andyd

I have 3 gold fish in my new 6 gal tank. It has been 13 days so far. I only paid .99 cents for each gold fish so it will not be a big deal if any die. Do you think this is a good cheap way to go through the new tank cycle? The gold fish must be hardy they are eating and doing well. I only feed them once or twice a day what they can eat in a few min. Any comments welcomed.
Andy

platy ben

Welcome to fishlore

I hope you dont intend on keeping the goldfish in there and having that as their permanent home, 3 goldfish would need 40 gallons to be comfortable. This is an ok way to do a cycle i guess but itsl ikely atleast one will die. Most people do a fishless cycle and some people use fish like zebra danios to cycle their tanks.

jgon_

I think you ought to re-evalute why you're going into fishkeeping...

timrellis

Zebra Danios! They are super hardy and will most likely all survive lol! i had to take them all back to the pet store after i was done lol!

Amanda

Most people would not condone using fish to cycle a tank.
It's very cruel & the fish are often in pain from the ammonia present. Please re-think your cycling method & reutrn the goldfish.

agabr123

are the goldies staying in the 6 or are you just using them to cycle and you're going to put something else in there?

agreed on the tank size, the general rule for goldfish is 20 for the first goldie and 10 for each additional. but i have to disagree on using zebra danios. yes they're hardy but that still doesn't mean that they should be subjected to the cycle. regardless of how well they can handle it, they're still being exposed to toxic levels in the tank that ARE damaging them even if it isn't noticeable.

i agree with Amanda, there are a LOT of different options to get you through the cycle without having to subject fish (yes, even 99c feeder goldfish are fish) to toxic levels of ammonia and nitrite. your options are

1. feeding the cycle with fish food, just add a pinch every day and it will break down and release ammonia that you need for the bacteria build up
2. add a piece of raw shrimp, does the same thing as one
3. add pure ammonia (ONLY water and ammonia, nothing else) to the tank daily, anywhere from 3-4ppm
4. use tetra safe start. as far as i know this is the ONLY bacterial supplement that anyone will recommend that actually will allow you to put fish in on the first day and for your tank to cycle in a week. i think it's supposed to work in the sense that the spikes in ammonia and nitrite are so short and so minimized by whatever is in the TSS that it doesn't do any harm to the fish

Iron waffle

Do you have access to an established tank? If so, use some filter media to cycle it. It's way more effective than using fish. If not, ask for a bit at your LFS.

andyd

Thanks! for all your advice. I think I will ck out that Tetra Safe Start right away. The gold fish are small and I plan on transfering them to my pond outside as soon as the water warms up out there.
Andy