How to Remedy Hazes and Cloudiness in Fresh Water
These are easy, and they’re often serious. They speak to ‘new’ systems, bacterial overgrowths, overfeeding, and an assortment of other things none of which are good, or even ‘okay’.
They’re easy to fix. I really like sponge filtration with a decent aerator driving it. That helps a lot but the “kicker” is clearing the haze and sending the flocculated particles to this sponge filter with a clarifier. All those do is ‘stick the microscopic particles together’ and when they start the settle out, the sponge filter picks them up.
When you buy a sponge filter, buy the biggest one you think you can hide in the tank, or do like me, and let the thing show. Loud and proud. lol
Most cases of freshwater haze do well with a little housekeeping, cleaning the gravel with a siphon cleaner and that never has been easier than with a Python. | |
If you're looking for a quiet aerator, to drive a sponge filter, I really like the Tetra units because they're the leader in silicone flappers. There are other, cheaper aerators but the noise can be off putting. That's not hard to fix by putting such aerators in a closet or box. | |
This is a higher-output aerator I really like, and the ones I've used the longest are the Eco Plus, Vivosun, Hydrofarm. I've had some of these running for, literally, years. | |
This is the filter I like the most. It has no moving parts, it's all contained IN the fish tank, it doesn't suck up fish babies. They're easy to clean and they're a miracle at clearing hazes if you use a clarifier. At left, that's a BIG filter, I use a couple of these in my 180 and my 220 at the house. | |
This is the water clarifier that I use. And yeah, it's for ponds but that's where the economy is. It doesn't take much of this to treat the average fish tank. So it goes a LONG way. There's not much of a choice when you're treating a pond, the economy is "the only way to fly" when treating a thousand gallons. | |
This is another one I've used for water clarification. It's got "okay" economy, and works fine. All the water clarifiers work VERY well with sponge filters in their many forms, but less impressively in canister and other pad filters. Clarifiers work VERY suckily in facilities with bead filtration. |