ornaments and plants, NO chemicals! You can use a soap and water mix, that’s it! After you’ve scrubbed them rinse them thoroughly.

6. Replace everything and fill your aquarium up with clean, treated water. Be sure to use some type of chlorine removing solution and it doesn’t hurt to use some conditioning salt as well to help prevent Ich and other diseases.

Keep sharing and reading

Thanks

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Not bad!

Just a pointer though, adding aquarium salt isn't really needed and all aquariums have small, background populations of various protozoans, parasites and bacteria. Maintaining good water quality will keep diseases at bay.

I love my algae scraper, it is the best part of cleaning because I feel like it is really clean after I scrape. Great job on your thread.

Not bad, we clean our tanks the exact same, pretty much. Only I have a few things to say; if you have well water instead of city water, there shouldn't be any chlorine in your tap water, and if there is, it cannot be enough to hurt anything. If you use city water, you will not want to clean your filter under tap water from the sink. But you should always dechlorinate you water before you add it to your tank. Also, you should have mentioned after cleaning your filter media a few times to trash it and get a fresh filter cartridge.

And one more thing, a big uh-oh. It may not be too much of an issue with you and your tank, but when you said to use a soap-water mix to clean ornaments, some people who read this may assume that any ol' soap will work, and end up poisoning their tank. What I do, is use vinegar to clean and kill germs. It is non-toxic, and does a darn good job.

I do not mean to offend you, but I just though I should say something about the soap-water issue.
-Ben

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There is no need to replace filter sponges until they are literally falling apart which would take years! That's what holds all the good bacteria, the sponges should only be rinsed in tank water.

Wow thats been really helpful i will try and keep the perfect balance between clean and bacteria
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