B13:: the best thing you can do it forget little bottles 'potions' and grab some of my filter media as this is much better and cheaper. you will probably need to be doing regualr daily 25% water changes or 50% every other day.
Newbie Needing Help And Advice Please!
- Thread starter B13
- Start date
OP
OP
B13
Fish Crazy
OK... here we go:
Today's feet-soaking-50%-water-change-and-a-coffee went as follows:
Day 1
Pre-water change:
07:00am
pH - 7.5
Ammonia - 0.1
Nitrite - 2.0
Nitrate - 35-ish
50% water change carried out:
08:00am
pH - 7.5
Ammonia - 0.1
Nitrite - 0.5
Nitrate - 35-ish
(The Nitrate results are a bit of a guestimate because the result falls between two colour bands on the chart - that are numerically quite far apart. Bear in mind I'm still using the Pond Master test kit...)
...and as a 'control', I did a test on my tap water:
pH - 7.5
Ammonia - 0.1
Nitrite - somewhere between 0 and 0.1
Nitrate - 25
So there is an improvement, but it's small. I can't do a water change tomorrow because I'm working Silly Hours again, but I can do one on Sunday. Again, I'll post up the results.
Had heaps of fun doing the tests tho' coz my ever-nosey gang of Danios were trying to get into the phials as I'm trying to get the tank water samples. "Guys? This isn't helping!!" and instead of getting out the way as I was pouring in the new water, they were swimming into the water stream and getting blasted. My Danios crack me up!!
..and a Coolie Loach was making a determined bid to be sucked up the water siphon. Must be a relative of the one who decided to investigate the inner workings of the pump...
I also put the carbon filter foam back in my filter, didn't bother with the White Spot meds and slung in some StressZyme and Safe Start for no reason other than "it's there, I might as well use it"
*nods*
Agreed.
It's just a bugger that I'm working both Saturday and Sunday this week... Oorgh...
Today's feet-soaking-50%-water-change-and-a-coffee went as follows:
Day 1
Pre-water change:
07:00am
pH - 7.5
Ammonia - 0.1
Nitrite - 2.0
Nitrate - 35-ish
50% water change carried out:
08:00am
pH - 7.5
Ammonia - 0.1
Nitrite - 0.5
Nitrate - 35-ish
(The Nitrate results are a bit of a guestimate because the result falls between two colour bands on the chart - that are numerically quite far apart. Bear in mind I'm still using the Pond Master test kit...)
...and as a 'control', I did a test on my tap water:
pH - 7.5
Ammonia - 0.1
Nitrite - somewhere between 0 and 0.1
Nitrate - 25
So there is an improvement, but it's small. I can't do a water change tomorrow because I'm working Silly Hours again, but I can do one on Sunday. Again, I'll post up the results.
Had heaps of fun doing the tests tho' coz my ever-nosey gang of Danios were trying to get into the phials as I'm trying to get the tank water samples. "Guys? This isn't helping!!" and instead of getting out the way as I was pouring in the new water, they were swimming into the water stream and getting blasted. My Danios crack me up!!
..and a Coolie Loach was making a determined bid to be sucked up the water siphon. Must be a relative of the one who decided to investigate the inner workings of the pump...
I also put the carbon filter foam back in my filter, didn't bother with the White Spot meds and slung in some StressZyme and Safe Start for no reason other than "it's there, I might as well use it"
*nods*
Agreed.
It's just a bugger that I'm working both Saturday and Sunday this week... Oorgh...
Miss Wiggle
Practically perfect in every way
sounds like you're doing everything right now, just keep up as many water changes as poss. if you can then keep ammonia and nitrite under 0.25ppm
but i do understand what having a hectic job and not being around all the time is like so you do have my sympathy.
but i do understand what having a hectic job and not being around all the time is like so you do have my sympathy.
waterdrop
Enthusiastic "Re-Beginner"
Yeah, the hobbyists having to work horrible hours should all hire the hobbyists who are between jobs to come 'round and do water changes for them! 
Is your tap water really testing 25 on nitrates?? That's terrible, has anyone ever seen 25 come out of the tap before?
Anyway, enjoyed your danio circus description. My danios are exactly the same, just a wild bunch of trouble during water change time - they are always getting up in the gravel cleaner tube and the love the rushing stream when refilling. They are great fun and so entertaining you have to forgive them for all they trouble they cause.
B13, I assume you've seen the various hose devices they have nowadays that can make water changes less messy? There are lots of threads discussing Pythons and that type thing.
