A N S W E R: Important aspects of DPM Type Natural Fishbowl I Aquarium maintenance are noted below.
ALGAE ON THE WALLS:
Maintaining a DPM Type Natural Fishbowl I Aquarium is pretty simple. You may consider scrubbing (wiping) the Green Algae that grows on the inside of the walls, once in 10 days. You may use a piece of cloth, appropriate for use inside an aquarium, to clean (wipe) the algae off the walls. It should not take you more than 15 minutes in case of a Fish Tank and 5 minutes in case of a Fishbowl. Do NOT touch the substrate and the algae on the substrate. While cleaning the walls inside, you are not required to clean anything else. Do not worry about the look of the water just after the algae-cleaning is done. The dust settles down really fast (usually, within a day). However, you may choose to clean 40% of the surface gravel, without disturbing the remaining 60% of the surface-substrate, to enhance the appearance of your DPM Type Fishbowl | Aquarium.
You may clean the algae off the walls more or less frequently based on how quickly the algae comes back on the inside of your walls. You may control the exposure to sunlight to control algae growth. You may reduce the length of light-exposure to reduce or slowdown algae growth. The platies, discussed in one of the previous section in the context of the DPM Type Fishbowl, love to eat algae. Other type of food is given to them only once in every 4 days, for the sake of variety and nutrition. So, certain amount of algae is always maintained on the surface of the substrate and the glass vase. The fishes feast on Green Algae as and when they want.
CHANGING WATER:
You may use an appropriate and clean pipe | hose | siphon (Common Names: Clear Flexible PVC Hose, Clear PVC Pipe, Transparent PVC Soft Tube, Clear Flexible PVC Tubing, Transparent Flexible PVC Tubing) to change water. While you use the pipe, you may keep the receiving end closer to the substrate. So that, the fish-waste locked within and under the substrate gets sucked into the pipe and goes out of the Fishbowl | Fish Tank. Do not worry about the rest of the fish-waste. That is going to be useful for the algae and the colonies of helpful bacteria. While changing water, take care not to suck in Fishes, Fish Babies and Fish Eggs. Collect the water in a clean bucket. In case something that should not have gone out of the Fishbowl | Aquarium is found in the bucket, you have an option to put that back into the place it came from!
DPM Natural Method is all about comfort and convenience. Just a 30% water change once in every TWO WEEKS is sufficient, in case of a DPM Type Natural Fishbowl (Recommended Capacity - 15 Liters). Just a 30% water change once in every TWO MONTHS, in case of a DPM Type Natural Aquarium (Recommended Capacity - 60 Liters or more), is sufficient. Add water, periodically, to your DPM Type Natural Fishbowl | Aquarium to compensate for the amount of water lost due to evaporation. Take care to add water in such a way that the flow | current of the incoming water does not disturb the fish-waste sitting locked underneath the substrate. If you could do that, you do not have to wait for the “dust to settle down”!
CLEANING THE FISHBOWL | AQUARIUM:
It is really easy to clean a DPM Type Natural Fishbowl I Aquarium. The procedure to clean a DPM Type Natural Fishbowl I Aquarium is known as "STIR-CLEANING". There is no need to take the fishes out of the Fishbowl I Aquarium. There is no need to take the substrate or anything else out of the DPM Type Natural Fishbowl I Aquarium for cleaning. Just clean the algae on the walls, as described under "ALGAE ON THE WALLS", stated above. Then, gently stir the water well for a minute using your hand.
The flow so generated, by stirring the water, releases the fish-waste locked within and under the layers of substrate. Then, with a clean pipe | hose | siphon, drain 60% of the water. Theoretically, close to 50% of the total Fish-waste volume goes out of the Fishbowl, with the outgoing water. The remaining 50% volume of waste remains to play its role in supporting the growth of helpful bacteria-colonies and helping growth of algae. The helpful bacteria-colony plays a wonderful role in maintaining the water-parameters. And, that is why exactly, one would never find the water in a DPM Type Natural Fishbowl I Aquarium smelling foul. Is not that so good a deal?
Once in 15 days, you may gently wipe the outside of the Fishbowl | Aquarium with a piece of wet cloth to remove the dust and dirt, if any, accumulated on the outer surface of the Fishbowl | Aquarium. Do NOT use the very piece of cloth that you use to clean the INSIDE of the Aquarium | Fishbowl wall (s). Instead, use ANOTHER piece of cloth to clean the OUTSIDE of the Aquarium | Fishbowl wall (s). "STIR-CLEANING" performed once in TWO MONTHS is enough to maintain a DPM Type Natural Fishbowl (Recommended Capacity - 15 Liters) in a good state and " STIR-CLEANING" performed once in EIGHT MONTHS is enough to maintain a DPM Type Natural Aquarium (Recommended Capacity - 60 Liters or more) in a good state. Does that sound good enough?
PART 28: MAINTENANCE! by Debi Prasad Mahapatra is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
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