High nitrites

[leafs]

Only change the water if the fish are stressed or gasping at the top of the tank, hope this helps.

I would strongly disagree with this advice, if you wait for symptoms that your fish are unhealthy you will most likely be changing water far too late to do any good. Ammonia & Nitrite are both very harmful for fish and the levels can raise very rapidly whilst cycling with fish.

As long as there is some Ammonia & Nitrite the tank will cycle just fine. I cycled a tank from scratch with no used filter media or anything and it took a few days short of one month. During this time I did lots of water changes and aimed to keep Ammonia & Nitrite around 0.25 with a max of 0.5ppm. From what I have read this is around the normal time a new tank should take to cycle.

Remember, prevention is better than cure!

When I started out, I used to do two water changes a week, since I was cycling with fish. I know cycling with fish isn't the best for the fish, but I assumed that changing the water more frequently would keep ammonia and nitrite down. If it takes a little longer to cycle, then so be it. I would have to agree with your advise

Thanks..

 

[WILDER]

It's up to the fishkeeper we can only give advice, I was told that if you kept the cycle going on to long that was bad, if you no your fish which is the best advice you no when to do a water change, and always try to get nitrite down to 01.

 

[BobK]

Didn't mean to cause confusion. If your tank cycles slowly, so what. I just wanted you to know it would take longer. I know when I started my 75 gallon I was doing water changes every couple of days (small ones) and I didn't understand why it was taking so long until I talked to someone at the lfs. If you don't mind waiting a little longer then go for it as it is the best for the fish.