New tank help required

Hi there I am currently setting up a fish tank I have no fish as of yet as I am waiting until the water is ready. I have treated the water 2 days ago with filter boost and tap safe and yesterday I put plant care nutrition capsules in for my real plants to grow correctly today I woke up and there is a lot of foam forming in my tank I have a heater and filter also is this normal just I don’t want to add fish to it until I no this is 100percent safe am not sure if it’s just cause the plants or what just want to do it all right please help Thanks Martin

That does not look right.

Can you tell us what brand of plant capsules they were? The filter boost and tap safe should not have done this, which just leaves the plant capsules as a possibility.

essjay said:

That does not look right.

Can you tell us what brand of plant capsules they were? The filter boost and tap safe should not have done this, which just leaves the plant capsules as a possibility.

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Thank you for getting back to me this is all the stuff I have put in the tank

How did you put the plant capsules into the tank? Did you open up the capsules and dump the contents inside the tank, add the capsule itself, or bury the capsule in the substrate? Not sure that this would make a difference or not and possibly cause foaming... Just trouble shooting here...

The plant capsule are Tropica brand and from what I understand that is a Very reputable company... I am not familiar with the brand of the other two products.

dmpfishlover said:

How did you put the plant capsules into the tank? Did you open up the capsules and dump the contents inside the tank, add the capsule itself, or bury the capsule in the substrate? Not sure that this would make a difference or not and possibly cause foaming... Just trouble shooting here...

The plant capsule are Tropica brand and from what I understand that is a Very reputable company... I am not familiar with the brand of the other two products.

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I just used tweezers and digger it into the gravel just beside the rots to ma plant then moved the gravel over the top of where I put it to cover it. By any chance do you think it could be the nitrogen that is contained in the tablet ? It’s all new equipment all been cleaned before set up I have had my heater and filter on for 3 days now I just seen this today it was not here yesterday and I put that tablet in yesterday I was not sure if it was just the tablet doing it’s job

It sounds like you put the root capsules in correctly... I can't imagine it would be the root capsules, but then again, I have never used them myself... so I can't say for sure.

When you say that the equipment was all "cleaned" before you set it up, what do you mean? How did you clean the equipment and with what?

dmpfishlover said:

It sounds like you put the root capsules in correctly... I can't imagine it would be the root capsules, but then again, I have never used them myself... so I can't say for sure.

When you say that the equipment was all "cleaned" before you set it up, what do you mean? How did you clean the equipment and with what?

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Just water boiling water for gravel and rock a few times and cold water for the plants a guy got back to me there saying Foam is an indication of protein in the water so we would recommend doing a 25% water change. The fertilizer you added to the tank probably caused this to occur. The plants are so new they are not going to be able to use the fertilizer as quickly as they should. So I done the water change and instantly went back to normal al just keep a eye on it. Can any of you recommend I want a beta I see people saying sails are good in the tank with it do any of you no dose this help in anyway with the tank for the fish and when I do water changes would you just change 25 percent and get a sponge they sell at the pet store to clean the sides and get the gravel cleaner to clean the gravel and would you do once a week or is that to much thanks again

you said "sails"... I am assuming this was a typo and you meant to say "snails"? If so, yes you can keep snails with a Beta. When you say "does this help in anyway with the tank and the fish", do you mean does keeping a snail in the tank help with the cleanliness of the tank at all? If so, yes, a snail will help to eat uneaten foot off of the bottom of the tank and will eat Algae, BUT it is important to understand that a snail or even a large number of snails can in no way ensure that your tank water is clean and the surfaces completely algae free. It is your job to make sure the water stays clean and to remove any algae that the snail(s) don't eat. So, frequent water changes, and gravel vacuuming are very important. Everyone seems to have a different idea of what percent of a water change should be preformed and how frequently. I think that this really depends on the stocking of the tank (bioload), how heavily and frequently you feed, whether or not you have live plants in the tank etc.. If your tank is heavily stocked, then obviously more frequent and higher volume water changes would be necessary, same goes for feeding amount/frequency. If you have live plants in the tank which help with the uptake of Nitrates then you might be able to get away with less frequent or smaller volumes of water changes.. But it is important to remember that EVERY tank is different and water changes should be tailored to the needs of the specific tank. I would suggest that you purchase (if you haven't already) API's Master Test Kit which will allow for you to test your tank water pH, Ammonia, Nitrites and Nitrates. Keep a close eye on your levels and always shoot for an Ammonia level of "0", Nitrites level of "0" and a low Nitrate level (< 10-15 ppm for example, even lower is better). And if you see spikes in any of these values above the stated levels then a large water change (~75% or more) would be warranted. I would suggest testing the water frequently in the beginning until you get a feel for your tank. If your values stay where they should be, I would suggest a weekly 25% water change. I would recommend that you vacuum the gravel when ever you perform a water change (or at least every other week). This will really help to keep your water parameters where they should be by removing dead decaying organic matter that releases Ammonia/Nitrites. As far as cleaning the glass, yes you can use a sponge (as long as it has not been previously used for anything) and there are also cleaning tools out there that you can use to scrape algae off of the glass. I hope all of this helps??

