New Tank

[sablebeauty]

How do I cycle a tank and what fish are hardy enough to stand the cycling process?

Its going to be a 29 Gallon tank (hopefully will house platies, mollies, guppies, and some tetras).

Please help!

 

[NinjaSmurf]

Pinned article on cycling. That'll tell you everything.

 

[Tempestuousfury]

http/www.fishforums.net/index.php?showtopic=10099

And here is the pinned article.

 

[sablebeauty]

I already read this. I dont want to fishless cycle because my friend tried it and it didnt work, but I wanted to know how to cycle with fish and get it right. Can someone please tell ME word for word what to do and dont tell me to read something 15 pages long. Its easier for me to learn how to do things if you tell me step by step what to do.

 

[Tempestuousfury]

Ok, very well. Here is how I cycled my tanks: I didn't.

The way I see it, if you have a hardy fish in a reasonable size tank, the tank should cycle ok. After bieng in the hobby for well over a year, I do not own a test kit, and have not needed one due to good water maintanence, adequate filtration, adequate circulation, and under/ proper stocking.

Most people start off with a handful of zebra danios or livebearers, since they are relatively hardy.

The thing to do is ot get a test kit and do partial water changes if there are massive spikes in the readings.

 

[sablebeauty]

Do you think I could cycle with Platies in my 29 Gallon tank and how many should I use for the cycling process?

 

[Tempestuousfury]

I'd say a trio (2 females: 1 male) should be fine. I think that the tank is big enough so that they don't build up too much organic wastes.

 

[sablebeauty]

How often should I take the tests and should I just change the water when there is a spike in the readings?

 

[newfishies]

my petco told me that i needed to cycle the tank for 4-6 weeks with a few danios (this was before i discovered this site!). anyways, i did no water changes and in 4-5 weeks brought a sample to them for testing and my tank had cycled. all 4 danios are still alive and kicking and chasing each other all over the tank, despite my clueless beginning to fishkeeping.
i am by no means an expert, but you should have your own test kit for nitrAte, nitrIte and ammonia. if any of these get into an unsafe range, you need to do a partial water change. i don't know what exact readings would be but in general you will have a spike in your ammonia first, then nitrIte, (both of these are stressful to fish) then you should have some nitrAte and the other 2 shoudl go back to 0. having not done any testing on my tank, i can't give you any more specifics than that.
i love my danios (long-finned) and they are pretty hardy (obviously). i think platys are also a fairly hardy fish that you could use to cycle.
hope this helps, maybe some one will be able to be a little more specific about your readings!!

 

[Tempestuousfury]

I can't help you with that, having no experience in the matter.

I would say do away with all that. However, members on this forum would get extremely angry with me. Also, I feel that I was somewhat lucky that I had so few casualties, going about it as I did.

 

[sablebeauty]

Thanks guys! All this really helped. I'll check out some test kits and post more when I get everything started!

 

[accordztech]

my petco told me that i needed to cycle the tank for 4-6 weeks with a few danios (this was before i discovered this site!). anyways, i did no water changes and in 4-5 weeks brought a sample to them for testing and my tank had cycled. all 4 danios are still alive and kicking and chasing each other all over the tank, despite my clueless beginning to fishkeeping.
i am by no means an expert, but you should have your own test kit for nitrAte, nitrIte and ammonia. if any of these get into an unsafe range, you need to do a partial water change. i don't know what exact readings would be but in general you will have a spike in your ammonia first, then nitrIte, (both of these are stressful to fish) then you should have some nitrAte and the other 2 shoudl go back to 0. having not done any testing on my tank, i can't give you any more specifics than that.
i love my danios (long-finned) and they are pretty hardy (obviously). i think platys are also a fairly hardy fish that you could use to cycle.
hope this helps, maybe some one will be able to be a little more specific about your readings!!

i did the same thing as him....i cycled with 4 zebras and never lost one of them....

 

[BobK]

I too have cycled with Danios. They're very hardy. However, I'd test for ammonia, nitrite and nitrate at a minimum of every other day and do partial water changes to keep the ammonia and nitrite levels down. It may take longer but it is much easier on the fish. I think you'd be okay cycling with Platies but they're not as hardy as the Danios.

Does anybody know of a hardier fish than the Danios?

By the way, if you stock with Platies, Mollies and Guppies I don't think you're going to have much room for Tetras. I think you'll find that the livebearers will overstock you tank rather quickly unless you get all male or all female.

 

[sylvia]

I may be too late but - do a fishless cycle - read the link in my signature. The fish may make it through the cycle but their immune systems are weakened for life and there's no real reason to put them through the stress. You don't need to use pure ammonia, fishfood works as well.

Also, don't use a trio of platies to cycle as you'll get fry - that's deffinately something you DON'T want whilst cycling. I cycled my first tank with 5 zebra danios (20 gallon) with water changes every other day for 2 weeks (for ammonia) and then weekly until the slightly less harmful nitrItes also went down. Never expose your fish to high levels of ammonia purposefuly (no water changes for 6 weeks). You wouldn't leave a tank that's cycled for 6 weeks without a water change so obviously doing this to your fish whilst cycling isn't reasonable. Before people get annoyed about my saying this - I know LFSs don't always give good advice so it isn't your fault if you did it otherwise. However, if you research the subject and love your fish, you won't want to put them through that again.

 

[NinjaSmurf]

If you are going to cycle with livebearers, don't get guppies as they are pretty inbred and die easier than the others. Also, if you want tetras, get all male livebearers, if you get all females they'll still have babies. If you don't mind them getting eaten, then no worries, but most people get sorta icky about that...