Drift wood help

I have a piece of drift wood in my tank for my firebellys. I seeded the tank with organic waste from my firebellies a week ago. Recently, even with a filter, the tank has been emitting a foul fish like odor. Dark films grow on the drift wood and requires daily brushing. Is the film normal? Is the smell normal? Also, i have been waiting for the tank to leech out all the acid from the wood, for the past week, every day i pour yellow water out. How much longer do i have to wait?

That is the thing with drift wood. The smell and films are normal for driftwood. Although I guess every driftwood look a bit different. Mine used to have transparent film on it.

I think the safe bet that the wood will need several months (3 - 6) to completely leech out the tannin.

I have heard of ways to prepare the wood. some mentioned about baking the wood or boiling it. And you should have put hte wood in a sperate bucket for a while before using.

I simply lived with the tannin for a while in my fish tank. Since my fishes actually prefer to have a little more acidic environment. As for the film, I introduced an algae eating fish, Oto, to take of it. It tooks only 1 night to clean it up and as long as I have the fish, the film never show up again. However, I do not suggest mixing of species with newt.

Wow, 3-7 months is a long time.... i dont think my fire bellies can wait that long, especially with the heat in new york.

Take the wood out and soak in a container separate from your tank. Then do a big water change on the tank and add the firebellies. You'll just have to rig up some other kind of island for them for a while.

What kind of wood is it, and where did you get it? Some kinds of wood just aren't suitable for an aquatic tank.

Hi Jen, i bought the wood at the herp show in new york. its a piece of drift wood, known at the convention as ghost wood.

You can find some information about ghost wood on blackjungle:
http://www.blackjungle.com/Merchant2/merchant.mv?Screen=CTGY&Store_Code=BJTS&Category_Code=WFWH

Does it look like their photo of ghost wood, or more like grape wood:
http://www.blackjungle.com/Merchant2/merchant.mv?Store_Code=BJTS&Screen=CTGY&Category_Code=GW

I know that grapewood is NOT supposed to be used in water. Since real ghost wood is rather uncommon, I'm wondering what you got and whether it's really supposed to be used in water.

I actually bought it from blackjungle at the nyc reptile show in july. It was labelled ghost wood.

Ah, then I would believe them They don't show it being used in any full-aquatic setups, so it might be worth asking them if it is suitable. Seems like if it's OK in wet terraria, it should be OK in water. Just keep soaking.