How Often Should You Change The Water In Your Betta Fish Tank?

When you’re about to buy new fish, one of the first things that you tend to think about is the tank that you’re keeping them in. Is it colorful enough? Will it be good enough to show off the unique characteristics of your finned friends?

That’s not the most important thing to think about, however. One of the most vital things to consider is how you will care for your fish.

You need to ensure that the tank is taken care of and that it’s cleaned on a regular basis in order to keep your fish safe. You also need to feed it, and know what to look out for to see whether your fish is sick.

If this is your very first time owning a betta, you may feel a little bit lost about how you can look after your new friend.

Thankfully, we know how to help. Read on for our advice about how often you should be cleaning and maintaining your aquarium to ensure that your fish are both happy and healthy.

How To Set Up Your Aquarium

The first thing that you need to do before you get your betta is to set up its tank. Nobody likes to live in a dirty environment - the same can be said for your fish. Make sure that your fish has the right environment so that it can thrive.

People will tell you all sorts of things that your fish simply must have, but in reality you don’t need anything particular fancy. There’s no particular need to get all sorts of colorful things for your tank since bettas are very colorful anyway, so you can make them the stars of the show.

It’s also best to ensure that your fish have plenty of room to move. Keep your tank minimalistic - your fish will thank you for it.

You are going to need to ensure that you have around 3 gallons of water per fish. It’s usually better to get a bigger tank than this though - if you have a few fish then you should err on the side of caution and get a tank that can hold a minimum of 10 gallons.

There are two key choices when it comes to getting a betta aquarium. You can either get a glass tank or an acrylic tank. Then you get to choose your plants. Driftwood may be a good choice, or you could get real or plastic plants. You’ll need to ensure that there are fish treatments in the tank as well.

On the bottom of the tank you can place some gravel that will absorb the water. In addition to this, make sure that you have a heater set up in the tank so that the fish are warm. This is the best environment for them.

You can give them different kinds of treats but betta fish are particularly fond of bloodworms. Play around with different treats, as you will then figure out what will work the best for your fish.

How To Switch the Water In Your Betta Fish Tank

Your fish need to remain in clean water in order to stay healthy! For this reason, you need to make sure that you change the water on a regular basis. Your fish will release waste on a regular basis, and things like nitrate and ammonia are inside of the waste.

While you can’t actually see these things when you look at the water, they are still incredibly bad for your fish. Your fish can get diseases, and living in their own waste can cause them a lot of stress.

For that reason, it is very important that you know how to change the water. Here’s everything that you need to know. 

What You Will Need

To start with, you need to gather up your gear so that you can do the job correctly. You are going to need to get a siphon to do this. You will also need 2 buckets. One of the buckets will have clean water inside of it, and you will put the dirty water in the other bucket.

In addition to this, you’re also going to need a water conditioner and a thermometer that you can use to check the temperature of the water inside of the tank. Betta fish require warmer tropical water - they are not cold water fish, so, will require a thermometer to ensure they are living in the correct temperatures.

It is vital to ensure that the one bucket is clean before you put any water inside of it. You don’t want any chemicals dissolving in the water, after all.

The water conditioner is also important since it will help to get any chlorine out of the water that you may get from the tank. You can remove the existing water with ease if you have a siphon for tank cleaning, and it will help to ensure that any waste from the very depths of the aquarium is removed. 

If you have a thermometer then you will find it a lot easier to figure out what temperature your water is. It means that you can change it more easily too as you will know exactly what temperature you need.

When Should I Change The Water?

Ultimately, the answer to the question depends on the tank size. Usually though, it’s going to be vital that you clean your tank much more often if you have a smaller tank. This is because it needs to be cleaner. Usually, this means cleaning the tank on a weekly basis.

As such, it will be important to change around 30 to 50 percent of the water on a weekly basis. If the tank is bigger and it already has a water filter inside of it, then you won’t need to change it as much. You are going to need to change around 20 percent of the water on a weekly basis.

The main reason that it’s so important to change the water on a regular basis is because it helps to take a lot of the nitrate and ammonia out of it. If the waste and stale food is left to fester in the water then the nitrate and ammonia levels will inevitably rise. 

When you clean the tank regularly and change the water, you are helping to make sure that your fish remain safe as the things that are likely to harm them are mostly removed.

It is important to mention, however, that it’s important to only change a little of the water at any given time. This is because there are certain things in the water that are important for the fish.

For instance, your fish is used to things like the pH levels, the bacteria, temperature, water hardness and various other things. Your fish can become incredibly stressed if you try to change too much of it in one go.

It can be hard to replicate these water conditions, and this may even be detrimental to the health of the fish.

How to Switch the Water

There isn’t any particular rule about how you should change the water inside of your tank. The main thing that you need to do at first is get all of the equipment together.

It won’t take too long to change the water in the tank after you have done this. There are a few key things that you need to do.

The first thing that you have to do is get a clean bucket of water, and fill it up with some clean water from the faucets. You should be filling it with the same amount of water that you are going to need in order to replace the water that’s currently in the tank.

Then, you need to work on preparing the water. It’s important to remember that there is chlorine in tap water. This is certainly not good for your fish, and they may even start to get diseases from assuming water with chlorine in it.

The worst case scenario is that chlorine could even kill your fish. For this reason, it’s vital to make sure that you get that nasty chlorine out of the water.

It’s a good idea to invest in a water conditioner for this. All you need to do is follow the instructions on the water conditioner then.

The next thing to do is get rid of a certain amount of the old water from the aquarium. You can move anything from 20% to 50% of the water using a siphon for the tank.

Alternatively, a gravel siphon may also be appropriate as this can help you to clean the tank too. In the event that you don’t have a siphon, you’re just going to have to get rid of the water yourself.

Then, all you need to do is put the dirty water into the other bucket that you have prepared.

The fourth step is one that you will need to take special attention with. This step requires you to have the proper temperature for the tank, which is crucial for their survival.

You are going to need to ensure that the temperature is going to work for the fish. Use a tank thermometer and figure out the temperature of the current water in the tank.

Then you will need to see if the temperature of the new water is a match with the old water. If it isn’t then you will need to alter the clean water so it is the correct temperature.

Finally, you just need to add a little bit of clean water into your fish tank so that the water level is back to how it was before. 

These steps are incredibly simple to follow, and it means that you can change the water with ease every time that you try to do it. It can be very helpful to ensure that you have the correct equipment though, so please keep that in mind.

How Can I Keep the Water Clean Even After Cleaning

Your betta tank needs to be clean all the time, not just on days that you are changing the water. It’s important for the hygiene and health of the fish after all.

Keeping the tank clean on a regular basis is vital. There are a couple of things that you can do in order to make sure that it’s squeaky clean even in between water changes.

First of all, it’s worth limiting the amount of feedings to 2-3 times each day. The problem with overfeeding is that your fish may not actually eat the food.

As such, it will not be eaten and it will start to stick to the bottom of the tank. This is a problem as it means that bacteria and ammonia is released into the air, and this isn’t good for your fish.

You should make sure that you are also cleaning the things inside of the aquarium too such as the accessories. This can help to ensure that betta diseases don’t crop up because things aren’t cleaned.

Sometimes people like to keep real plans inside of their tanks. If this is the case, then you need to make an effort to keep these well maintained.

Make sure that you get rid of any rotten parts of the plant to avoid bacteria growing in the tank. Finally, make sure that you put a water filter in the aquarium as this helps to keep it clean.

Conclusion

Ultimately, it’s vital to make sure that your betta tank is clean. It can seem confusing at first, but you will get used to cleaning it. Hopefully this guide has helped you to clean your tank much more easily!