How to stop my fish tank water from smelling?

A

abhijat.saraswat

New member
I've got a 4ft tropical tank, with an external filter, because of the external filter tubing part of the lid at the back remains a little bit open.

I do frequent water changes (15% every week), but my water still smells and because of the lib being open it's making my room smell as well.

What can I do to remedy this?

I would appreciate any and all help.
 
It's great you're doing lots of water changes, but 15% weekly is too much at once. You're going to be much better off doing more frequent, smaller changes.

A 100% water change will obliterate the bacteria that keep the water cycled.

I keep guppies, a dozen tanks. When I'm able I do 10% water changes twice a week. If I can only get to one water change a week, I do 20%. When I do the 10% water changes the fish don't seem to notice. When I do the 20% water changes, you can tell the fish are a bit annoyed. No matter how well you adjust for temperature, chlorine, chloramine, etc., the new water you're putting in is going to have different characteristics than the water you're taking out.

If your tank's smelly after all those water changes, you're overfeeding. I've had lots of problems myself that are due to overfeeding. It's difficult not to overfeed, you almost have to practice it.

Calm down on the water changes and back the feeding off to a fraction. If you feed them every time they look hungry they'll overeat. They look hungry all the time.
 
Determine what the smell is, basically what it smells like. You may want to purchase a filter that sits on the side of your tank (Aqua clear, Penguin, etc.) and add carbon and an ammonia remover to fight the smell. If it is a high level of ammonia you may need to look at causes for that (too much food, extra waste).
 
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