My Fish Passed Last Night, Now What Do I Do?

*This is an update to a previous post about ammonia removing filter but now I have a new question and thought I should start a new thread*
I'm going to assume those filters prevented a cycle to actually start and I removed the ammonia filter after my goldI passed early this morning.(he had already been so stressed I didnt have the heart to take the ammonia filter out before he died) Doing a water test....still no ammonia (filter has been out for half an hour) do I leave him in till I get an ammonia spike or do I take him out and just use shrimp waffers? How much water should I change if any? I did a 15% water change yesterday.
To clarify:
I moved from a 5 gallon to a 20 gallon had only enough time to run 20 gallon with gravel media from old tank for 24 hours before 5 gallon stetes leaking. Had this new tank for 2 weeks

 

Shrimp wafers for what?

 

Shrimp wafers for what?

Sorry. I typed too fast. Shrimp wafers to start a fishless cycle now that my fish has passed and I'm still not getting ammonia readings. I don't really want to go buy ammonia to start cycle. Id rather just use what I have now instead of buying more stuff

Shrimp wafers for what?

Oh. And I did remove him. I didnt want to take a chance of him polluting the water or the 3 year old see him. I just don't know if I should change out water or not. Its still clear, paramaters are zero for everything and ph is 7.5

 

I’m sorry for your loss. Personally, I’d take him out and bury him. It’s not going to be pretty to watch his body decompose in order to produce ammonia.

You can use fish food to cycle. I tried it and didn’t like it, so switched to using ammonia without additives. The reasons why were:

1) it’s really hard to measure how much ammonia you’re adding to the tank with fish food. It takes some time to actually release ammonia so it’s a bit unpredictable.

2) it’s really messy. I was using shrimp pellets and they turned into a goopy slimy mess. Thankfully I had a sponge prefilter over the intake so it didn’t gunk up the filter.

3) using ammonia without additives is super easy to target the ppm you want in the tank. It’s also pretty cheap. I got almost 1 litre of Old Country ammonia for around $3. It may even be cheaper where you are.

It’s up to you how you want to fishless cycle, this is just my experience so far!

Just read that your removed him from the tank. If all your parameters are 0, you haven’t started your cycle yet, so you could change all your water if you want.

 

Just read that your removed him from the tank. If all your parameters are 0, you haven’t started your cycle yet, so you could change all your water if you want.

I really don't want to. Lol I did a 15% change yesterday and a 25% 2days before bc the bn pleco had been gone for (I think) 3 days before I found him.

 

I really don't want to. Lol I did a 15% change yesterday and a 25% 2days before bc the bn pleco had been gone for (I think) 3 days before I found him.

It’s up to you. If it were me and I had no fish left, and no cycle going. I’d take the opportunity to give it a good clean. Although, I just read above that this tank is only two weeks old. You should be fine either way.

 

It’s up to you. If it were me and I had no fish left, and no cycle going. I’d take the opportunity to give it a good clean. Although, I just read above that this tank is only two weeks old. You should be fine either way.

When I'm looking for the ammonia, is there anything a should avoid? Look for the bottle that says 'pure ammonia'? I have to go to walmart anyways for dog food but I'm not 100% sure where I would go in that building, and I'm sure the workers won't either.

 

It’s sometimes hard to find ammonia without additives. You’re looking for a mixture of just ammonia and water. You don’t want scents, surfactants, and other ingredients. Most bottles don’t even list their ingredients. I went to about 5 different stores looking for suitable ammonia. In the end I posted on here and looked online, the two brands that come up often as being safe are Old Country (from Home Hardware in Canada) or Ace Janitorial Strength Ammonia (from Ace Hardware in the US). My first bottle of ammonia was Dr Tim’s Ammonia. It’s a tiny bottle and I paid $4 off of Amazon. It’s just very expensive for a tiny bottle. It was fine for cycling a 10 gallon, but for the 90 gallon it used up almost 1/2 a bottle in one go. We went and got Old Country.

 

Consider this: Fast Fishless Cycle.

 

Consider this: Fast Fishless Cycle.

Should I remove my drift wood before the cycle or is it ok to leave in there?

 

Should I remove my drift wood before the cycle or is it ok to leave in there?

You can leave it.

 

I couldn't find suitable ammonia at Wal-mart. I ended up going to a True Value type hardware store and buying commercial grade pure ammonia (it's stronger so you don't need to use as much to achieve the same result).

 

Dollar Tree has pure ammonia. Basically shake the ammonia, if it bubbles its a no go.

 

Dollar Tree has pure ammonia. Basically shake the ammonia, if it bubbles its a no go.

Yes thank you. Dollar tree is the only place I didnt go lol. I found some at tractor supply and now I unnecessaryly have a gallon. The shake test helped and I looked up the msds to make sure

 

Yes thank you. Dollar tree is the only place I didnt go lol. I found some at tractor supply and now I unnecessaryly have a gallon. The shake test helped and I looked up the msds to make sure

Totally okay. Good luck with your cycle!

 

Totally okay. Good luck with your cycle!

I will happily report my tank once I have it finished and stocked. I didnt expect my whole family to be upset our goldI passed. He was a fan tailed calico. He survived the cycle of the 5 gallon with flying colors but just couldnt do this new tank bc my mistake of the ammonia filter. We had him for 2 months. But every one is excited to start over and promised me to not bug me about how slow I put fish in this time