Best place to buy rocks?

[CRS]

Good morning/afternoon/evening where ever you are from

So, my pump will be arriving later today i can finally start setting the tank up, i haven't put any water in yet, just wondering the best place in the UK to buy large rocks?
And also what tests/equipment do i need to test that the water is safe and ready for fish?

Thanks for any help,

Craig.

 

[Bruce Leyland-Jones]

Good morning/afternoon/evening where ever you are from

So, my pump will be arriving later today i can finally start setting the tank up, i haven't put any water in yet, just wondering the best place in the UK to buy large rocks?
And also what tests/equipment do i need to test that the water is safe and ready for fish?

Thanks for any help,

Craig.

I've never paid money for something that was freely available.
To be sure, I've had to be careful to pick rocks of the right material, but by keeping my eyes open and by visiting beaches, quarries and the general Great Outdoors, I've been able to find rocks of great (and matching) colour. In the Lake District, for example, slate is readily available and comes in a wide variety of colours, from green, to blue and so on through to purple.

Of course, it should go without saying that each rock gets a thorough washing before use and I'm careful to avoid rocks that would...er...contribute to the water chemistry.
(Avoid limestones, lava/pumice, geodes, marble, rocks with metal ores present).
A good test is to drop some vinegar onto the rock of your choice and see if it fizzes...if it does, it isn't suitable.

 

[Essjay]

And also what tests/equipment do i need to test that the water is safe and ready for fish?

Ammonia and nitrite need to be zero so you definitely need tests for those.
pH is useful.

If you do a fishless cycle, you need ammonia and nitrite testers to monitor the progress of the cycle; and if you do a plant cycle you need the same testers to make sure the plants are removing all the ammonia amde by the fish after you get some.


You don't need a hardness (GH) tester as I see on another thread that you've already found your hardness on your water company's website.

Typical water hardness: Soft
Hardness clarke: 2.73

Not sure what this means, haha!

Degrees Clarke isn't used in fish keeping, so it needs to be converted into the two units which are used.
2.73 deg Clarke = 2.2 dH and 39 ppm.
Not just soft but very soft.

 

[CRS]

I've never paid money for something that was freely available.
To be sure, I've had to be careful to pick rocks of the right material, but by keeping my eyes open and by visiting beaches, quarries and the general Great Outdoors, I've been able to find rocks of great (and matching) colour. In the Lake District, for example, slate is readily available and comes in a wide variety of colours, from green, to blue and so on through to purple.

Of course, it should go without saying that each rock gets a thorough washing before use and I'm careful to avoid rocks that would...er...contribute to the water chemistry.
(Avoid limestones, lava/pumice, geodes, marble, rocks with metal ores present).
A good test is to drop some vinegar onto the rock of your choice and see if it fizzes...if it does, it isn't suitable.

There are some places local to me, i could try there, i thought maybe buying from somewhere would be the safer option, i could always pick some and post on here to see if they're suitable after a good wash

Ammonia and nitrite need to be zero so you definitely need tests for those.
pH is useful.

If you do a fishless cycle, you need ammonia and nitrite testers to monitor the progress of the cycle; and if you do a plant cycle you need the same testers to make sure the plants are removing all the ammonia amde by the fish after you get some.


You don't need a hardness (GH) tester as I see on another thread that you've already found your hardness on your water company's website.

Degrees Clarke isn't used in fish keeping, so it needs to be converted into the two units which are used.
2.73 deg Clarke = 2.2 dH and 39 ppm.
Not just soft but very soft.

Just having a look on Amazon, looking at the destription looks like i would need both of these in this link?

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B08CN2VYQN/?tag=

I'll be doing a fishless cycle, can you put plants in on the same day as filling the tank with water, or is it best to wait?

Thanks for the help, i've still got much to learn

 

[Bruce Leyland-Jones]

There are some places local to me, i could try there, i thought maybe buying from somewhere would be the safer option, i could always pick some and post on here to see if they're suitable after a good wash
I'll be doing a fishless cycle, can you put plants in on the same day as filling the tank with water, or is it best to wait?

To be honest, I can't think of any good reasons NOT to add plants right from the start.

