Not enough time for a fishless cycle

[Nelly]

Thank you all for all of your help and advice - it's very gratefully received. We got our aquarium set up today (ready to get fish next week so there will be fish in there while it's cycling but I thought this week would help the plants get a little more established which might help a bit at least), and here's a picture for those who are interested.

All of the decorations and plants were chosen by my son - I was a little worried it would be a bit overcrowded but I'm pretty happy with it (lookswise at least - I think it's been well established that my technical knowledge so far is nigh on zero!). Hopefully we can get keep some happy fish in there next week and they will have long and healthy lives (fingers crossed).

 

[Nelly]

Oh, and sorry about the bad photo, my phone is broken at the moment so it's a photo taken with my laptop which is not ideal!

 

[connorlindeman]

What worked best for me was to set up the tank, dechlorinate the water add a full bottle of good bacteria and put the fish in within 2 hours. Zero deaths

I used
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B002DZNP3E/?tag=ff0d01-20

 

[Colin_T]

You need a picture on the back of the tank to help the fish feel more secure. You can buy them online or form any pet shop and just tape them to the outside on the back.

Did the store take you through cleaning the filter?

I would get some Water Sprite plants to float on the surface and some Ambulia and narrow Vallis to grow along the back.

Have you got 2 different colours of gravel?
Or did the shop sell you a plant substrate/ soil?
If they sold you soil, you might have ammonia problems for a while because most plant substrates release ammonia for 6-12 months and then they stop.

 

[Colin_T]

Oh, and sorry about the bad photo, my phone is broken at the moment so it's a photo taken with my laptop which is not ideal!

I'm about to break my phone too

 

[Nelly]

You need a picture on the back of the tank to help the fish feel more secure. You can buy them online or form any pet shop and just tape them to the outside on the back.

Did the store take you through cleaning the filter?

I would get some Water Sprite plants to float on the surface and some Ambulia and narrow Vallis to grow along the back.

Have you got 2 different colours of gravel?
Or did the shop sell you a plant substrate/ soil?
If they sold you soil, you might have ammonia problems for a while because most plant substrates release ammonia for 6-12 months and then they stop.

No, just one colour of gravel, its just funny lighting in that picture.

Thanks for the tip about the picture for the back, I will get one to put in. And no, I'll check with my husband as I was looking after the boy while they were going through filter related things!

 

[Naughts]

Add floating plants (frog bit, salvinia, dwarf water lettuce, or red root floater...), they use ammonia and fish love the shelter.

 

[Oblio]

And no, I'll check with my husband as I was looking after the boy while they were going through filter related things!

Hopefully, the friendly LFS guy didn't just say:

[Points to replacement cartridges] ... and just replace these once a week ...

It is quite simple to upgrade your filter, at low cost, no modifications, to use re-usable filter media. Folks here will debate sponge vs biomedia and poly batting (that you dispose rather than clean), but they are all better than replaceable cartridges.

 

[Nelly]

We seem to have a sponge and a cartridge in the filter. Should we replace the cartridge with another sponge/similar?

 

[Colin_T]

We seem to have a sponge and a cartridge in the filter. Should we replace the cartridge with another sponge/similar?

yes, remove the cartridges and fill the filter with sponges

 

[itiwhetu]

I got rid of cartridges years ago, all my tanks have had only sponges in them, all those are things are media hype (see what I did there, good pun )

 

[Nelly]

Hi,
So, after setting up our tank for a day or so, the water went cloudy... which on reading some websites, seemed to be normal and the advice seemed to be to leave it alone as it was doing it's thing. Now it is clear again with a layer of... I'm not really sure what to be honest, on the top. Is that normal and doing it's thing or do we need to do something? The plants are looking pretty healthy still!

 

[Colin_T]

Now it is clear again with a layer of... I'm not really sure what to be honest, on the top.

What does it look like?

If there is an oily film on the surface, you can sometimes remove it with a paper towel. Just gently drag a paper towel across the surface. Aerating the water will help break up the oily film too.

You can drain the tank and refill it with dechlorinated water if it gets too cloudy or oily on the surface.

 

[Nelly]

We did put water conditioner in to dechlorinate the water. And it's not really oily, more like everything that was making the water cloudy has just floated to the surface of the water

 

[Lajos_Detari]

Just a suggestion which Colin had also mentioned earlier.

If you want to speed up the cycle (to establish the biofilter), you can get a bottle of live bacteria such as Seachem Stability.
Pour it into your filter.
And follow the instruction on the bottle.

Seachem - Stability

www.seachem.com