Oneonion's First Fishless Cycle

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OMG! (as the high school girls seem to always be saying around here) You TOTALLY can't use the same syringe/dropper for the different purposes. Definately yet another thing we may have deemed obvious that we've been leaving out of our beginner paragraphs!

Whenever you're lost you just need to start by getting several sets (perhaps 4 sets of tests 12 hours apart, so two days worth) of tests of everything (ammonia, nitrite(NO2), nitrate(NO3), pH) and post them up here on your log and let the members take a look. If you don't have new syringes/droppers to use then be sure to take them apart and clean each part in tap water, followed by a couple of distilled water rinses. We are measuring things in the *parts per million* here, so even the slightest traces of these substances may show up as a test result - the previous use of a testing syringe for your concentrated ammonia solution would show up as quite a reading or a "messing up" of any of these tests.

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[OneOnion]

Alright, so you're saying that if I give all tests for 2 days you could tell where I am in the cycle? I'll try to do that, thanks. The problem is, I've only got 3 test tubes. x_____x

Oh yeah, and for some reason the AquaClear got unplugged... I don't know how long it was unplugged, but all the water in it evaporated. I probably killed 40-50 percent of the bacteria in the tank. Great.

 

[waterdrop]

O man! what a setback!

OK OO, several things here then. The "Day" data in your log is actually a useful thing to those of us who take a look. The 100 days plus you've got up there (don't delete what you've got, just leave it) is not useful in that form -- so I'd make an entry that the media all dried out and start on "Day 1" again at that point so we can have that number feel better when looking. I -does- appear that some of the A-Bacs have survived as your initial 4ppm since the mishap has dropped some, so hopefully your new fishless cycle will still be much faster.

A Fishless Cycle doesn't need all that much attention but you -do- need to take the time to make a reasonable observation of your tank each day when you test and potentially add ammonia. It should never be the case that you don't verify that your filter and heater are operating correctly and that the temperature is ok. These are the first two things you do prior to drawing water for the tests. You'll also need to keep an eye on the aquaclear to make sure the motor didn't get burned out in the mishap - was it still running with the media dry?

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[OneOnion]

Thanks, I'll do that... I still can't figure out how it got unplugged. And, the motor wasn't running dry, because it just somehow got unplugged. Good thing I still have 2 filters, lol. Just goes to show you, sometimes procrastination is good.

Anyway, I'm thinking of keeping dwarf puffers now. They look pretty cool, and completely freshwater. They like overfiltration, but is having a 15 gallon and a 10 gallon filter running too much? I was thinking since all the bacteria in the AC dried out, it's a good time to switch the 10 gallon filter media into it. Here's how I think it might work...

EDIT: Oh yeah, the tank has its first inhabitant! It's a common pond snail. I was thinking of taking it out, but it adds some... warmth to the otherwise bare tank. Besides, if he survives he'll just be decapitated by the dwarf puffers. I'm thinking of starting my culture of snails soon, so that I'll already have some when I add the dwarf puffers. But, I want ramshorn snails; I want to breed them into the red kind!

 

[OneOnion]

LOL. Well, I decided to give the pond snail its own mini container, so I got a small plastic clear box used for holding candies, about 3.5 inches across, washed it and put some sand in it. Then I carefully planted some microsword and a mini java fern, trying to make it perfect for the little snail. So, everything looked great, with plants, gravel, sand, and light, on a desk next to my bed. So, when I tried to pick up the snail, it got smushed. Wow. Well, I got its carcass and fed it to my betta. Actually, now I don't think it was a good idea because the snail's been living in 4 PPM of ammonia since it was born. I still can't believe how easy it was to kill that snail. I just tapped it and it fell apart.