Cleaning the glue from 10 gallon.

Question
Hello I have a 10 gallon and it used to be the home of a pet rat.  I heard that their urine can seep into the glue and act as a toxin to fish and I learned that the hard way.  I was wondering if the glue could be cured from this by using bleach or something else?  Also I wanted to know that since my gravel was in the tank aswell that I should clean it with bleach.

Thanks!
Mike

Answer
Hi Mike,
I've never heard the rat urine problem, but I'm sure it could certainly happen. What I would be tempted to do is to try the aquarium out anyway. But first you'd want to clean it of course. You can use bleach to clean your tank. I'd first rinse it out very well, and use a paper towel or an aquarium algae scrubber and scrub all corners and everywhere in the tank. Then you can fill the tank up with water and add just enough bleach to make the tank water smell like fairly strong chlorinated pool water. Then let it sit for several hours to even a whole day if you are worried. Then rinse, rinse, rinse! Its best to rinse for at least 15 minutes. Let it dry.. Then later, fill up the tank and add plenty of dechlorinator water conditioner to remove any traces. After that, you can experiment setting up the tank and adding a few simple fish like Zebra danios and see how they do.

I feel it would be best if you just replace your gravel. Its much better than risking it and Gravel will be more trouble to clean.

Keep in mind that the tank will start cycling and ammonia will build up as it does with every newly setup aquarium. Until the bacteria develop that control the ammonia you will have to test your water regularly and take note of the ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate levels. If you need more help on this, visit here-

http://www.firsttankguide.net/cycle.php

I really hope this helps and best of luck!
Karen~