How To Introduce Fish To An Aquarium?

So today in this post/article we will be looking at buying new fish and how we do this safely and How to Introduce Fish to an Aquarium? Or hospital tanks to enjoy! Firstly before buying any new fish, we need to consider a few things!

make sure you have a fully cycled tank both the hospital/quarantine tank and the main tank!
make sure you have tested the water of both tanks and all is good
consider what size tanks you have and what fish you already have and how many new fish you can safely home!
make sure the new fish are compatible with the existing fish you already own
before adding new fish make sure there are good hiding places for them
move the decorations around 24 hours before adding new fish to the main tank this will stop the territorial behavior of your existing fish
do a water change and gravel clean and recheck water parameters with a decent test kit 24 hours before adding fish
feed fish the existing fish you already have the day before adding new fish this will help greatly with any aggressive behavior
sounds silly but make sure everything in the tanks is working as it should!
never mix the shop’s water with your tank’s water keep waters separated at all times.

Now we have the basics and we have checked everything and are ready to buy our new fish yay!

So how do we introduce a new fish into an existing aquarium?

The answer is a process called acclimation first we turn the tank lights off and also the lighting within the room then we can float the bag of new fish on the water for 15 mins, Then open the bag

roll the sides down, and add a cup of tank water to the bag and leave for 15 mins. After which we can check the temp and water conditions of both the bag water and tank water ideally we are looking to be within .5 a degree ph and temp to be similar!

WHY ACCLIMATISE?

So let’s look into this in more detail, Acclimation or Acclimatisation is the process of adding new fish to our Aquariums and needs to be done when moving fish from any tank into a new tank even from your own hospital tank

back into the main tank. but why acclimatize at all right well any change even the smallest of changes to the fish environment can put our fish into a heightened state of shock which can lead to a weakened immune system, Which in turn will lead to illnesses and or diseases and even death! So we indeed need to be super careful.

LET’S INTRODUCE A NEW FISH!

We have checked our tanks are working correctly obviously the tanks are cycled right! Cool and all the equipment is working fine lights heater filter we even did a water check fed our fish and did a water change etc, Well we will

be putting our new fish into a hospital tank first so the main tank will not be required for 14 days that’s right I’m gonna check my new fishy friends are all a-OK for two weeks.

We have our fish make sure we bring them home in a paper bag over the main bag to help keep out too much light and to help hopefully to keep the fish calm, We don’t want to stress them out once home it’s time to prep the

quarantine tank making sure lights are off and dim the lights if possible within the room now we can float the still sealed bag. With our new fish on top of the tank’s water, we do this and allow them to acclimate for 15 mins after 15

mins we can open the bag and roll the sides down being super careful not to allow any water from the bag to enter the tank’s water! Now take a clean cup (that has been cleaned without any chemicals) and add a cup of tank water to the BAG and allow 15 mins once again to acclimate.

ACCLIMATION TESTING THE WATERS!

So now we have a cup of our hospital tanks water in with the bag of new fish water and it’s been 30 mins in total! Time to test the water with a decent test kit for ph levels and we can check the Temp too, Ideally, we are looking to be

no more than .5 a degree ph and temp of our tank’s water. If we have achieved this then great don’t panic! We can keep adding a cup from the tank to our bag remembering to not let any bag water into our tank each time we add

a cup leave for 15 mins and allow time to acclimatize to keep this process going until we have achieved the desired results.

BUT THE BAGS ARE FULL AND WE ARE STILL NOT ACCLIMATISED?

No worries if in the event you reach the point of having a full bag just take a cup or two out of the bag and disregard chuck it down the sink and then add tank water to the bag and keep repeating until you have the desired results at this point you would have all tank water so all should be good.

Now we need to add our new fish to the tank if you have had to keep adding water to the point that the bag was full and you let out a couple of cups and filled the bag back up you have been acclimatizing for some considerable time

and you have no doubt has been left solely with tank water in that bag of yours lol! In this case, you can let the bag gently sink into the tank allowing your new fishy friends to just simply swim out into the tank and enjoy its new temporary surroundings.

INTRODUCE NEW FISH ALTERNATIVE WAY

The previous method is only fine and dandy if you were left with only tank water in that bag of new fish for most of us this would not be the case and the new fish would have acclimatized much quicker and we would still have shop water in that bag hence we would not be able to just let our fish swim out!

In this case, we simply net the fish out a few at a time and allow them to swim off the idea is to be as quick and safe as possible as we don’t want to stress the fish and we ideally don’t want any shop water in our tanks water.

PUTTING NEW FISH INTO YOUR MAIN TANK

So we waited 14 days and our new fish are fine we’ve checked them overall all is good, Great how do we get these bad boys into our main tank so we can show them off? Well after we have checked our main tank is running OK and

as requested earlier in this very post-IE we have fed the fish done a water change and done a quick vacuum of the gravel/substrate and changed the positions of all the decorations we should be ready to get started. The decor

changes coupled with the extra feeding the day before will help greatly in stopping any aggression towards the new fish, Now if the water parameters are in line between the two tanks I would be inclined to net the fish into a

Tupperware container or bucket with enough water from the hospital tank and transfer them straight over easy peasy!

As we know the fish in both tanks are fully healthy now and the waters are in line with each other in terms of temp and all other parameters, That being said if the water is off by more than .5 a degree on the test kit in terms of ph and

or temp and other parameters then you will have to follow the steps used previously in transferring the fish from the shop into the hospital tank it’s just best to be as safe as possible for the little fellas!

Conclusion How to Introduce Fish to an Aquarium

So in conclusion How to Introduce Fish to an Aquarium? It’s best to know what fish you want before you buy and make sure they are right for your tank! In terms of water conditions and in terms of size and compatibility with the existing fish and the size of the tank you

already own, Take things slow make sure to turn lights off, and float the new fish in their bag for as long as is necessary be patient, and if you follow these steps I feel confident those fish will do fine thanks for reading,

and hope you enjoyed it and maybe learned a few things along the way!

How to Introduce Fish to an Aquarium? Acclimatization 5 Easy Steps