why you should check your filter socks.

[picoreefguy]

today ended up being filter sock cleaning day for me and i normally see a bunch of pods running around inside the sock when i wash them but never took the time to try and save them. i figured since i have nothing to do most of the day i could waste a little time and see how many i could save. so i took the filter sock to the bathroom and turned it inside out in the sink and dumped the bits of detritus out and let the filter sock sit there as i picked the pods up and put them in a little cup. i spent about 5 or 6 minutes picking them and turning the sock and picking the ones that came off under it and repeating. i got close to 40 of them!! and that was only about half of them cause there were still pleanty scurrying around when i washed the sock after i got tired of picking them up. i also got a limpet and a couple astrina stars as well there were a couple bristle worms but i just flushed those down the drain.

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[twocute2b4u]

wow, that's awesome

 

[ichthyoid]

That's cool

 

[picoreefguy]

the reason some people say not to use them is because they become nitrate factories due to all the detritus build up but if you but if you change them frequently like you should (i never do lol) then there wont be any problems

 

[picoreefguy]

man you would be surprised at how much stuff itll pull out even when youre not feeding. i left mine on for about a week and a half (i know way too long but im lazy lol) and when i dumped it out in the sink there were lumps of detritus and i dont think most of it was food cause i only feed every other day sometimes every third day

 

[joseayes]

You'll be more surprise if you leave the sock sun drying and come back next day to check it. but no reason to kill this little guys

 

[glxtrix]

If it's in the filter sock or in your tank...what's the diff? At least you have it collected in the sock and can pull it out thus removing more than if you didn't have a sock.

 

[picoreefguy]

By cleaning them often you don't give the detritus a chance to breakdown into ammonia, nitrite and nitrate where as it would if you didn't and you might see an algae bloom due to the resulting spike in nitrates. I actually would use the algae all over my glass as a sign that it was filter sock changing time but that's just cause I'm lazy