# How do you clean your tank of parasites after all the fish are gone?



## Luti-Kriss

I just discovered that "Camallanus" is what's been killing my fish the past 5 months. I only have 4 left and it looks like it's already too late to do anything for them.

I've been planning on turning my tank into a goldfish tank after my other fish are all gone. But how do I know it's safe to put new fish in there? How do I know when all of the worms are all dead? Should I starve them out? Dry out the tank? Clean it in some special way?


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## emc7

My "unknown disease killed all the fish, nuke everything" method starts with bleach first. I add a fair amount of bleach to the tank with water still in it and run the filters on the tank with the decor and everything still in it still in it. Then I drain and dry. You may have to spread the gravel in something shallow to get it to dry. Letting everything get all the way dry will take care of most of the bleach and some nasties need to stay wet. Then everything gets rinsed in tap water, even the gravel, decor gets scrubbed if necessary to get off dead, bleached algae. Rinsing gets off loose crap. Then I fill up the tank and run it empty adding dechlor until the smell, taste of chlorine is gone and the pH is ok. This treatment will take out your filter bacteria (use new media instead of the bleached stuff), so you get to cycle over again.

I'm told there is some stuff that will even survive this treatment or evade it (like viruses that pass to humans and back to fish). There are other methods on the forum including one using a lot of salt. See what you can find with the advanced search. 

Now, if your nasty is known, you could try just treating the empty tank for everything you think your fish were exposed to. You could use a broad spectrum med like Clout. Probably be pricier than bleach. If i had a definite diagnosis (like from an autopsy on the last fish), I might treat for the nasty and then bleach, and then dry.


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## Luti-Kriss

emc7 said:


> My "unknown disease killed all the fish, nuke everything" method starts with bleach first. I add a fair amount of bleach to the tank with water still in it and run the filters on the tank with the decor and everything still in it still in it.


I heard somewhere that if you clean with bleach you risk ruining the tank because it will dry out the seals or something though? Am I wrong? Or does it just matter how long I leave it in for, how much I put in, ect...?


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## emc7

Anything you clean a tank with can hurt the seals. But adding bleach to a tank full of water is far less harmful than cleaning it empty with straight bleach. You don't need full strength bleach to kill everything. The amount of chlorine in a swimming pool would do.


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## Luti-Kriss

Okay thank you. I'll try this


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