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Si's Fishless Cycle

The nitrogen cycle has never been so exciting. Why didn't they make us get fish tanks when I did biology :lol:

So, tomorrows results should be 0ppm. therefore I will add 5ppm, and hopefully that will be gone by the next day. So thats stage 1 over and i'll start adding 3ppm and testing for nitrates occaasionally?

Sounds about right to me, nitrates not dropping at all yet? Just peaked so far?

Oh yeah, nitrates :X

They're 5ppm, they'll be on the up won't they? wait..nitrates can't drop. Do you mean nitrites?
 
The nitrogen cycle has never been so exciting. Why didn't they make us get fish tanks when I did biology :lol:

So, tomorrows results should be 0ppm. therefore I will add 5ppm, and hopefully that will be gone by the next day. So thats stage 1 over and i'll start adding 3ppm and testing for nitrates occaasionally?

Sounds about right to me, nitrates not dropping at all yet? Just peaked so far?

Oh yeah, nitrates :X

They're 5ppm, they'll be on the up won't they? wait..nitrates can't drop. Do you mean nitrites?

Ammonia->Nitrites->Nitrates (I always get the to two the wrong way around :))

Not sure what ppm they can be expected to rise to...

p.s. my new tank journal is moving along now
biggrin.gif
 
I’m not sure but nitrites have been a steady 5ppm for a few days. All my tests are on the first post if you didn’t know :p

Your tanks looking cloudy! It’ll be interesting to see what fish you’re gunna get. Will look amazing…

I’ve been out to 3 different stores today! Researching ..haha

One store which is called the green machine near me specialises in aqua scaping and has some amazing tanks, covered in moss, plants..loads and loads of little shrimp everywhere. All looks really clean and healthy too so a good find..

They have bolivian rams which I was looking for! Also electric blue rams which look amazing although I’m not to sure about them for my tank. They also had a large collection of shrimp: amino, crystal red, orange bumble bee, red tail, blue shrimp (wow..), mountain fan(awesome little fan hand things) and black and white shrimp. They were talking about this substrate that they put in the corner on top of sand, and held in with rocks, said it was good for plants and especially their roots. This guy was like an aquascaper at heart so I was just listening. He said he wrote some article in some sort of fish magazine about how basically sand compresses too much for plant roots. They obviously grow though, such as curioisity101’s tank.

Also saw some kribensis at another store, and apparently some albino rams but they were blue and red (and the normal cichlid grey colour) with black patches so not sure what they were. They had blue rams(which weren’t the electric blue ones at the other place..). Oh and gold and blue rams.

Other fish that which I like are

Rummy nose tetra
Cardinal tetra
Penguin tetra
Black widow tetra
Phantom black tetra
Saw some peacock cichlid which I’ve never heard off – too big I imagine

Found striped kuhli loaches which I would love to have..

Sorry for the essay haha.
 
I did know you posted all the readings in the first post, I just always want another test done!
tongue2.gif
I assume every other day is what you're doing now until you get some proper movement of the readings?

Yeah a peacock cichlid gets massive, and will eat everything :) Very cool in a massive tank with other monster fish but IMO you lose out on keeping other smaller interesting fish if you have one. It certainly wouldn't go into your 125 or my 5ft'er long term for that matter.

If you want rams I would go with Bolivians as they like a middle of the road pH and temp which lots of other fish fit into as well...blue rams need a higher temp and lower pH which means your tank would not be able to take on too many types of fish...although discus would go and do look very impressive. I tried keeping blue rams when I first started which I now know was a big mistake, the pair died because the tank although cycled was just too newly setup, plus the pH was too high really.

I am a bit mifted about how cloudy the sand became, I washed it for 2 hours again today before putting it in...it's getting there and I have to wait for the temp to come up yet anyway...almost 20C now, risen 6 degrees in 4 hours
crazy.gif


I'm happy with the colour though, I thought it was a tad too dark but I like it under lighting, it's just more natural than the usual suspects - I want a natural looking tank for sure.

