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update: - did er... 12 buckets @ 9l each, out of total 180l so spot on 60% water change added the dechlorinator and put the plants in that i've had in a bucket for the last 2 weeks [am thinking they will only "eat" the nitrates once they are produced and so should be ok] - SOMEONE WITH...

ok, i'll do a 75% change tonight and re-feed with ammonia afterwards. How "wide" is this spike going to be? I has been a week so far. Regards Simon

hi all, i did all the tests again tonight, and pretty much the same as yesterday. Ammonia @ 0, Nitrites @ pale green :-) and nitrates @ 10; temp @ 28 if i do a 50% water change tonight, wouldn't that remove the "food" for the growing bacteria? i'd rather not disturb the little beggars - they...

i'll make sure we have consistent results over the next couple of days and then maybe have a trip in to Douglas after swimming on Saturday. got my list of garish fish :-) means i can do a big water change friday night, ready for everything if all goes well. Simon

hmmm, thanks MW. i'll run the tests tomorrow evening BEFORE i add the ammonia to take it up to 3ppm. if it HAS gone, back to the wierd pale green, i'll do the nitrates as well as they only registered 10 today but i did do a partial water change a couple of days ago due to some weird manky...

hi all, i think i may have finally completed the cycle, but need to confirm with some knowledgable ones on this forum. for 10 days or so, i've been adding 5ml of ammonia to the 180l tank, to take it from 0ppm to 3ppm. The nitrite test has always gone (and stayed) dark purple. tonights test...

Happy Birthday Mary Poppins!!!!! my daughter refuses to use the MW tag Have a great day!!! thanks for all the advice. Simon & Ruth

thanks MW, M413 et al, i too am [thankfully] at the ammonia dropping to 0 stage and had exactly the same query. 9ml of ammonia in tonight to bring it back up to 5 (mis-read the instructions and will only take it to 4ppm tomorrow). Nitrite goes purple immediately - so as per the instructions...

the "planted tank" setup seems like wet indoor gardening to me, and a bit delicate - i'm already trying to figure out how to vacuum the gravel without uprooting everything - heavily planted tanks must be a nightmare... rocks are the answer... i'll build some caves and put the vegetation around...

congrats martyn. just a quick query (as i have the same tank as you) - how long before the first stage? i.e. the ammonia dropped to 0 i've just finished week 1, with no change in ammonia. regards Simon

how long should i boil the rocks for? I would like to have the rocks boiled and cooling...... and my wife's soup pot back where it should be by the time she gets home from work. Regards Simon

i have gone beach combing with the nipper, and we picked up a selection of rocks...hers, that are the size of your pinky nail (to add to the garish gravel) mine, big chunky colourful rocks with holes so that there are "caves" when the fish get moved back. so assuming that there is all kind of...

thanks MW i'll take out the plants that look "iffy" <OT> I suddenly have the fawlty towers scene in my mind where Basil leaves the hotel with a plastic garden gnome under his arm with the intention of "visiting" his inept builder... going round with some half-dead grot-weed wouldn't have the...

For those on this wonderful forum who are so patient with me, thanks! approx 10 days ago, i put plants in a tank, and after a couple of days started to cycle it. The plants looked ok in the beginning, but one of them looks to all the world like it is dead/dying whereas the others look fine...

just ordered some fry food - as opposed to fried food :-) hopefully they will survive until it arrives. am trying the crushed flakes until that happens. fry now in 2 distinct groups. "happy swimming top of tubbers", and "not swimming but lying on the bottom of tubbers" am assuming that the...

np WD, i lacked subtlety with swimming at school - mainly swam butterfly and so my crawl developed that, almost sine wave, movement - never able to get myself out of the habit of it. the wee one is doggy paddling rather than maintaining a stroke - i'll let pool lessons take over soon :-) on...

the Zebra Danios were in the tank for 2 days...but the plants have been in there since the beginning. in the lfs the plants were in with tanks with fish. The "rescue count" is up to 17, and (to my VERY untrained eyes) look like 2 different species. some of the fry have "dark googly eyes and...

while doing the ammonia test on the tank today, my better half and daughter spotted wriggling things in the cycling tank... it is a leaf!! was poo poo'd and once i focussed on them, i could see they are in fact fry. i am assuming the filter will have sucked up some as there are only 5 that can...

I used to work for a US MNC, and was always amazed by the fact that Americans use [what we call] imperial measures...i thought that was what Boston harbour was all about :-) - rejection of all that is British... lol

ha ha - it starts WELL before that. The adorably innocent "i'm going to marry X when i grow up" and another mum recounting the story of finding a game of "show and tell" going on :-) - how to handle situations like that without scaring either child... it is the downside of only having one...

i'll take all the advice that is going as i get up to speed in this new field :-) I subscribe to the "circle of knowledge" theory, i.e. the level of ignorance (lack of knowledge NOT attitude) is equivalent to the circumference of a small circle when you start out. When you don't know much [the...

