Driftwood Help

[Ryan]

I went out last fall and found some realy nice dieces of drift wood for a chemeleon set-up I was doing. Well i now have extra peices and I was wondering how do I disinfect them :question: . They are too big to boil and have been sitting out in the cold all winter. I want to bee safe seeing that it is going in with my Discus anyone got some ideas?

[BCWolfen]

Don't know if this would work or not, but....
Put them in bathtub with the hotest water your tank puts out.
Have 4 or pots of boiling water ready and add them in....boil some more and do it again.

That should heat enough to penetrate the wood and kill off anything in it.

Heat them in the oven?? But watch they don't catch fire....

You'd think that would cure them enough for a FW tank.

Just thoughts.

[Willow]

hot tub!

[Cap'n]

I like the idea of pouring boiling water over them, should work well enough. Most anything that could be harmful is probably already dead from winter exposure anyway.

Pretty sure I read about baking wood at low heat for quite some time to disinfect as well. Do a search on that and let us know what you come up with.

[Ryan]

Well i am going to do all of them. First i am going to do a 10 percent bleach soak. Rinse them 6 or 7 times with boiling water. let them soak then air dry then bake. I cant be too carful with my discus.

[Canadian Man]

If you want to be carefull than Don't Bother Using Them.

Why take the chance if your concerned :confused:

[G1GY]

The wood that is used in aquariums is bog wood. This wood spent many years in a bog and is full of tanum(sp)(The same stuff in peat moss.). This wood looks like drift wood, but is very dark in colour because of the tanum that's in it and it's heavier than other wood because of this. This wood does not rot very often and softens your water because of the tanum that's released from it(Great for South american fish, but bad for Africans.). Drift wood will need to be held down to stop from floating untill it's water logged and will most likely foul your water when it starts to rot.

I've seen many people try to use drift wood over the years, but very few keep it in their tank for long.

I wouldn't use it.

Just my opinion though.

[Delphinus]

Hmmm, geez I've never even given driftwood a second thought. I've got some pieces in my FW setup I found years ago, collected from creek beds and so on. A strategic rock here or there to keep it submerged until it's waterlogged, and away I went. My plecs actually nibble on the stuff so it tends to get a little smaller over time anyhow, eventually I'll need new pieces. I forget where I read this, but some (or all? :confused: ) plecostomus actually need that kind of roughage in their diet.

But uh.. yeah I'm with Canadian Man on this one though. If you're going to go through all that much trouble, then why bother in the first place? Isn't there stuff you could purchase instead and save yourself the hassle? Are discus so sensitive that anything less than 100% sterilized/pasteurized/etc. is going to be a problem?

[Ryan]

I would rather spend my time than spend money buying it. I dont know what the price of driftwood around your parts is but it is like 30 bukcs for a 12 inch peice here. Thats outrageous. But it kooks like i am going to have to start coughing up the cash for the store stuff.

Are discus so sensitive that anything less than 100% sterilized/pasteurized/etc. is going to be a problem?

No not realy i just dont want to take a chance. I have worked hard to get them to the size they are i dont want to do it for nothing.

Maybe i can make some synthetic stuff out of PVC and a bark wrap. Or reptile stuff.

[G1GY]

The reason this wood is getting so expensive is because mopani driftwood is not that easy to find any more. Prices for this stuff will only go up in the future and the available peices will only get smaller. I have around 40 peices of the stuff stored in my crawlspace that I'm saving for a rainy day. :mrgreen:

[Cap'n]

Tannins, Gary. The same kind of natural dyes found in red wine. I agree with you that the type of wood you describe would be the best to use.

However, go for it Ryan! I can't see any reason why your plan wouldn't work. Were you able to find any additional info from others who have used found wood? There's got to be lots of them...

[Beverly]

We used large pieces of driftwood in our 180g FW tank several years ago. They were too big to sterilize in the oven, so we boiled up heap loads of tapwater and poured the water over each separate piece of wood. Took awhile to do all the pieces, but they were fine in the tank for as long as we had it set up.

[Ryan]

Thanks for all te help guys/gals. THey are in 5 gallon pails right now with some guppies. I want to make sure i got all the bleach out. If the guppies die i will do more rinsing and sokaing but i think it should all be done. Ill take some pictures once it is in the tank.

[Delphinus]

Some chlorine neutralizer might have worked just fine too. :neutral:

[Ryan]

Tony I didnt mean it like i was killing guppies. This gave me an excuse to go out and buy more fish which i know everyone on this board likes to do. I probaly would have put hem in there if i didnt think it was safe. I mean i have a pond full of 7 cent feeder minnows i could have used.

[rickjames]

I want to make sure i got all the bleach out. If the guppies die i will do more rinsing and sokaing but i think it should all be done.

Never heard of a guppy bleach test kit....

Is there a method for using them to test for Ca and Alk too? :lol:

Brennan

[Ryan]

hahaha guppies dont live in SW trust me i have tried. Anyway i sold my other 3 smaller Discus for some store credit and bought a wisteria i think, a sword and a anubia. Tomorrow i will put the driftwood into form and in the tank. We will see how it goes.

[Aquattro]

hahaha guppies dont live in SW trust me i have tried.

Properly acclimated, they do indeed live in salt water....

[Ryan]

Realy i tried to so it slowly by adding a little bit of salt every day and they died. I cant remeber at wat SG but they didnt make it to reef tank SG.

[Fish Breath]

Try this link out http://www.aquariumadvice.com/showquestion.php?faq=2&fldAuto=34

[Ryan]

Thanks fish breath but it is in the tank already. I just gotta find some time to post some pictures.

[Majestic_Aquariums]

We have a large piece of driftwood (stump off a tree) in one of our freshwater tanks. All has been fine, but within the last two weeks the tank has clouded up. All signs look o.k. in the tank, and we can't help but think that maybe the log is rotting? Looks crappy right now. For what the bog wood is worth, we may just stick to that in the future. Too bad, the stump looks nice in there. Have to wait and see. If that's the case though, I wouldn't reccommend it for your Discus, but I have no knowledge of them other than what I have read.
Good Luck!

[G1GY]

I've seen many people do very well with normal driftwood. This usualy only lasts until the wood starts to rot and effect your water quality. Also if you take the wood out of the tank and look at the bottom and into any holes on the bottom, you'll see a white jelly like slime sometimes. I tried all types of wood and will only ever use bog wood ever again. (And sometimes you even get a peice of bog wood that will rot bellive it or not.)

[Majestic_Aquariums]

Yup. Can't help but think you are right Gary. I think our log is rotting, causing poor clarity in the tank. It's the only explanation for all the particles floating around in there. Looks like our Breardie gets another piece of wood! (if it ever dries out!!-after 15 months, it still isn't 100% water-logged!)
Perhaps time to tear that tank apart! :evil:
Rob

[Ryan]

Just dry it out under a heat lamp or blow a fan on it. I got 2 nice peices in there now but unfortunalty i gotta sell everything do to college in the fall :(