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Going on holiday for 10 days

TarkMalbot

TarkMalbot

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15 Mar 2013
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172
What should I do?
I almopst trust the in-laws to feed the fish as I will just put out individually wrapped foil packages with flake in them but what about Co2, Ferts and water changes?

Should I just leave the lights and Co2 on the timers and do a water change before I go add the ferts and as soon as I get back change the water again?

Any advise would be great.
Thanks.
 
Should be OK for 10 days, sometimes my weekly water changes have stretched to 2 weeks when busy, plants & fish don't care. I have an automatic fish feeder as well.

When I went away for 3 weeks, I used an peristaltic dosing pump system I built for ferts, automatic fish feeder and turned the lights down to 4 hours. All survived fine.
 
Would be worth dropping the light level or duration, i know clive has told people in the past to leave the lights of entirely for a weeks holiday... I just did 3 weeks away and dropped lights to 3 hours, mostly fine when i got back.
if your folks are feeding the fish why not just leave instruction to fert as well.
 
Not sure about the plants as I'm still a noob but the fish will be fine. I'm guessing though as long as, like you say you have the lights and co2 (and enough left of it) on a timer that should be good too :)
 
Having recently come back from a 10 day trip, I decided to drop the lights and turn off co2 completely.
Done a massive water change the day before.

Came back to a dirty external filter (the tube was green but had turned brown) but no fish lost and a few leaves had been lost.

Did a good clean the next day and started dosing again.
Lights went on for 4 hours for a week and increased the light level by an hour each week after (co2 adjusted accordingly).

Tank doing great! all back to normal.
 
You have had some good advice allready but i went away for 2 weeks and cut the lighting to 4 hours a day co2 5 hours a day(came on 1.5 hours before lights on).Plants were fine when i came back.Leave some water prepared for top up's it is suprising how much is lost due to evaporation.Cheers Mark
 
Well I am going away in April sometime so I plan to take on what you have all said and do the following:

50% water change the day before or the day I go and treat the new water with prime.
Treat with TNC Complete Fertilisers as per the instructions.
Run Co2 via solenoid to come on an hour before lights on and an hour before lights off and have the lights running for 4 hours a day.
Set up an auto feeder or individually wrap up portions for in-laws to feed.
50% water change when I got back after 10 days.

And my "other" tank will just have a water change, treat with TNC Lite and have the lights on a timers.
 
To be honest I dont do water changes at the moment every ten days as only just setting things up with plants and Co2 so nothing would be really different to normal at the moment. Not sure if I would be happy tripple dosing? Why would I do that just because I am away rather than home?
 
Sorry. I am new to this. Normally I would have just left the lights on a timer and went on holiday and changed the water once a month. lol. I have only had Co2 running less than a week (not even got a solenoid yet) and am dosing with TNC Lite or Flourish every few days by dividing the weekly doase up rather than just once as week. I think I should swap to TNC Complete now we have Co2 so will get and will be putting the Solenoid in as soon as it arrives. Hopefully I will have everything set up and stable before I go away so just want to get prepared in case I need to order or buy something no so it is here in time.
 
Ok I have read the EI thread and bought the dry salts. Now not sure how much to dose on the day I go away. Lol
 
Right I am going away tomorrow for ten days. I have done a 50% water change on both tanks and set the Co2 to come on for 3 hours and the lights for 3 hours with the Co2 coming on an hour before and off an hour before the lights.

On my larger 425 litre tank I am only going to run 2 of the 4 54w T5 lights.

My Smaller tank has auto dosing pumps set to dose the full amount. Should I turn it down or keep the dosing as per normal?

On my 425 litre tank I do not have auto dosing so have dosed a weeks worth of Macro this morning and a weeks worth of Micro this evening.

Hopefully everything will be ok in 10 days time when I get back!

I have fed the fish up over the last week or so and hoping a couple of slow releasing holiday sticks should keep the fish going.
 
I'm back! If going away for 10 days wasn't bad enough there was a power cut Friday mining and I didn't arrive back home until the early hours of Sunday so both tanks had no heater or filtration for 36 hours never mind lighting Co2 or Ferts!
The temp in the small tank was 17 degrees and the large tank 20. Lucky it only happened on Friday!! Lost 2 fish out of about 65 so not bad. One was a rummy nose that has been suffering from a bacterial infection for a few weeks and the other was the Rubbernose Pleco which is a shame.

Plants haven't grown much and have a few holes and thin ends but hopefully they will recover.

I have just changed 50% water but didn't want to clean the filters out as the good bacteria may be suffering from siting stagnant for a day or so.

Start dosing again tomorrow.
 
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