Bit Of A Newbie Question

[soybean]

What are you nitrItes, not nitrAtes?

 

[andyg81]

there 0,

 

[Akasha72]

I would cut out food for a couple of days - see if that helps bring the ammonia down. It won't harm the fish to go hungry but ammonia in there will kill them slowly.

Also, I think I read you have another tank? Is it possible to move a few fish into there to give the filter a fighting chance of catching up with the waste? This may mean ammonia and water changed to 2 tanks but I'm wondering if reducing the bio load may keep it down below .50.

Just a thought

 

[andyg81]

not fed the fish for 2 days now with moving them to the big tank etc, I did have a smaller tank but this was sold yesterday to help cover the costs of us buying the new one. we paid about £150 in total for the small tank and stand plus heater etc etc about 4 weeks ago and ive sold it for £100 which went towards the cost of the new one. so this small tank is all clean now waiting to be delivered to its new owner so I dont really want to have to re-fill it and start messing again

I'll just keep going along with water changes and checking on the new big tank

 

[andyg81]

would adding some Anubias on driftwood help at all ? ive been offered some by a fish shop today but im sure ive read somewhere that amonia will increase with plants ?

 

[Akasha72]

okay, sounds like your doing all the right things. I've been in your position and I know it's hard work. In desperation I added some stuff by king British, safe water I think it was called. It's a bottled bacteria, there's a lot of members that will say it's a waste of your money (it cost me about £3.50! hardly expensive) but I found it helped my new filter to get going.

My Dad has recently taken my old tank and filter, added some of the king british stuff and found the filter re-cycled itself straight away - he'd cleaned it and put new sponges in it and it had been sat dry for a good 2-3 weeks. I'm not saying this stuff is wonderful, just that I've found it useful. I thought I'd pass it on.

Good luck with everything

Akasha

 

[andyg81]

I have seen the Safe water product but wasnt sure if it would do any good with reading other comments

just researching to Anubias now to see if its worth adding some or waiting

 

[andyg81]

ive been told by my LFS not to do a water change today as it may be a bacterial bloom thats happening, getting proper confused again because one person says one thing one says another lol

 

[Akasha72]

I can say one thing. You will get much better advice here than you will at any lfs. The people here all keep fish and have been through various problems. We have nothing to lose or to gain in helping you. Go ahead and do your water change, add some safe water when your done and keep checking the parameters. The filter will get there but it's going to take time

 

[andyg81]

thats what I thought, im just going to keep going with it and not rush it while at the same time trying not to lose any more fish.

right im logging off for a while but may be back on later if anyone wants to offer advice etc

thanks again people much appreciated

 

[soybean]

There's no way of rushing this. You are getting normal readings for an uncycled tank: X ammonia, 0 nitrite and nitrate. Eventually you will start to get a reading for nitrite as well. This, and ammonia, will then drop gradually to 0 while nitrate climbs.

Don't just stop feeding your fish, because they're your ammonia source to feed the filter. You still need a scrap of it else it'll never cycle. I do mean a scrap, like 0.2 or something, because don't forget it's a poison. This is another reason you need to be doing the BIG water changes - try about 70% rather than 50%.

Like I said before, you're potentially in this for the long haul - some filters cycle on a couple of weeks, some have taken a couple of months.

I'm very dubious of any filter aids like king British or Cycle, but you can try them if you really want to.

 

[andyg81]

soybean - im following what people are saying, dont want to keep adding fluids to "treat" the water even if it does mean 6 weeks of water change, ill check levels again when I get home and then decide if to do a change now or leave it till tomorrow

 

[andyg81]

just an update - ammonia 0 nitrite and nitrates both 0 upon return from work, so the ammonia level has dropped

not fed the fish for 2 days would anyone recommend a little feed ? and do a water change tomorrow ?

 

[Akasha72]

just give them enough that they will eat in around a minute. That way they have some food in their bellies but you get nothing rotting in your substrate and not too much poo from them later

 

[magpie]

Live plants HELP with ammonia, they don't add to the problem. Plants utilize ammonia and nitrites so in a planted tank (heavily planted) there's rarely an issue with either, you'll only see nitrates, even when you first start up a new tank as long as you just add a few fish at a time. People with heavily planted tanks don't get ammonia spikes (unless something is seriously wrong) because the plants use it up. But to start up a new tank with out ammonia spikes you have to have enough plants and add fish slowly in smaller numbers.

Not sure how much anubias use, but anything would help. Floating plants are great for ammonia, as are fast-growing stem plants. Go to your local fish store and get something you can float if you don't want to plant it - cabomba, pennywort, water sprite, wisteria, frogbit would all work. And it would help settle the fish down. They generally like cover anyway.

Happy to hear things are leveling out for you!