Converting to Fresh

[danenelsen]

Hey everyone,

I have decided to convert my 55G to fresh. I just don’t have the time right now to properly maintain a salt. That being said, what are the steps that I need to take to make sure all of the salt residue has been rinsed out and is safe for freshwater fish? What equipment can I keep? What do I not need anymore? It has a sump, which I plan to keep up, but do I need the wavemakers still? Thank large for advice in advance!

 

[edsbeaker]

Take out all of the sand and siphon out all of the salt water. Refill the tank with freshwater with some citric acid or vinegar and leave your return pump on for a day or two. This will help to make it easier to scrape off all of the coraline and other algae’s and clean the tank. I would then repeat this again just to dilute any little bit of saltwater that is left. You can wipe everything down at this point so all the water is removed. A very small amount of salt should not hurt freshwater fish, so don’t worry too much.

You will not be using your skimmer anymore, and freshwater uses much less flow. Depending on the GPH of the return pump, and where and how many return nozzles you have, it is possible that you won’t need the power heads.

Without the rock, you will need a different type of biological filtration, as you probably know. You will have plenty of room for that in your sump.