Posted: Sat Aug 04, 2007 12:56 pm
The cloudiness that you're seeing is the bacteria that have bloomed in the tank from feeding on the ammonia and nitrites. Ideally you want to have the bacteria settle on the surfaces in your filter (like the carbon, sponge, biomedia) and on the tank and decorations in it too. This will eventually happen as the ammonia and nitrites are reduced to zero, the amount of bacteria needed to maintain zero levels will diminish. The excess bacteria will begin to die off and get trapped in the filter, get consumed by other bacteria, and/or decompose. That in turn adds a little to the nitrogen cycle again but will slowly diminish until the tank is finally stabilized. Then your water should become clear again. I would advise giving it some time, don't overfeed, don't underfeed, don't do large water changes or totally clean out your filter. If anything maybe just do a 10% water change and take the sponge part of the filter out and rinse it real good in the dirty tank water you just removed from the tank to get the solid waste out (you want to preserve any bacteria that has settled in the sponge). Then make sure to replace the water with conditioned water (no chlorine).
