Just Realized I Made A Noob Mistake...can It Be Fixed?

[watertown28]

SO I moved the 10 gallon tank down in the basement, now that the stuff has been transferred to the new 30 gallon.

SO I filled it up a few days ago, got the heater up and going with the pump.

I was just running though what all needs to be done with my tanks, and I just realized... I filled up the 10 gallon and did NOT put any chlorine treatment in it! So I pretty much killed my bio-filterer right??? DO I need to re cycle the tank?

 

[Bignose]

I doubt that the entire biofilter is killed. The chlorine levels in the water are designed to kill small numbers of bacteria, not the large culture you should have grown to cycle the tank. Now, the bacteria may also have be dying off slowly from lack of food, but 3 days isn't enough to be worried about there being none left. If possible, put some ammonia in there before adding fish, and test several times over the next hours and days. How the levels change to the added ammonia should tell you a lot about the health of the colony.

 

[KittyKat]

As Bignose said, it is unlikely that the *whole* culture had died off, but between the three days and the chlorine, I would estimate that you have around 10% of the culture still alive (die off from lack of food is estimated at 50% per day). So based purely on food, on day 2, the filter would contain 50% of original bacteria and on day 3, 25% of the original bacteria. On top of that, I estimated a 50% die off due to chlorine.

I do recommend, same as Bignose, that you feed the filter some ammonia to see how much it is processing as in ideal conditions, it would take around 5 days to get the filter back into good condition (since none of us work in ideal conditions, it might take a little longer in practice).

 

[watertown28]

I doubt that the entire biofilter is killed. The chlorine levels in the water are designed to kill small numbers of bacteria, not the large culture you should have grown to cycle the tank. Now, the bacteria may also have be dying off slowly from lack of food, but 3 days isn't enough to be worried about there being none left. If possible, put some ammonia in there before adding fish, and test several times over the next hours and days. How the levels change to the added ammonia should tell you a lot about the health of the colony.

yeah I was planning on doing the fish-less cycle for the 50 gallon tank...went to go buy ammonia and got it home to only find out it has surfactant in it. So I got a good cleaning item and that is all. Im gonna try Ace hardware or something like that to find some ammonia.

BTW can i use fish food ? I know its a mess but I can always vacuume it out once done checking.

 

[KittyKat]

BTW can i use fish food ? I know its a mess but I can always vacuume it out once done checking.

Yes, but it is quite expensive, you cannot control the amount of ammonia going in and it can take days for it to start showing up. Also, you would likely need to do a number of vacuums unless you have a bare-bottom tank for cycling. If you do not use household ammonia, then frozen prawns would probably be a better bet… but I recommend that you just get some household ammonia as it is easier and less messy.

 

[watertown28]

BTW can i use fish food ? I know its a mess but I can always vacuume it out once done checking.

Yes, but it is quite expensive, you cannot control the amount of ammonia going in and it can take days for it to start showing up. Also, you would likely need to do a number of vacuums unless you have a bare-bottom tank for cycling. If you do not use household ammonia, then frozen prawns would probably be a better bet… but I recommend that you just get some household ammonia as it is easier and less messy.

Yeah its finding the ammonia that is going to be the challenge. Though I plan on going to Ocean Dreams Inc there in Oconomowac today so they should have something for me to use.
As for the food... I got this packet of goldfish flakes lol... never gonna have goldfish so I might as well use it.

 

[KittyKat]

Yeah its finding the ammonia that is going to be the challenge. Though I plan on going to Ocean Dreams Inc there in Oconomowac today so they should have something for me to use.

I think I read somewhere that Ace should stock it, you might want to call up beforehand and ask about it.

As for the food... I got this packet of goldfish flakes lol... never gonna have goldfish so I might as well use it.

You should be able to use it for your tropical fish, as long as you feed them a varied diet (which they would benefit from anyway). For example, if you have only tropical and goldfish flakes, you should be able to feed goldfish flakes every third time without a problem. If you are worried about nutritional value, just have a look at what they say on the back, it should be pretty similar. In fact, I would say feeding a mix of tropical and goldfish flakes is better than feeding only tropical flakes because I have never come across a single food that provided good, all round nutrition, which is why I use 5+ different foods at any one time (does not help that I keep getting free samples!).

 

[Bignose]

If you are in the U.S., WalMart ammonia is commonly cited as being free of everything but ammonia.