Four Aquarium mini-hacks that will make your life much easier

Maintaining a fish tank can be a lot of work – especially if you’re new to it. Today, we’re going to share some tips – or more precisely – some hacks that you can use to make maintaining your tank a little bit easier. These will help make it so you spend less time stewing over cleaning your tank and more time enjoying it. 

Let’s jump right in!

Clamps for water changes

Glass safe clamps are a godsend when you’re going water changes. Instead of standing there and aimlessly holding the hose and letting the tank fill, if you purchase a handi-clamp – the clamp can help hold the hose in place so that you can tend to other things. 

The infamous credit card algae scraper

Algae scrapers are pretty much standard issue insofar as maintenance tools go for an aquarium owner. However – some areas are tough to get at, or you need a little bit more of an edge to get the gunk off. Now some people use razor blades and magnetic scrapers – but instead of dealing with sharp objects that might scratch your glass- just use an old debit card/gift card/credit card.

This has become such a popular way of doing things, that they sell things like the Flipper Scraper – which are designed to fit onto cards so you can get to hard to reach areas. Don’t go nuts – just use what you have at your disposal. 

Test tubes and syringes for water testing

Keeping the appropriate chemical balance in an aquarium is essential to the overall health and vitality of your tank. There are plenty of test kits you can buy out there that make running these tests really easy – but the problem is that many of the test tubes they give you are really small, cheap and oftentimes made out of glass. They’re small, easy to misplace and even break with relative ease. 

We recommend just buying a basic set of syringes and 15ml test tubes. You’ll be able to use them over and over again – and the extra roominess will make it so that you’re not making as big of a mess. 

Bio media

Bio media like bio balls are great for helping to maintain the cleanliness and overall health of your aquarium. They’re easy to use, easy to recycle and don’t cost an arm and a leg. There are many types you can use and what you choose will depend largely on the makeup of your aquarium. If you want a well-balanced, clean and healthy tank – purchase some bio media. 

We hope this helps to take a little bit of the edge off of owning an aquarium. If you have any questions about what the best setup is for you, feel free to give us a call today. Until then – good luck!