Thanks waterdrop & MW my daughter is happily scanning the fish book i bought her (and discussing the options with her zebra's who are on holiday in the little tank) she is accepting the reasoning for the holiday - i just want to make sure i don't screw up my side of the deal :-) I've replaced...

Hi all, the previous set of results were with the Interpet tests. <rant> what a badly put together kit. differing results for repeated tests...oooo makes yer blood boil! </rant> The API testkit arrived via the posty today no-one stocks it on the island, so got the masterkit delivered via ebay...

I am now on day 4 of my cycling, but want to ensure I am giving the bacteria the best possible conditions (and therefore have the shortest possible cycling time) baseline tapwater: Nitrite - 0ppm, Ammonia - 0ppm, Nitrate - 0ppm, Ph - 7 Tank test results: Day 0: - Ammonia - 4ppm, NO2 - 0ppm...

Thanks for the reply Rabbut. I've just taken the bag out - there isn't any id on it - it just looks like a muslin bag. i'll get some more blue filters then - keeps everything neat. i assume that the waterflow pulls the water down from the top (surface) through the filters, back up the pumps...

so just to make sure i've got this (bear with me) take out the carbon filter and the nitrate filter (so the bacteria grow...) put blue filter pads in the space (coarse or fine?) and get some ceramic thingys - i've seen fluval tubes on ebay - should i put them in the foot of a pair of tights to...

i have been reading (a lot) while my cycling goes on (and wait for another amonia test kit) i put the juwel filter together as the instructions said for my rio 180... but have read in various places that the carbon filter at the bottom, should be chucked out and crushed rocks put in its...

did quite a few tests yesterday when putting in the ammonia. 5ml water sample, add 11 drops bottle 1, agitate, add 7 drops bottle 2, agitate, add 7 drops bottle 3 agitate, wait 10 mins. seems to be as foolproof* as it could be. I will see if the local pet shop has a different test kit...

hi all, as per the thread about pink fish for my daughters tank, i am cycling it (with gravel and plants) using kleen off ammonia and an interpet test kit I had to put in twice as much kleen off ammonia as i expected (there is no concentration information on the bottle, but the web based fact...

welcome to my world...pink, light lilac, pinky peach....I always thought nippers in pink was evidence of pushy parents. NOT ONE BIT! as soon as my little one was asked to choose (around 2ish) it was pink every time. denim caused screams. "apparently" girls grow out of it at 10. until I get my...

Again... Miss Wiggle, i am indebted to your knowledge. the Apistogramma aggasizi certainly raised an awed cheer by the little one (especially since Mary Poppins recomended it :-) ), but i can't find any mail order co that stocks it. i'll hunt around the site for recommended mailorder co's

Thanks again for all advice (especially Mrs Wiggle). I am going for a forked strategy ;-) tank now has plants and detritus object d'art on the bottom, and over the weekend had some zebra danio's zipping around while i got a much smaller 9l tank (future use as quarantine/breeding tank) prepped...

will get the plants, ammonia and eye dropper tomorrow. had a talk this evening and agreed that we would need to order the "pretty fish" from the uk and that will take time. meanwhile we'll get the tank perfect for them... i'm hoping the chosing process will take a week in itself if the cycling...

i'll definately push for a couple of hardy fish (the lfs said tetra's would do) - knowledgable recomendations would be appreciated that can survive the rest of the cycling - Curse the LFS! I can't not get some fish tomorrow - she was awarded the school star today.... I'll make sure i'm up early...

Thanks for all the advice. In addition to the starter neon tetra's. Once the cycling is complete i'll go for the list below. It should give me enough time to check the ph requirements for them, and make sure that they are compatible. I think a number of shoals will be easier to manage than too...

ok, here is another go... ...she's only 5 but she did it all herself (including washing the gravel) so don't be cruel :rolleyes:

I tried to upload a picture of the tank so that you can see the colour scheme she has made with the gravel.... i had to attach it to my avatar in the end. hopefully once the plants go in, it'll hide some of the "vibrancy" The list is adding up nicely. I appreciate all the advice so far Simon

hi, <history> just to pad out the topic title, my daughter was promised a fishtank as she did really well at school, and after reading many many posts, i abandoned the biorb and 2 goldfish option, and went for a rio 180 (the mrs had a few "choice" words on that decision...) After my daughter...