I think I might be moving the fish at around 11pm at this rate...still it wouldn't hurt to wait until tomorrow morning
 
I did know you posted all the readings in the first post, I just always want another test done!
tongue2.gif
I assume every other day is what you're doing now until you get some proper movement of the readings?

Yeah a peacock cichlid gets massive, and will eat everything :) Very cool in a massive tank with other monster fish but IMO you lose out on keeping other smaller interesting fish if you have one. It certainly wouldn't go into your 125 or my 5ft'er long term for that matter.

If you want rams I would go with Bolivians as they like a middle of the road pH and temp which lots of other fish fit into as well...blue rams need a higher temp and lower pH which means your tank would not be able to take on too many types of fish...although discus would go and do look very impressive. I tried keeping blue rams when I first started which I now know was a big mistake, the pair died because the tank although cycled was just too newly setup, plus the pH was too high really.

I am a bit mifted about how cloudy the sand became, I washed it for 2 hours again today before putting it in...it's getting there and I have to wait for the temp to come up yet anyway...almost 20C now, risen 6 degrees in 4 hours
crazy.gif


I'm happy with the colour though, I thought it was a tad too dark but I like it under lighting, it's just more natural than the usual suspects - I want a natural looking tank for sure.

I think I might be moving the fish at around 11pm at this rate...still it wouldn't hurt to wait until tomorrow morning

my tank took ages to heat up too. Natural is the best :D

Every day for ammonia and nitrite, I don't see the point in every day for nitrate so yeah every few days :nod: atleast at the mo.

I love discus fish, I will probably get some when i'm older but I'd need a taller tank and + they're one of the hardest to look after pH wise atleast so not the best for beginners. I was looking at discus today and a few of them turned and look towards me :lol:

I will probably add the cichlids last because all the fish and things I want will probably start as babies and I've read rams will eat small shrimp... so if i spend money on some nice looking shrimp I dont want them being eaten!

Lots more research to do.

I didn't realise plants were so expensive, most are like 10 pound in the green machine place. (thegreenmachine)

edit: I was also wondering about lowering pH. Waterdrop says ~ less than 6.2 will stop the cycling process, so how do discus and similar tanks cycle so well?
 
edit: I was also wondering about lowering pH. Waterdrop says ~ less than 6.2 will stop the cycling process, so how do discus and similar tanks cycle so well?

I think they must use bicarb for the cycle if their natural pH is low, but I would imagine that the natural pH is around 7 and a bit and that to have the discus after cycling the tank they will use peat slugs or other things that lower the pH.

The chances are though that most discus keepers have been in the hobby for some time and have mature media to use so cycling really isn't an issue for them

A good rule of thumb is to add least aggressive fish first so as more bossy fish are added the others just adjust and the new fish gets what he/she wants and therefore doesn't get into a fight or too hopefully, but it really only relates to Cichlids mainly. But then you are doing a fish-less cycle so there is no reason to not add most of the fish you want right away once the cycle is done - especially if you're only going to have one species of Cichlid in there...

On the shrimp front I have had cherry and amano and I have none left as of today for sure. I had one large male amano (thought I had) but I couldn't find him on the transfer today, he must have been full size but someone ate him anyway...I will not be bothering with shrimp anymore. Instead I am moving on to snails to help with the sand etc. I am thinking of getting some Malaysian Trumpet Snails (MTS) which I should be able to pick up on these forums for postage only, they'll bury into the sand and keep it well sifted/moved about. I'll probably then add some Assassin snails after a while to keep the MTS population under control...the MTS population will be a good indicator of over feeding though :)
 
edit: I was also wondering about lowering pH. Waterdrop says ~ less than 6.2 will stop the cycling process, so how do discus and similar tanks cycle so well?

