The Process Begins

[kalihat]

So after much anticipation, I found a used 75 gallon tank, stand and filter for at great prices. I got the tank this weekend, have added the sand and some cool rocks, it's filled and the filter came today and after some confusion, I got it running. It looks great, except that the water is still cloudy, even though we spent forever cleaning the sand. I tested to determine how much ammonia to add, and put in an air tube for extra aeriation.

Tomorrow I'm going to do a big water change and start adding ammonia. It will take so much patience, because i'm so excited to get my fish in there. BUT I will wait untill it is cycled, because I want them to go into a perfectly prepared tank. I'm following the cycling outline I found on here, but any advice is welcomed.

Wish me luck and share any tips/hints!

Thanks all!

 

[pauly]

Good luck I'm about to start in the next couple of days too.

You can get some additives to put in your water and using some extra media in your filter can help with the cloudyness. There are threads on here about it somewhere.

 

[Behold]

Get som media from a fellow fish owner. save you a week or twh and turn up the temp to 88ish.

 

[doresy]

Hi, patience, patience and lots more patience

If you can get some media straight from an established filter it will save you time as said before. Other than that just ammonia but do check it has no cleaning agent in it (give it a shake and any frothing means its not the right stuff) Boots and Homebase

Save your money, other additives not needed and things like 'Cycle' solution are a con

As an indication as to what to expect, ammonia will take anywhere from 10 days to 3 weeks to start processing and producing nitrite. Then to process the nitrite it will take twice as long as the ammonia did

No two set ups are the same, some can completely cycle in 2-3 weeks but up to a couple of months (from scratch) is more common

Please dont cut corners or be tempted to say what the heck and put fish in too early. Your well chosen hobby will get off to the best start if you follow the system and you will feel a great sense of achievment on the day you get a double zero

Stay with us for all the support you'll ever need

 

[SexyFishKeeper]

Yer good look. It does take a while (see my thread) but I guess with patience you'll get there and then can stock away.

Good luck

 

[kalihat]

Hi all,

Thanks for the tips. I've added some mature media from one of my smaller, well established tanks, and after just a few days I'm getting some progress on nitrites. I also did one more water change and added about 10 gallons of water from my established tank (it was water change time for it). I'm good and patient, but my parents keep asking if I can put the fish in yet! I think I'll have to print out the cycling post for them to read

One new question: how often should you do water changes in a cycling tank?

 

[pauly]

How long will a cycle take with mature media in the filter?

 

[Thirdfloor]

Hi all, Thanks for the tips. I've added some mature media from one of my smaller, well established tanks, and after just a few days I'm getting some progress on nitrites. I also did one more water change and added about 10 gallons of water from my established tank (it was water change time for it). I'm good and patient, but my parents keep asking if I can put the fish in yet! I think I'll have to print out the cycling post for them to read One new question: how often should you do water changes in a cycling tank?

You dont' need to do WC's in a tank if there are no fish. At least not until your bacteria colonies are well established and ammonia and nitrites are processing back to 0 in a timely manner. then you need to do a major WC (at least 80%) before you put your fish in to remove the nitrates.

How long will a cycle take with mature media in the filter?

I think it depends on the bacteria, if conditions are ideal, the colony should double every 24 hours. Some will grow slower than others i would imagine.