~~waterdrop~~
Is your tap water really testing 25 on nitrates?? That's terrible, has anyone ever seen 25 come out of the tap before?
Anyway, enjoyed your danio circus description. My danios are exactly the same, just a wild bunch of trouble during water change time - they are always getting up in the gravel cleaner tube and the love the rushing stream when refilling. They are great fun and so entertaining you have to forgive them for all they trouble they cause.
B13, I assume you've seen the various hose devices they have nowadays that can make water changes less messy? There are lots of threads discussing Pythons and that type thing.
~~waterdrop~~
Miss Wiggle
Practically perfect in every way
yeah in London they regularly get 40ppm of nitrate from the tap.
Was just about to say I get about 40ppm NitrAte from the taps. As such it can be quite amusing (in a sadistic way), when people say that they are going to have to do a water change because they are at 20ppm... The LOWEST I can EVER get mine (without resorting to RO) is 40ppm. But I guess thats where the whole 'trend' rather than absolute values being important comes into play
B13, I just read through your latest post and think you may have a misunderstanding. It is perfectly OK to "get your feet wet" several times in the same day. The only real concern would be to wait an hour or so in between so you can test the water and see how you are doing. When I have gotten myself into trouble, it happens to all of us, I have changed 50% of my water 4 times in a single evening to keep things under control. It is a bit of work but can make all the difference to your fish. If you expect to need to skip a day of water changes, it is even more important to start with the best water quality that you can manage.
OP
OP
B13
Fish Crazy
Yeah, the hobbyists having to work horrible hours should all hire the hobbyists who are between jobs to come 'round and do water changes for them!
I'd gladly give 'em all the tea and cake they can eat and drink at the mo!!
Yeah... That surprised the hell out of me too!!
BLIMEY!!! I'm glad I don't live in London any more! Is there anything that can be done about that?
*grins*
Getting the water to siphon out of the tank ain't a problem coz the tank is higher than the bucket on the floor.
To get new water in I'll either have to defy both the laws of physics and gravity coz I can't get the bucket higher than the tank, ...or use a very large jug.
And bearing in mind that I have an attention span that tends to wander off and go look at shiney things, I generally end up soaked.
And going on from what OldMan47 said, the only thing I worry about with doing more water changes at the mo is a. I haven't got a lot (if any...) 'good' bacteria in my tank at the mo, so wouldn't doing even more water changes on the same day totally wipe out the bacteria that I do have? And also, the water in my tap is FREEZING!!! Even if I let it run for a while. The temperature dropped from a nice cozy 25ºC to 20ºC when I changed the water yesterday - surely any colder would be bad news for the fish?
(I swear, when I've got my tank up-and-running, and a bit (lot...) more experience under my belt, I'm gonna write a book called 'Newbie Fish Keeping for Dummies ...and what they DON'T Tell You in The Shops")
Miss Wiggle
Practically perfect in every way
just use a hose pipe hun, you can add dechlor straight to the tank and then run water back in with a hose pipe straight from the tap 
i'm quite short and have quite a tall tank as well...... had to learn these tricks!
i'm quite short and have quite a tall tank as well...... had to learn these tricks!
waterdrop
Enthusiastic "Re-Beginner"
With Fish-In cycling you never worry about how many bacteria are in the water. The bacteria you care about are already attached to media in the filter. Even when you take out most of the water in a large water change there will still be plenty of bacteria to keep adding to the growing colonies and most of the growth will come from cell division of other bacteria right there in the filter. The advice is correct - you can do another water change as soon as an hour after the previous one if either of ammonia or nitrite has not been lowered to between zero ppm and 0.25ppm and getting those stats and maintaining them is your most important goal.
OK, let's get more detailed about the refilling of water bit: (I'm well known for belaboring things )
(In all cases you add conditioner to the tank when you add tap water directly to the tank.)
1) You can hook up a garden hose, run it into the room and fill the tank directly. This works well if you've got a really large tank and the percentage is not that great, as its actually unlikely to lower the tank temp more than 2 degrees anyway and besides the fish like it.
2) You can hook up a garden hose to a utility sink that has a garden-hose type faucet and do the same thing. Same problem of too cold may apply here too if its not a mixing tap.
3) You can put an adaptor on a non-mixing sink/tub faucet, still same scenerio.
