20 Gallon Tank Help please, fish in cycle

Hi, i have a 20 Gallon tank
1 honey gourami
1 neon gourami
2 danios
2 guppies
3 neon tetras
3 high skirt tetras
1 gold zebra loach
I know my tank is scattered and i plan on upgrading to a 30 Gallon soon my problem is with my cycle I was an idiot and didnt let my tank cycle (new fish keeper obvs) its been cycling for about two weeks now and ive run into a problem where my ammonia reads at 1-2ppm my nitrites .25ppm and nitrates are at 0? Ive been treating the water to detoxify it but could really use some help here

 

do a water change. next step is, only feed them once a week let the tank be until you see nitrates go up and ammonia and nitrites stabilize. the fish will be fine, in fact they could last months without food.

 

Welcome to Fishlore! Your not alone as new fishkeeper and the cycling... However fish in cycling is something that can be done and you can make it through. While it maybe more stressful on the fish, there are things that you can do to reduce that stress.

I would highly recommend filling out the emergency template and post it in this forum Aquarium Nitrogen Cycle Forum (fishlore.com)

I wish you great success!

 

Welcome to the forum!! You have come to the right place!!

My advice would be to just keep a daily eye on your parameters. Two weeks in and where your ammonia and nitrites are, you're knee-deep in the process. As stated already, do a water change and make sure to do one any time you see those levels going up. Read through the Nitrogen Process link above.

You'll be fine as long as you stay on top of it!

I would be remiss if I didn't mention that you will really want to keep an eye on your Honey and Neon. Typically, Gourami don't mix well. Maybe rehome one of them (my advice would be to keep the Honey) and maybe up the stock on the Danios, Loach, or Tetras because those are all shoaling fish and would prefer to be in groups of at least 5-6. Once you upgrade to the 30, you may also want to up some of those numbers as well.

 

thanks for the help! Really want my fishes to be happy i am rehoming the neon dwarf gourami as he has been bullying my tetras and sometimes my honey, i did get a sunset gourami but i plan on getting a 50 gallon tank soon !

 

Expect some fish loss because some of your fish aren’t good starter fish. Your conditions aren’t ideal for any fish but if you do it right you will at least minimize loss.

1- test every day
2- Do a water change every time ammonia and/or nitrite are over 0.25 ppm. Don’t do more than 33%-50% at once. If ammonia and nitrites are still too high, wait 5-10 hours to do another WC.

This means for a while you will be doing water changes every day. That’s the price to pay to save your fish. Fish-in cycles are a lot of work and take 4-6 weeks.

Good luck !

 

ive run into a problem where my ammonia reads at 1-2ppm my nitrites .25ppm and nitrates are at 0? Ive been treating the water to detoxify it but could really use some help here

Welcome to Fishlore

You have already gotten some very good advice. I do want to ask though, Which product are you using to detox the ammonia? Nothing works better than a water change. I both use and recommend Seachem Prime but only in conjunction with water changes. Never in place of a water change.

When doing a fish in cycle we need to keep the ammonia and nitrite levels as low as possible with water change and then adding Prime to detox the tiny bit left after the water changes. I highly recommend you get and keep the ammonia down to no more than .25 Now that you are seeing nitrites try to keep them down to .25 also. It may be difficult but you want to keep the total amount of ammonia plus nitrites below 1. At or below .50 would be even better but is often very difficult to do when fish in cycling.

The cycle is important but the safety of the fish has to be your number one priority. Be prepared to do water changes almost every day for another 2 or 3 weeks. Let your numbers be your guide as to how often they need to be done to keep the ammonia/nitrites down to safe levels.

 

i use seachem prime too! And API when i do water changes, Ive also been using stability to help jump start things but i cant tell if its working, i test my water daily and have been for the past two weeks or so but i worry a lot

 

i use seachem prime too! And API when i do water changes, Ive also been using stability to help jump start things but i cant tell if its working, i test my water daily and have been for the past two weeks or so but i worry a lot

I am happy to hear you are using Prime. When you say API do you mean some kind of water conditioner? If that is the case there is no need to use both it and Prime since both are water conditioners. Just use the Prime. It is first and foremost a water conditioner but goes one step farther and detoxes low levels of ammonia. Once the cycle is complete any of the many water conditioners will work just fine.

The Stability may help but I don't have a great deal of faith in it. At least it shouldn't hurt anything. As long as you keep an eye on the numbers and keep the ammonia and nitrite low there is no need to worry. Keep an eye on your pH level too. The cycling process has been known to lower it but the frequent water changes should keep it close to the level coming out of the tap.

 

I use API quick start and stress coat for water changes and micro doses of Seachem Prime when i get small spikes before the next water change to keep my levels lowered and at a reasonably safe amount,i test my water daily or every other day ive been doing water changes 2 times a week but will start doing them 3-4 times as needed