I think they must use bicarb for the cycle if their natural pH is low, but I would imagine that the natural pH is around 7 and a bit and that to have the discus after cycling the tank they will use peat slugs or other things that lower the pH.

The chances are though that most discus keepers have been in the hobby for some time and have mature media to use so cycling really isn't an issue for them

A good rule of thumb is to add least aggressive fish first so as more bossy fish are added the others just adjust and the new fish gets what he/she wants and therefore doesn't get into a fight or too hopefully, but it really only relates to Cichlids mainly. But then you are doing a fish-less cycle so there is no reason to not add most of the fish you want right away once the cycle is done - especially if you're only going to have one species of Cichlid in there...

On the shrimp front I have had cherry and amano and I have none left as of today for sure. I had one large male amano (thought I had) but I couldn't find him on the transfer today, he must have been full size but someone ate him anyway...I will not be bothering with shrimp anymore. Instead I am moving on to snails to help with the sand etc. I am thinking of getting some Malaysian Trumpet Snails (MTS) which I should be able to pick up on these forums for postage only, they'll bury into the sand and keep it well sifted/moved about. I'll probably then add some Assassin snails after a while to keep the MTS population under control...the MTS population will be a good indicator of over feeding though :)

They ate a full sized shrimp :crazy: Dwarfs couldn't eat full sized ones but the baby shrimp are so tiny.... :-(

I just figured, most of the stuff the LFS's are young so they need to grow a bit so that the rams wouldn't eat them.. but yeah..i'll see what I want to get.
 
Fantastic! A picture speaks a thousand words and all that...

You've got to admit it will be really useful not just for you but for anyone doing a fish-less wanting to know what to roughly expect
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I hope so, I've certainly found this blog very useful and think it'd be worth the read for beginners.

If I wanted a pH of 6-6.5, throughout the last stabilisation week, would I introduce peat slugs? and the bogwood then?

That would allow the tank to cycle with the new pH?

Or would I have to acclimatize them from neutral to a lower pH?
 
The subject of our autotrophic bacterial species stalling or stopping their cycling process at low pH is a somewhat complicated one in reality. The simple story for the average beginner carrying out a fishless cycle is that as the natural cycling process eats up the buffer and drops the pH to 6.2, the cycle will stall and at 6.0 we will often find it totally stopped. Its then important to take a major action like a huge water change and/or the addition of bicarb to replenish the buffer. That's the simple story.

The truth is probably more complicated than we know but we do know some of it. I believe what is really happening is that the bacteria are responding to some extent to the "rapidity" of the pH drop. They may have some sort of shock response to rapid drops in pH. Once the pH has been low for a long time, the bacteria can still apparently come back and acclimate to it and begin working. Tanks that have very low pH for Amazonian biotopes can still have nice working biofilters I believe.

In practice, what often happens is that tanks where people are putting together amazonian fish like neons/card, angels and the like will also heavily plant the tank and the if the plants are successful, they will play a significant role in biofiltration. The plants and the autotrophic bacteria will compete for ammonia and ideally the tank will come in to a balance where the plants are healthy, the bacterial colonies are somewhat reduced as compared to a non-planted tank and the water is pristine and the fish quite happy!

~~waterdrop~~
 
The subject of our autotrophic bacterial species stalling or stopping their cycling process at low pH is a somewhat complicated one in reality. The simple story for the average beginner carrying out a fishless cycle is that as the natural cycling process eats up the buffer and drops the pH to 6.2, the cycle will stall and at 6.0 we will often find it totally stopped. Its then important to take a major action like a huge water change and/or the addition of bicarb to replenish the buffer. That's the simple story.

The truth is probably more complicated than we know but we do know some of it. I believe what is really happening is that the bacteria are responding to some extent to the "rapidity" of the pH drop. They may have some sort of shock response to rapid drops in pH. Once the pH has been low for a long time, the bacteria can still apparently come back and acclimate to it and begin working. Tanks that have very low pH for Amazonian biotopes can still have nice working biofilters I believe.