4) You can put an adaptor on a temperature mixing sink/tub faucet. Depending on the type of faucet you may be able to adjust the temp beforehand. Put a large cup of tank water on the sink and alternate your hand between that and the running water and match it, leave the modern faucet at that temp position, attach long clear siphon hose to the adapter, make sure the other end it captured and stable in the tank and turn on the water gently, check its ok at the tank, go back and turn up the force, go back and watch it fill the tank quickly, go back and turn it off before it runs over! When I do this I dump about half the dechlor amount in beforehand, half near the end of the fill or afterwards.
5) If your mixing tap is not modern, you will have to run the hot beforehand, making sure hot is really coming out, then turn it off, hook up the hose to the adapter, start running it into the tank and adjust the temp by running back and forth from the tank a couple times. In all cases temp matching only needs to be rough and probably best to be slightly cooler than the tank water rather than hotter.
Does this make sense? Buckets above the tank level are not necessary, although that's fine if that's what you want to do or its easier. On big tanks you can sometimes put a big board across the corner of the tank to support the bucket but you should always judge that you are not straining the tank or in danger of it falling.
Also a technical note: I am describing this for typical beginner communities of common tropicals. There are hobbyists with delicate fish and hobbyists with time and the desire to carefully pre-condition and thermometer match their bucket water and this is bound to be more ideal, so its fair that I make you aware of that. On the other hand I thing the majority of fishkeepers here do the quicker type things I've described above and many very experienced hobbyists just hosepipe cold water in there full force! For beginners who still have under-six-month-old filters, I feel rough skin temperature matching makes sense.
Whew!
~~waterdrop~~
OK, let's get more detailed about the refilling of water bit: (I'm well known for belaboring things
)(In all cases you add conditioner to the tank when you add tap water directly to the tank.)
1) You can hook up a garden hose, run it into the room and fill the tank directly. This works well if you've got a really large tank and the percentage is not that great, as its actually unlikely to lower the tank temp more than 2 degrees anyway and besides the fish like it.
2) You can hook up a garden hose to a utility sink that has a garden-hose type faucet and do the same thing. Same problem of too cold may apply here too if its not a mixing tap.
3) You can put an adaptor on a non-mixing sink/tub faucet, still same scenerio.
4) You can put an adaptor on a temperature mixing sink/tub faucet. Depending on the type of faucet you may be able to adjust the temp beforehand. Put a large cup of tank water on the sink and alternate your hand between that and the running water and match it, leave the modern faucet at that temp position, attach long clear siphon hose to the adapter, make sure the other end it captured and stable in the tank and turn on the water gently, check its ok at the tank, go back and turn up the force, go back and watch it fill the tank quickly, go back and turn it off before it runs over! When I do this I dump about half the dechlor amount in beforehand, half near the end of the fill or afterwards.
5) If your mixing tap is not modern, you will have to run the hot beforehand, making sure hot is really coming out, then turn it off, hook up the hose to the adapter, start running it into the tank and adjust the temp by running back and forth from the tank a couple times. In all cases temp matching only needs to be rough and probably best to be slightly cooler than the tank water rather than hotter.
Does this make sense? Buckets above the tank level are not necessary, although that's fine if that's what you want to do or its easier. On big tanks you can sometimes put a big board across the corner of the tank to support the bucket but you should always judge that you are not straining the tank or in danger of it falling.
Also a technical note: I am describing this for typical beginner communities of common tropicals. There are hobbyists with delicate fish and hobbyists with time and the desire to carefully pre-condition and thermometer match their bucket water and this is bound to be more ideal, so its fair that I make you aware of that. On the other hand I thing the majority of fishkeepers here do the quicker type things I've described above and many very experienced hobbyists just hosepipe cold water in there full force! For beginners who still have under-six-month-old filters, I feel rough skin temperature matching makes sense.
Whew!
~~waterdrop~~
OP
OP
B13
Fish Crazy
Dang!!
Just as I was about to order a pair of these:
...someone gives a sensible solution!!
You and me both! I'm the kind of gal who persues things to it's total and utter illogical conclusion! (Often at length...)
Just as I was about to order a pair of these:
...someone gives a sensible solution!!
(I'm well known for belaboring things
You and me both! I'm the kind of gal who persues things to it's total and utter illogical conclusion! (Often at length...)
waterdrop
Enthusiastic "Re-Beginner"
Miss Wiggle
Practically perfect in every way
ah order the snazzy wellies anyway...... always room for another pair of shoes. (that's one of my other loves along with fishkeeping, formula one and sewing/dressmaking)
(that's one of my other loves along with fishkeeping, formula one and sewing/dressmaking) waterdrop
Enthusiastic "Re-Beginner"
(we're still trying to find out what she doesn't do )
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