Ormarr

I'm currently cycling my first tank with some gold fish (added them after having the tank setup for about 5 days). How often should I do 30% or so water changes in a tank cycling with fish in it?

Thanks!

Luniyn

With Goldfish, more often then other tropical fish. They are about 3 times as messy as other tropical fish and all that extra waste will make a lot more ammonia. However, how often that needs to be can only be determined by testing your water. Either bring a sample to your pet store to check for you, or buy a test kit and do it yourself (your fish deserve it... this one from API is the one most of us recommend). Once you see your ammonia go up you will need to keep changing the water to help keep it down, then once you start seeing nitrite in your water you need to do even more water changes to keep that low as well. I was doing 25% water changes once a day during the ammonia part of my cycle and went up to 2 times a day when the nitrite part started. Because of that my ammonia never got above 0.5ppm and my nitrite never got above 2.0ppm and best of all I didn't lose a single fish. Also I used a product called Prime to make the ammonia and nitrite non-toxic to the fish (Amquel+ will also work if you can't find Prime). So even though it was in the tank, it wouldn't hurt them. However, I still did all those water changes to keep the levels low. Good Luck!

Ormarr

I do have an API Master test kit and so far, I only have ammonia in my water. I also already treated my water with Prime. I am due for a water change then. Will do it tonight. I am not, however, adding ammonia, other than what the fish produce. Thanks for the info/advice.

Gunnie

When the ammonia and/or nitrites get to 1.0 you need to do a water change. How big is the tank, and how many goldfish do you have in the tank?