Sterilizing with Dirty Salt Water?

[goldenpuon]

I decided to use salt water (fresh water with 2/3 cup or more) added per gallon to sterilize a few plastic containers that had fish that were sick and/or died in them previously.

I did them all in one bunch. But after I wiped the area where the water line was on the first one (that is the dirtiest part of the tank since it is where residue builds up), the water got somewhat cloudy and dirty looking. I did the next tank despite that and also a heater and plants from another with the same water. I didn't use new water because I was in a hurry and it took the salt about 1 1/2 hours to dissolve.

I was wondering if the sterilization was still effective enough since I used the same water for two different tanks and since it was dirty? Is it advisable that I do the sterilization again with different containers of water for each tank because of this?

Thanks

Renee

[Carl]

As a general rule, I sterilize each tank individually, especially with the use of salt, since salt is not 100% in removal of pathogens as bleach/chlorine would be.

If you are concerned, I would recommend another round of sterilization prior to re-starting this tank.

Aquarium Disease Prevention; Tank Sterilization

Carl

[kagome]

Renee, I would agree with Carl that the only way to sterilize something for sure is to use a bleach solution. I use bleach to clean aquarium stuff all the time. Usually I use a 20 to 1 water/bleach solution and let it soak over night. I then rinse everything really well in the morning, cover with water again and add twice the normal amount of dechlorinating solution and let that sit for twenty minutes or so. If you don't want to use up a bunch of dechlorinater then you can just let the chlorine dissipate naturally, but this takes much longer and you can't be absolutely sure that it's all gone unless you wait several days. I hope that's helpful.

[goldenpuon]

Thanks Kagome. My mom is phobic about bleach ruining my clothes and getting on the carpet like the Methyline Blue. As well I get quite worried using it due to this. I'll try to use bleach in the future for these things though.

For this situation however, I have decided against using the bleach for these containers and aquarium decorations. Before I sterilized them with salt water, they had been empty for months and I don't plan to add fish or fill them up for months more. I think that giving them a good rinse will be enough for this. As well, two of the fish that died from disease were very old. I think that the salt was probably enough. (Sorry I didn't arrive at this conclusion sooner.)