In practice, what often happens is that tanks where people are putting together amazonian fish like neons/card, angels and the like will also heavily plant the tank and the if the plants are successful, they will play a significant role in biofiltration. The plants and the autotrophic bacteria will compete for ammonia and ideally the tank will come in to a balance where the plants are healthy, the bacterial colonies are somewhat reduced as compared to a non-planted tank and the water is pristine and the fish quite happy!

~~waterdrop~~

I see... Normally you'd put all the plants and fish in the same day right?

But seeing as that its likely i'm going to keep rams, what approach would you recommend? Do you think it would be better to alter the pH before hand and add plants whilst still adding ammonia?
 
I say my nitrites are 5 but I have no idea what they are tonight, I've tested them twice now and the closest colour they are too is 0.5ppm! Maybe they're off the scale? any input from anyone on this stage of my cycle?

I've added 3ppm.

edit:

I'm doing this stage right? It's still just one test every 24 hours with an addition of 3ppm ammonia?

I take it its the 3rd stage where your testing every 12 hours to ensure the ammonia disappears within 12? but you won't add any until the 24th hour?
 
I counted days in your first post and from that am going to guess you are on "Day 19" of your fishless cycle (Posting a single line per test battery and logging a "Day #" of fishless cycling is more useful as a first piece of data for us to look at. (Part of judging a fishless cycle is seeing how many days its been going and seeing how many days the various spikes are taking etc.)

You have clearly started your nitrite(NO2) spike but its not so clear whether it will last long or start coming down soon. I agree with the idea of dosing only about 3ppm during the nitrite spike phase, but then easing it back up to 5ppm once the nitrite spike is clearly ending. I agree that two sets of tests a day is not usually worth much during the nitrite spike but become much more valuable in the third phase. Nitrate and pH are valuable during the spike as you want to watch for crashes. Often this is when a cycle will begin making enough nitric acid to use up all the buffer.

When interpreting the API nitrite(NO2) test be sure you conduct the test in a well-lighted situation. Observe the look of the reagent drops as they first fall through the test water in the test tube. If they are vivid aqua, its likely your test will turn out zero or low NO2. If they are shiny/vivid purple or have a weird green on purple sheen then its likely the test won't be able to handle the high level of nitrite (they are truly off the chart) and after the required 5 min, the result will turn a weird greenish or grayish (if you missed the first part and see that it too means "off the chart.)

In all cases you should only ever add ammonia at your 24-hour test time (your "add-hour" as we like to call it) and only if ammonia dropped to zero (or was really close to zero yesterday and looks the same today) within the last 24 hours. Once you start testing at the 12-hour time, you may often see zero ppm ammonia but you still won't do the re-dose of ammonia until the "add-hour." Its also really helpful to be good and regular about your testing and adding times as this helps the multi-day data to be more regular and meaningful. But of course, any person with a life that lets them be out and about with plans will have a hard time of this off and on, so that's just life!

The timing of when plants go in relative to the end of the fishless cycle is not nearly so important as when fish go in. The fish need to come on it fairly soon after the ammonia dosing stops so that the bacteria can be fed (there's actually a wee bit more flexibility than some beginners think, in that if you do a 90% water change and get the nitrates(NO3) out, you could still dose ammonia once or twice more if you couldn't get fish because that much ammonia won't produce all that much nitrate and by now the filter is of course dropping ammonia and nitrite down to zero within 12 hours (because you wouldn't be considering the big water change unless the filter had "qualified.")

The plants on the other hand can be more flexible. Its nice to keep them out of the fishless cycle so that they won't get algae on the leaves and so they won't get ammonia burn (if indeed there is such a thing and your species has trouble with it - there have been some reports that some plants don't like high ammonia) but both those things are really things that would just happen over the long haul of the fishless cycle. Putting plants in a week or two early wouldn't be likely to cause them to suffer those things I don't think. Plants could also go in at any time later after the fish have been introduced. In fact, if you are going to depend on the fish waste to fertilize the plants you'd want some to build up. One down side of waiting on the plants may be that the fish won't have the "cover" they need to feel less stressed at their introduction and early period after stocking. So, in some ways, choosing a fertilizer dosing method and beginning it and introducing the plants a bit early might be more ideal if that works out.

