No carbon for Discus?

[Whiskey]

Hello all!

I was reading around and gathering information and I came across a post which said that using carbon in a discus tank was not recommended. Can anyone tell me why that is?

Thank you!
Whiskey

[DiscusLoverJeff]

Try reading through some of these great threads regarding carbon. Some good information in them.

http://forum.simplydiscus.com/search.php?searchid=1909243

[dpt8]

I use a "Polypad" Takes all nasties out of tank water and really polishes water.. in addition to frequent water changes... The above links didn't connect on my computer..

[rdiscus]

To carbon, or not to carbon? (http://forum.simplydiscus.com/showthread.php?103234-To-carbon-or-not-to-carbon&highlight=carbon)

[Whiskey]

Interesting.

In those threads and links contained within I found compelling reasons to Both use, and not use carbon.

It seems that by using carbon (and only carbon) I can prevent the water company from poisoning my fish.
But if I do my fish may get HITH or Lateral Line erosion as a side effect.

-shrug-
Whiskey

[William Palumbo]

LOL...Old wives tale...Carbon will NOT cause HITH disease. Under normal aquarium use, carbon CANNOT leach anything back into the aquarium that it has adsorbed/absorbed. VERY high heat is used to strip carbon, like that of a blast furnace. It has it's place in the hobby. I use it in my filters, but always found carbon worked best treating the water BEFORE it goes into the tank...Bill

[DonMD]

LOL...Old wives tale...Carbon will NOT cause HITH disease. Under normal aquarium use, carbon CANNOT leach anything back into the aquarium that it has adsorbed/absorbed. VERY high heat is used to strip carbon, like that of a blast furnace. It has it's place in the hobby. I use it in my filters, but always found carbon worked best treating the water BEFORE it goes into the tank...Bill

Bill is spot on. I was, coincidentally, just reading an article on Seachem's web page on chemical filtration. If you want to get into the weeds on this, here's the link: http://www.seachem.com/Library/Articles.html#FiltrationPrimer.

On that page, select "A Primer on Aquarium Filtration." More than you'll ever need to know about carbon.

I think most discus keepers change so much water that carbon is mostly irrelevant, imo.

[camuth8]

I have carbon in my filters and no problems so far.

[aalbina]

Very interesting article Don - I was struck by the kudos given to the efficiency of a canister filter over other types. I've always used a canister just because I didn't like the look of the HOBs on the tank - turns out it is a pretty good choice.

Thanks for the link.

Adam

[DonMD]

Very interesting article Don - I was struck by the kudos given to the efficiency of a canister filter over other types. I've always used a canister just because I didn't like the look of the HOBs on the tank - turns out it is a pretty good choice.

Thanks for the link.

Adam

I saw that, too. Isn't it great when research confirms your own preferences?

[Skip]

Carbon changes can get expensive over time.. some people jus don't want added expense..

[yogi]

I just want to add that there is no reason to use carbon in your fish tank and it can cause problems. First of all the filter holds just a tiny bit of carbon and your pumping water through it at a few hundred gallons an hour. So in most cases it's exhausted in just a couple of days. Second there are papers and studies that directly relate the use of carbon to HLLE. Here is a link to one paper. http://tinyurl.com/3owm55v

Using a carbon water filter to pefilter your tap water is good. It will remove a lot of things from your water that your fish don't need. This is being used differently than the carbon in your fish tank. It should be a single pass through at a slow speed. You can also check the carbon to see if it's exhausted. Using a $5.00 swimming pool chlorine test kit should give you a reading of zero chlorine. Once your test kit starts showing chlorine it's time to change your carbon.

[Bilbo]

I just want to add that there is no reason to use carbon in your fish tank and it can cause problems. First of all the filter holds just a tiny bit of carbon and your pumping water through it at a few hundred gallons an hour. So in most cases it's exhausted in just a couple of days. Second there are papers and studies that directly relate the use of carbon to HLLE. Here is a link to one paper. http://tinyurl.com/3owm55v

Using a carbon water filter to pefilter your tap water is good. It will remove a lot of things from your water that your fish don't need. This is being used differently than the carbon in your fish tank. It should be a single pass through at a slow speed. You can also check the carbon to see if it's exhausted. Using a $5.00 swimming pool chlorine test kit should give you a reading of zero chlorine. Once your test kit starts showing chlorine it's time to change your carbon. Interesting. I have never experienced any negative effects from using carbon but I buy it in bulk and replace it as easily as I replace toilet paper. I mostly use carbon to treat my water before it goes into my tanks but occasionally I throw a home made bag filled with carbon over my water flow from my filter. I use it for about a week then discard it. No problems so far. I am "assuming" that..... well. .... i'm not going to assume. I am not sure why some people seem to have problems with the stuff. Now I am hearing that people have problems with even new fresh carbon when used to it was always a so called "No no" to keep using old carbon.

[BODYDUB]

I've only ever used carbon to remove MEDS in the past. I've been carbon free on my tank for the past 4YRS without any issues............

[tolga]

Hi, I've also used carbon to remove meds but it caused my ph to increase rapidly which caused a lot of stress for my heckels. I was wondering if there were any special type of carbon that can be used to remove medication without affecting ph values in a soft water tank. Other than that, I've been using purigen and it looks as if the fish are floating in air.

[DISCUS STU]

I stopped using carbon and carbon based resins years ago and haven't had much of a problem with HITH or LLD ever since. I would not go back to using these products.

The resin based products claim an active life of 6 months, I would change them out in my Eheim canisters after 3 months and still had problems. After abandoning them I can't say I've had this issue and relate it directly to this.