Step by step, this is exactly what I do to drip acclimate --
#1 Gather the tools I need, which are --
- Any size bucket
- Several pieces of any kind of tape (duct works great)
- A long piece of airline tubing
- Scissors
Place the livestock bag into the bucket.
Rip several 2-3 inch pieces of the tape and set these aside, you will need them soon.
Cut the top of the livestock bag open and using the tape, tape the bag to the bucket so that the bag can 'stand up' like a paper grocery bag, keeping the opening at the top. To do this, I generally press the side of the bag against the bucket, and tape from the INSIDE of the livestock bag, to the bucket.
Now that the bag is secured in your bucket (ON THE FLOOR) go ahead and put one end of the airline tubing into your tank, making sure it stays submerged (this is the hardest part for me... you maybe can use a lettuce clip to keep it down). Start the siphon, and then make a loose/somewhat tight knot in it, so that it drips only a few drips a second. Then, place this inside of the livestock bag.
Here are some pictures I happen to have of me acclimating some plecos.
http://lucidsoft.org/~rcl/pics/accliml260-2.jpg
Note, this second picture is pretty bad, but I figured I might as well include it. ..
http://lucidsoft.org/~rcl/pics/accliml260-1.jpg
How long I let things drip depends on what I am doing. If I am just sitting around, I will let it go for quite a while sometimes. If you are anxious, then around 30 minutes or so feel free to increase the drip speed. My technical reasoning behind this is that initially there is low water volume, so each new drop changes the water the livestock is in more than the same drop will later, when the water volume is greater. So, if you increase the drip speed after the bag is more full, you probably aren't actually raising the speed at which the water CHANGES. In fact, you're really just keeping it more stable.
I normally squeeze the bag to make water overflow from the top when it is almost full, to lower the water volume to about half the bag.. and after some more drip, I usually untie the knot and let the bag fill up again. The more you do, the less shock it will be when the fish actually goes into the tank.
Don't worry, this acclimation was confusing to me at first too.. but now it seems easier to do logistically than floating the bag/making sure it doesn't sink/spill/etc.. what a mess!! Also, if I am acclimating things like snails or crabs or very small fish (like my tiger goby), I will typically just empty the entire livestock bag into my 3 us gal bucket and drip directly into that. Saves some work and is just as effective --- but it can be harder to net the livestock if you do this!
Good luck and feel free to reply with any questions or tips to make this even easier! I think it is a great method and we should all use it and share it with our friends, saltwater and freshwater alike.
Robert