 

[CRS]

To be honest, I can't think of any good reasons NOT to add plants right from the start.

Just getting some stupid questions out of the way

 

[Bruce Leyland-Jones]

Just getting some stupid questions out of the way

 

[Essjay]

@CRS The testers in your link are strips. They don't include ammonia, which you need, and liquid testers are more reliable. Look at this instead - eBay is cheaper than Amazon.

API® | FRESHWATER MASTER TEST KIT

The API FRESHWATER MASTER TEST KIT measures the 4 most important levels in freshwater aquariums quickly and accurately, including pH, high range pH, ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate.

apifishcare.com

There is a good reason for not putting plants in if you intend to do a fishless cycle with ammonia. Many plants can't cope with having a full day's ammonia added in one single dose. If the same amount of ammonia is added in tiny amounts continuously over 24 hours (eg by a tankful of fish) the level never gets high enough to harm plants but adding 3 ppm all at once can kill some plants.

But if you intend a good number of fast growing plants, especially floating plants, you don't need to do a fishless cycle. Put the plants in the tank and take a photo and wait a couple of weeks. Then compare the plants to the photo you took when they were first planted. If the plants are actively growing, it is safe to add the first batch of fish, testing for ammonia and nitrite every day to make sure the plants are taking up all the ammonia. Wait a couple more weeks, then get the next batch of fish, again testing until you are sure both ammonia and nitrite are staying at zero.

 

[Bruce Leyland-Jones]

Some can even do a fishless cycle without having to add ammonia.

 

[Essjay]

Question. Since fishless cycling means adding a source of ammonia, how can you do one without? By source of ammonia, I mean from a bottle of ammonia/ammonium chloride or decomposing fish food/prawns. As far as I'm aware the only other ways of cycling a tank are using fish to create ammonia (fish-in cycling) or using plants to remove the ammonia made by the fish (plant or silent cycling).

 

[Bruce Leyland-Jones]

Question. Since fishless cycling means adding a source of ammonia, how can you do one without? By source of ammonia, I mean from a bottle of ammonia/ammonium chloride or decomposing fish food/prawns. As far as I'm aware the only other ways of cycling a tank are using fish to create ammonia (fish-in cycling) or using plants to remove the ammonia made by the fish (plant or silent cycling).

Perhaps if you read my journal.
Fishless cycling doesn't mean adding a source of ammonia, it means no fish.

 

[Essjay]

The photos in your journal show lots of live plants so you don't need to add ammonia.

When most of us talk about fishless cycling, we mean using ammonia to grow bacteria. If there are live plants, most of us call that plant cycling (or sometimes silent cycling). I would hate a newcomer to read that they don't need to add ammonia for a fishless cycle and assume that means to just leave the tank to run without specifying that plants are needed if ammonia is not used.

 

[Bruce Leyland-Jones]

The photos in your journal show lots of live plants so you don't need to add ammonia.

When most of us talk about fishless cycling, we mean using ammonia to grow bacteria. If there are live plants, most of us call that plant cycling (or sometimes silent cycling). I would hate a newcomer to read that they don't need to add ammonia for a fishless cycle and assume that means to just leave the tank to run without specifying that plants are needed if ammonia is not used.

That 'most' may well relate to this Forum, but I could easily acquire a group of others for whom that 'most' would not apply. Normality is a statistical fiction, and all of that.
In our minds, there is fishless cycling (sans fish) and cycling with fish.
The latter is an anethema, as it usually imposes unnecessary stress on the fish, all for the sake of basic impatience.
The former is preferred and the very idea of cycling a tank with nothing in it just does not compute. Plants are just the norm...and these don't include plastic or silk, so to have to state that plants are necessary for cycling a tank can be easily forgotten.

 

[itiwhetu]

Please just make this cycling thing simple. Fill your tank with water turn everything on, add a whole lot of plant. Once the plant starts growing add a few fish at a time. I can not believe how something so simple has become this huge scientific exercise size of ppm of this and ppm of that. Who really wants to do this, we only want to keep fish in a glass box!!.

 

[itiwhetu]

I'm sorry got side tracked. Just go and pick up some rocks and put them in your tank, you don't need to buy them.