Newtank

[KatienDavid]

Hi everyone,
We just started up a 40 gallon hex two days ago. I have had fish tanks in the past, it has just been a while so I need some refreshers. Well as of right now, we have all the water in it, the filter running, the heater, the water conditioner, aquarium salt, and something with live bacteria in it. Well hopefully haha. Umm we also added, 5 feeder goldfish. I know it isn't a fishless cycle, but I honestly couldn't remember how to do it, and I looked to late. Well basically what I am saying is does anyone have any advice for us, tips and so on. I would highly appreciate it.

Thanks,
Katie and David

 

[waterdrop]

A 40 Hex sounds like a nice tank

You are not the first to make some "re-beginner" mistakes! I thought my previous years in the hobby would come back and have me doing the right things, but I've since decided this forum has many that are way more experienced than I ever was! I've since switched to following advice from this wonderful forum and participating in the info sharing and I'm sold!

You're not going to need that salt - its not needed and is dangerous for most fish. Keep it on your fishkeepers shelf however as it occasionally comes in handy for a few diseases.

If you can't return or re-home the goldfish (and this would really be best and would be worth working very hard on!) then you will be having to perform what we call a "fish-in" cycle. This will involve very frequent water changes, perhaps daily. It takes about 4 to 6 weeks to perform a fish-in cycle, so you can imagine how tiring the water changes get. By contrast, fishless cycling is a piece of cake - you just squirt some ammonia in the tank each day!

In either case you'll need to perform water tests with a liquid-reagent based test kit. If you are not familiar with these you'll need to ask in the morning (the UKers will be up bright and early, assuming they didn't stay too late in the pubs!)

~~waterdrop~~

 

[OldMan47]

KatienDavid, try looking here as a starting point if you must do a fishy cycle. It's one person's record of doing one. http/www.fishforums.net/content/Tropical...rded-by-Skimpy/
The 40 hex is a very nice tank and I made all the mistakes that you are about to make about 4 years ago. I got back into the hobby, even had a few tanks around, thinking I knew what to do. Once I found the internet forums I started to have better success.

 

[Dave L]

Hi KatienDavid,

I'm just restarting but it may as well be a fresh start given the years that have passed. I've had my tank a few months but I'm just waiting on my cabinet being made so you are ahead here.

This forum is indeed 'the' place to be for all the advice you will ever need and I would Highly recommend you take note of advice offered. You will save yourselves a lot of heart ache.

Definitely consider rehousing the fish you have and go with the fishless cycle advice. I've spent hours reading up on here and it all makes perfect sense. I have followed many threads on new fish keepers success stories which have resulted in this sharing of knowledge and experience.

Good luck with your new venture.

Regards

Dave.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

yup agree with everyone, if you can return the fish to the store (or re-home them to a neightbours pond or something like that) then that's the best course of action.

have a read of the link in my sig 'whats cycling' which will explain some mroe to you.

 

[KatienDavid]

Ok thanks everyone for the advice. I looked at the line with the "fishy cycle" and it looked like a lot of work. So much for doing it the old fashioned way. Anyways I have gave the gold fish new homes in a friends pond. And I siphoned the tank completely out with the python I have and refilled it. I have the filter running. I am going to try a fishless cycle. I will need some help though. Where do you get the ammonia from? And how much do you put in? Ect. If anyone has a link to something that will explain this in a fool proof method I would really appreciate it. Thanks again for all the tips.

Katie

 

[KatienDavid]

Oh We forgot to ask why is the aquarium salt bad to use unless your treating for diseases We thought it improved gill function and added electrolytes to the water.

David and Katie

 

[OldMan47]

The aquarium salt does add electrolytes to the water. Electrolytes are ionic compounds that will conduct electricity in an aqueous solution, like salt water. The value of these particular electrolytes is almost none. There are some diseases that can be treated with salt, which is better than harsher chemicals, so salt does have a use. Aquarium salt is the stuff on the dining room table but without the added iodine.

If you have fish that routinely need salt, aquarium salt is still the wrong stuff. Fish that come from areas where a river goes into the ocean are often adapted to at least survive and some fish will even thrive in what is called brackish water, a mixture of fresh and salt water. The salt they need is sea salt, not aquarium salt. It's the stuff they sell for people who keep salt water aquariums.

Another kind of fish that needs salt is obviously salt water fish. That is another whole subject but they use the salt that matches what is in the ocean, not aquarium salt. There is a lot more to salt water aquariums than adding salt and I only know enough to know that I don't intend to go that route. The water in those tanks and a salt water cycle are complicated compared to what we do with fresh water.

 

[Corleone]

The part about improving gill function is from old methods of maintaining tanks. It does reduce the toxicity of nitrite (which reduces the blood's ability to absorb oxygen - not exactly reducing gill function, but similar net effect), and nitrate (which built up to high levels because of the belief in "old water" leading to exceedingly rare water changes). Now, the cycle process is better understood, so normally nitrite is kept at 0, and nitrate is regularly removed by water changes.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

as for a step by step guide to who to do fishless cycling read the link in my sig 'fishless cycling'

basically you buy pure ammonia, in the UK people often get it from homebase or boots, top up the tank so it reads 5ppm of ammonia, it'll sit at that level doing nothing for at least a few days, you keep testing each day and when the ammonia starts to drop off you top it back up to 5ppm, after a couple of weeks you'll find that it needs topping up nearly every day, at this point your nitrite will start to rise, you just keep adding the ammonia to 5ppm once a day untilt eh nitrite starts to fall, keep going until you get to a point where you add 5ppm of ammonia, test the water 12 hrs later and ammonia and nitrite both read 0. then you do a massive water change and add some fish.

That's it in a nutshell, do read the pinned topic though as there's a few things to watch out for and some things you can do to speed it along.