Fishless Cycling

[Daza-Cupcake]

thx

 

[Fisherfield]

Reading for Southeast London tap water:

PH-7.4, Amonia-0.25, Nitrite-0, Nitrate somwhere between 40 and 80.

Looks like someone urinated in my water.

I just started cycling 64L tropical tank, raised amonia to 4.0, the tank has been setup a week ago and inital cloudy water settled it is clear now.

I have a few questions and I would appreciate your help:

1.) PH value for tap water seems a bit high, do I need to take it in account when choosing fish
2.)I have two sponges in my filter - one normal one and one carbon, do I need to replace the carbon one, I read on some forums that carbon should be used in special cases only
3.)64 L does not leave a lot of space for fish, my main concern is to keep the environment as healthy as possible for the occupants, can anyone suggest what kind of fish to stock it with, my initial thought is; 2 tiger barbs and 5 neon tetras.

 

[fluttermoth]

That pH is perfectly acceptable for most trops, but London water is quite hard, so avoid the very soft, acid loving species like most tetras, I'm afraid, although many will adapt.

You would be better off replacing the carbon sponge with a 'normal' one, yes, then you don't have to replace it if you ever have to medicate the tank.

Two tiger barbs would be a very, very bad idea; they're notoriously nippy in smaller shoals and would rip each other apart in no time; they also grow really quite large, too big for a 60l. The neons would be better in softer water, and also prefer more mature tanks.

Perhaps you could look at the smaller rainbowfish, like threadfins or Celebes rainbows; they never look much in shop tanks, but are really gorgeous once you get them home and settled in, and they like harder water.

 

[hornbeam rd]

Hi this will be is my starter set up. Just bought the Boyu/Orca Tl 550, two days ago.

Filled it with water and dechlorinator, still doing the cycle, but the store didn't mention adding ammonia.

Thats the thing, a lot of useless info, one store i've been, would have happly sold a carb fish for a new tank!!!

just after 2 days cycling (criminal) a beginner like me dosent know the process thanks for the help

 

[Fisherfield]

9 days ago I added around 3 ml ammonia into 64 l tank, which raised it to around 4.0ppm. This morning readings are:

ammonia 4.0 ppm
nitrite 0 ppm

Just wandering if everything is going well with the cycling should I have some nitrite reading by now?

 

[Prime Ordeal]

9 days ago I added around 3 ml ammonia into 64 l tank, which raised it to around 40ppm. This morning readings are:ammonia 40 ppmnitrite 0 ppm Just wandering if everything is going well with the cycling should I have some nitrite reading by now?

Ammonia levels that high inhibit the bacteria you're trying to establish. You should have a maximum of 4ppm (1ppm is better though) ammonia not 40ppm! Change your water and redose to that level or you'll never get started.

 

[Fisherfield]

It is my mistake - I meant 4.0 not 40 for ammonia reading. it is actually anywhere between 4 and 8 shade, these are 2 adjacent colours on the chart - but definitely nearer to 4. The ammonia quantity calculation was done with the calculator linked in the first post of this thread (64L tank, 5ppm target, 9.5% ammonia solution = 3.37 ml).

I apologise for the confusion, I would expect however some reading for nitrite after 9 days.

 

[Prime Ordeal]

I would expect however some reading for nitrite after 9 days.

Indeed you would. But there are an awful number of variables when cycling a filter. To speed things up you can raise the tank temperature to 29C, get the pH as close to 8.0 as you can, make sure the tank is very well oxygenated, turn the filter flow to maximum (if you can) etc, etc. Also did you dechlorinate the water you added to the tank? Are you using pure ammonia, i.e. no other additives?

 

[Fisherfield]

I would expect however some reading for nitrite after 9 days.

Indeed you would. But there are an awful number of variables when cycling a filter. To speed things up you can raise the tank temperature to 29C, get the pH as close to 8.0 as you can, make sure the tank is very well oxygenated, turn the filter flow to maximum (if you can) etc, etc. Also did you dechlorinate the water you added to the tank? Are you using pure ammonia, i.e. no other additives?

London water PH is 7.4, it was dechlorinated, the temperature is around 28C, ammonia is from Boots as suggested on this site. maybe 2 or 3 other things could affect it:

-The lid was was mostly down
-I have 1 carbon sponge in my filter, 1 is ordinary sponge
-I added 3 times bacteria culture supplied with the tank kit

 

[Prime Ordeal]

London water PH is 7.4, it was dechlorinated, the temperature is around 28C, ammonia is from Boots as suggested on this site. maybe 2 or 3 other things could affect itThe lid was was mostly down-I have 1 carbon sponge in my filter, 1 is ordinary sponge-I added 3 times bacteria culture supplied with the tank kit

There's no need to have carbon in at this point and it would be better to replace it with a normal sponge. Given that you dosed bacteria you should have seen falling ammonia and rising nitrite in three days so there is something amiss but nothing immediately obvious. However, unless you intend to fully stock the tank after the cycle is complete, I would drop the ammonia dose down to 1 or 2ppm by changing some water (about half to three quarters). You could also dose with bicarbonate of soda to bring the pH up to 8.0 which is closer to optimum for the bacteria.

Having the lid on won't matter as long as you're getting oxygen into the tank by an air stone for example. Otherwise leave the cover off and make sure the filter outflow is pointed at the surface to mix it up and get oxygen into the water. Lack of oxygen might be the most obvious cause of your delay.

 

[Fisherfield]

ok here is my latest update:

Last few weeks ammonia falls to 0 within few hours but nitrite were high all the time. So I decided to do water change. After 2 70% water changes in the last 2 days nitrite were still high off the chart but at least the colour was building slowly. Today nitrites reading was 0.25 for the first time.

So my 2 cents - after getting ammonia reading low for several days do a large water change to bring nitrites down.

 

[Fisherfield]

48 hours stocked with 3 corys + 4 glofish, amonia,nitrite and nitrate checked all reading zero. Long live fishforums.net, it was worth waiting 4 weeks to see happy fish in the tank.

The lady in LFS says that I can have 1 fish per inch of length of my tank,making it 23 fish in all. I did not argue but as far as I remember it was 1 inch of fish per inch of length, those I have now are about 1 inch but both species can grow over 2 inches.

Also are corys happy to scavenge leftover flakes that are not picked by glofish, or do they need dinner of it's own?

Last I would like to thank everyone for help with setting up healthy fishtank.

 

[lucasluke]

1 Inch of fish per inch of length?

That isn't right...

 

[Fisherfield]

You are right,just finished reading this, it is not that simple. Anyway I am happy to keep the population at the current level, but my better half wants another 4 neon tetras.

 

[fluttermoth]

Well; the LFS lady hasn't stated it correctly, but it's a guideline based on surface area; twelve square inches of surface area to one inch of fish. Standard sized tanks are a foot wide, so that gives you an amount of fish 'inches' equal to the length of the tank.

It's a pretty good guideline and one that I use still for advising n00bs.

So you have neons, not glofish? I was wondering about that, bearing in mind glofish are illegal in the UK! How big is your tank?