what is a cycling tank

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ok everyone talks about how they cycle the tank and stuff but how do you cycle a tank???

 

[Dragonslair]

Hi
There are two ways you can cycle a tank. What every newbie wants to do is to buy a fishtank, loads of fish and decor etc. throw them all together and watch. That is a sure and trusted method of watching...............your fish die.
Once you have bought your tank and are a proud owner of a fishtank, it is natural that you want fish in it right away. Resist that tempetation. Once you have washed and disinfected all your substrate and decoration and filled up your tank. Obviously the disinfectant is an aquarium disinfectant and not household. So you now have your tank setup and your bubbles and heater going and you are watching,WHAT?.....an empty tank.(that may or may not be cloudy) Now dependant on which type of cycling you wish to take up will determine what you do next. I will give you my personal choice. There are no rights or wrongs about the type of cycling you may choose. Test the chemistry of the water with a test kit from your local fish supplier(lfs). Initially buy a kit that will test for ammonia and nitrites. These are the two main killers of fish in a new tank. This is also known as new tank syndrome. Once tested and the ammonia is down to 0 and nitrite to 0 then you can consider introducing a few small fish. (Max. size: Neons and max. 4) Assuming that your filter is working efficiently and that you don't have too much of a bacterial bloom you can leave these fish in the tank, feeding very sparingly. Remember the aim is to have no food sinking to the substrate where it will rot and cause pollution. After 4 weeks or so, and testing regurarly you can introduce a few more fish, maybe a little larger, again only a few. You keep doing this until you reach your tanks max. load. Word of caution here Know your tanks max. load fish/tank ratio. When you do your first water change, don't rinse out your filter media in tapwater. You need the bacteria in the media. That is what you have been cultivating all these weeks. If the media is dirty at this stage, you will need to consider two things. 1) Am I overfeeding. 2) Why is my media so dirty. To initially clean the media, take some of the matured water from your tank into a container and rinse out the media and then discard the dirty water. Never put old dirty water back into the tank. You can then replace the media back into the filter. You can discard some of the media if it is too dirty and replace it with some new. Remember though the new media will need to be "seeded" by the old in order for it to beome effective.
So you see it is not as easy as it may first seem.
I hope I have answered some of your concerns. Happy fishkeeping.

 

[fishyfoo]

hi just one question -i instend on doin as you said and putting small fish in first - but someone else recommended putting in the fish that cleans algae from the tank i dont know its exact name but its usually brown with a longer tail and just generally sucks on the glass tank? would one of those be suitable to put in with a few small fish to start with??

 

[Alien Anna]

hi just one question -i instend on doin as you said and putting small fish in first - but someone else recommended putting in the fish that cleans algae from the tank i dont know its exact name but its usually brown with a longer tail and just generally sucks on the glass tank? would one of those be suitable to put in with a few small fish to start with??

That would be a pleco (aka "Suckermouth catfish"). They can grow to 14" long or more so are really not suitable for most "small" tanks (that is, any tank under about 4'). Dwarf varieties are available, which might eventually be of interest to you, but if you want to cycle with fish (which I'd strongly discourage), plecos are not a good choice.

My suggestion is that you do fishless cycling. Even if you're careful, cycling with fish puts fish in danger and also limits the type of fish you can start with (most people start with danios or black neon tetras, the sort of fish that could withstand a nuclear holocaust). Fishless cycling basically means that instead of ammonia coming from live fish and "feeding" the beneficial bacteria, you add artificial ammonia and grow your beneficial bacteria before any fish comes near it. The bacteria will convert the ammonia into nitrite, and the nitrite into nitrate.

Once you've got ammonia and nitrite levels reading as zero, and nitrate starting to appear in your tank, it's cycled. Then you can add your fish slowly, having had plenty of time to plan what you're going to have and read up on their care.

 

[fishyfoo]

yeah i decided to go for the fishless cycle its been a day so far that it has been set up when do u recommend that i do a water test after about a week??? and do they cost alot of money?? i heard u could just take a water sample into some aquatics and they test it for you??

 

[Alien Anna]

yeah i decided to go for the fishless cycle its been a day so far that it has been set up when do u recommend that i do a water test after about a week??? and do they cost alot of money?? i heard u could just take a water sample into some aquatics and they test it for you??

There's no point testing the water when you've just added ammonia (or urine or fish food or whatever) so waiting a week would seem sensible. You can take a sample to the LFS, but you'd probably find it a lot easier to invest in a couple of home test-kits to start with. Buying them online saves money.

Initially, I'd recommend an ammonia kit, a nitrite kit and some eSHa multi-sticks, which will test for nitrate, nitrite, water hardness (KH and GH) and pH. Make sure the tests are in date and keep them in a cool, dry place. You could take a sample to the LFS as well to double-check your test kits. I recommend an extra nitrite test kit because it's cheaper than using a multi-stick every time and more accurate.

 

[fishyfoo]

have u got an address that sells stuff like test kits online then?? that would be helpful thanks

 

[Alien Anna]

have u got an address that sells stuff like test kits online then?? that would be helpful thanks

Hi, I use Aquarium Supplies myself. They haven't always been perfect but they are very quick to resolve problems and very straight-forward to deal with. There are others, and I'm sure they're just as good, but I tend to stick to what I know.

You can also get bargains on Ebay, the online auction site, but do check with Aquarium Supplies for price first because sometimes people ask silly prices. A lot of test kits on sale are passed their date and once you include shipping, they're not so cheap.

If you buy online, try to get a local buddy to put in a big order with you - it saves on shipping.