A Tidy Fish Habitat

With the boys on holiday with Grandma and Grandpa at the cottage, it was time for Ian and I to get some of the less kid-friendly chores out of the way.  In comparison to skinning the deer and taking her to the butcher (one of Ian's jobs for today), cleaning the fish tank might seem like a good chore to do with kids.  It is not.  Allowing them to help usually results in water all over both the kitchen and living room floors and fish suffering from PTSD.

First I scooped all the goldfish out of the tank.  They each got their own temporary residence in a mixing bowl.  Without boys terrorizing them by sticking their fingers in the bowls, this was a relatively peaceful relocation.

I then emptied out two-thirds of the water, cleaned lots of fish poop out of the gravel, and scraped algae off the inside of the tank walls.  I cleaned out the filter with an old toothbrush.

I refilled the tank with fresh, clean water - half hard water from our well and half reverse osmosis water.  I added some liquid aquarium plant minerals and a new branch decoration.  We still need to replace the fluorescent light with a new one - the hardware store was out of stock.  So far so good.  The tank looks much improved and the fish seem happy with their tidy habitat.

All clean.  Good as new.