thanks for all the help a really appreciate it looking forward now to getting the fish feel like am getting more info every day lol yeh a ment snails was a typo error lol

Tinomcc1888 said:

thanks for all the help a really appreciate it looking forward now to getting the fish feel like am getting more info every day lol yeh a ment snails was a typo error lol

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No problem... Just keep monitoring your Ammonia, Nitrites and Nitrates... and DONT add fish until you see a spike in Nitrates. If you are not seeing any Nitrates, the cycle is likely not complete. When you do see Nitrates, perform a Large (~ 90%) water change, and dechlorinate the water, before adding fish.

Also, I forgot.... I should have added that you should determine what your water hardness (GH) is of your Tap water. Do you know what it is? This will determine what species of fish (along with the pH of your water) you can keep in your tank. If you don't know what it is, you can contact your water provider to find out, or checkout their website.. It is important that you know the actual number (not just that it is hard or soft.. as these are general terms) for the hardness (usually in degrees/dGH or ppm GH). Without knowing the number and units for the hardness just knowing that it is "hard" or "soft" is useless information.

dmpfishlover said:

No problem... Just keep monitoring your Ammonia, Nitrites and Nitrates... and DONT add fish until you see a spike in Nitrates. If you are not seeing any Nitrates, the cycle is likely not complete. When you do see Nitrates, perform a Large (~ 90%) water change, and dechlorinate the water, before adding fish.

Also, I forgot.... I should have added that you should determine what your water hardness (GH) is of your Tap water. Do you know what it is? This will determine what species of fish (along with the pH of your water) you can keep in your tank. If you don't know what it is, you can contact your water provider to find out, or checkout their website.. It is important that you know the actual number (not just that it is hard or soft.. as these are general terms) for the hardness (usually in degrees/dGH or ppm GH). Without knowing the number and units for the hardness just knowing that it is "hard" or "soft" is useless information.

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Am not sure to be onist I will phone the water company tomorrow to be sure and yeh al monitor the ammonia , nitrites and nitrates a don’t want to rush anything al make sure it’s already before anything goes in for sure

Tinomcc1888 said:

Am not sure to be onist I will phone the water company tomorrow to be sure and yeh al monitor the ammonia , nitrites and nitrates a don’t want to rush anything al make sure it’s already before anything goes in for sure

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Sounds good.... If you have a hard time getting information from the water company, or they don't have actual numbers/units to provide to you... there are commercially available testing kits that you can use to test your Tap water's hardness (GH) and Alkalinity (KH). API puts out a test kit for the two combined tests and you can get it on Amazon for under $10 USD.

Yeh av seen these the pet shop near me sells water testing kits I was going to buy one of these the girl in the shop gave me the water treatment and told me they can test water also for me but I think I phone the water company in the morning then al get one of these packs also can’t be to safe as I say I just want it to be a nice safe healthy home for when I get the fish I still got a few days to wait as I set my tank up on Saturday I seen a video someone recommended waiting a week before putting fish in so av got until Saturday at the earliest to get everything done but al get the water done tomorrow definite and someone told me to buy Tetra Safestart Water Conditioner so av ordered that also do you no if this goes in the same time as the fish and is it to make it settle in better just I had never herd of it but the person that told me about it has Aquarian’s and I got them on Facebook so I thought throw there photos of there tanks they seemed they new what there where talking about dose this sound right ?

You can't go by a set number of weeks when it comes to cycling your tank... It takes a different amount of time for every tank is unique... You can not assume that because your tank has been set up for "X" amounts of weeks that it is cycled and ready for fish. The only way you can determine this is by testing your water parameters. I would HIGHLY suggest you check out the thread in this forum on Tank Cycling: "Cycle your Tank" (https://www.fishforums.net/threads/cycling-your-new-fresh-water-tank-read-this-first.421488/) I think you will find it VERY HELPFUL!!! Yes you will need to add a water conditioner to remove chlorine/chloramines from your tap water, and adding a product like API Quick Start or Tetra Safe Start are also a good idea as they contain live cultures of the beneficial bacteria you will want to have your tank to help it cycle.

The majority of Scotland has very soft water but as you may be in one of the few areas which don't have soft water it is worth checking.

Tetra Safe Start is not a conditioner, it is a bacterial starter. You still need to use a conditioner (aka dechlorinator).

None of these bacterial starters work instantly, it still takes some time before there are large enough colonies of the two bacteria.