~~waterdrop~~
 
I counted days in your first post and from that am going to guess you are on "Day 19" of your fishless cycle (Posting a single line per test battery and logging a "Day #" of fishless cycling is more useful as a first piece of data for us to look at. (Part of judging a fishless cycle is seeing how many days its been going and seeing how many days the various spikes are taking etc.)

You have clearly started your nitrite(NO2) spike but its not so clear whether it will last long or start coming down soon. I agree with the idea of dosing only about 3ppm during the nitrite spike phase, but then easing it back up to 5ppm once the nitrite spike is clearly ending. I agree that two sets of tests a day is not usually worth much during the nitrite spike but become much more valuable in the third phase. Nitrate and pH are valuable during the spike as you want to watch for crashes. Often this is when a cycle will begin making enough nitric acid to use up all the buffer.

When interpreting the API nitrite(NO2) test be sure you conduct the test in a well-lighted situation. Observe the look of the reagent drops as they first fall through the test water in the test tube. If they are vivid aqua, its likely your test will turn out zero or low NO2. If they are shiny/vivid purple or have a weird green on purple sheen then its likely the test won't be able to handle the high level of nitrite (they are truly off the chart) and after the required 5 min, the result will turn a weird greenish or grayish (if you missed the first part and see that it too means "off the chart.)

In all cases you should only ever add ammonia at your 24-hour test time (your "add-hour" as we like to call it) and only if ammonia dropped to zero (or was really close to zero yesterday and looks the same today) within the last 24 hours. Once you start testing at the 12-hour time, you may often see zero ppm ammonia but you still won't do the re-dose of ammonia until the "add-hour." Its also really helpful to be good and regular about your testing and adding times as this helps the multi-day data to be more regular and meaningful. But of course, any person with a life that lets them be out and about with plans will have a hard time of this off and on, so that's just life!

The timing of when plants go in relative to the end of the fishless cycle is not nearly so important as when fish go in. The fish need to come on it fairly soon after the ammonia dosing stops so that the bacteria can be fed (there's actually a wee bit more flexibility than some beginners think, in that if you do a 90% water change and get the nitrates(NO3) out, you could still dose ammonia once or twice more if you couldn't get fish because that much ammonia won't produce all that much nitrate and by now the filter is of course dropping ammonia and nitrite down to zero within 12 hours (because you wouldn't be considering the big water change unless the filter had "qualified.")

The plants on the other hand can be more flexible. Its nice to keep them out of the fishless cycle so that they won't get algae on the leaves and so they won't get ammonia burn (if indeed there is such a thing and your species has trouble with it - there have been some reports that some plants don't like high ammonia) but both those things are really things that would just happen over the long haul of the fishless cycle. Putting plants in a week or two early wouldn't be likely to cause them to suffer those things I don't think. Plants could also go in at any time later after the fish have been introduced. In fact, if you are going to depend on the fish waste to fertilize the plants you'd want some to build up. One down side of waiting on the plants may be that the fish won't have the "cover" they need to feel less stressed at their introduction and early period after stocking. So, in some ways, choosing a fertilizer dosing method and beginning it and introducing the plants a bit early might be more ideal if that works out.

~~waterdrop~~

Ok - will edit the days

I'm a bit confused about my nitrites, I think they're above 5 but i've added 3ppm of ammonia as it was 0 anyway. Will be sure to check that next time thank you

The planting will be easy now, the LFS near me has everything i need, just sorting out the required conditions for the fish seem the difficult part.

cheers for the help once again :)
 

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