10 Gallon Tank New tank started with bad advice

Everyone was helpful yesterday, so I'm back at it.

Thanks to bad advice from my LFS I began cycling my first ever tank over the weekend, fish-in with fish that are too big for my tank. I filled the tank on Saturday with tap water treated with stress coat and PH powder, and added fish on Sunday. (Then did a bit of research online).

On Monday the Ammonia was 1ppm, Ph was approx 7.0, with No Nitrites (I didn't test for Nitrates). In response I did a 20% water change, with stress coat and PH powder, and also a small feeding.

On Tuesday, The test results were the same, and I also tested for Nitrates with a 0 reading. This time I did a 40% water change, with stress coat, but did not add PH powder.

I also tested my tap water and found the PH to be approx 7.6.
I did a small feeding this morning, and am planning on testing again tonight.

Five questions:

1. Am I on the right track overall, or should I be doing something drastically different?

2. Should I resume adding PH Powder with every water change?

3. Should I continue adding Stress coat?

4. How long after feeding should I expect ammonia levels to rise, and how much?

5. Should I feed 1xday or every other day, and should It be at same time?

Sry for asking so many questions in one post, but you guys seemed much more enthused about the hobby than the kids at the lfs.
Thank you for your help.

 

Welcome, Lawsquire. I didn't see your thread yesterday, but did you try to return the fish? Especially since they won't be happy in your tank anyway. Without the fish in there, you could get your tank cycled much faster.

The pH powder, I assume is for regulating the pH? I think you are doing well by discontinuing that.

The stress coat should be fine. If you discontinued that, you would need to get another water conditioner.

If you keep the current fish, you will probably need to increase your water changes to at least 50%/day until cycled. Based on the information you gave, the ammonia level raised from 0 to 1 in two days time. That is really fast (due to the fish being an inappropriate size for the tank).

I would feed not more than 1x every other day until cycled. Feeding doesn't need to be on a precise rhythm.

I would strongly encourage you to bring the giant danios back though. If they make a stink about returning the fish, be firm that they recommended fish entirely inappropriate for your set-up, and you would like to get a different variety as soon as your tank is ready for them. You probably want to talk to a manager. If they are really difficult with you, I would insist on cash rather than store credit, and find a different store to work with in the future.

 

Thanks Sanjin. The Ph powder is as you said. If I can return the fish can I continue the cycle with an empty tank, or would I need to start over?

 

If you bring the fish back, you can start working with the tank where it's at. See this thread for information on fishless cycling (generally considered the best way to go). You will likely find more information of value to you in the forum under

 

Most chain stores have at least a 14 day return period for live freshwater fish. PetCo does 30 days. So unless they were purchased from a Mom & Pop store the return shouldn't be an issue.

If you return the fish, you will need to provide another source of ammonia as food for the bacteria you are trying to grow during the cycle either in the form of pure ammonia, or by adding different fish.

I've personally never done a fishless cycle, but there are excellent articles on this site on how to do it. The gist of it is that you have to add a fixed amount of pure bottled ammonia to the tank every day to simulate the fish waste until cycled.

I have done fish-in-tank cycle with no additives except a water conditioner on my 30 gallon, and it's a pain. Minimum 50% water changes every other day for about 6 weeks, and that's with a good detoxifier like Prime.

On my 55 gallon I did fish in tank cycling using a product called Nite-out II which worked excellently. It's basically bottled aquarium cycling bacteria. Tetra SafeStart is another of this type of product that a lot of FL members had success with. These products will cycle your tank in about 2 weeks with no water changes and fish in the tank.

Heres the thread where I recorded testing the Nite-Out II. I have no experience with the Tetra SafeStart product.



Usually good to avoid using pH products unless you have a ridiculously low pH for some reason. They tend to do more harm than good as pH stability is more important than the level and these products usually cause rapid pH fluctuations. pH 6.0 is the danger zone. At 6.0 the bacteria goes dormant and the cycle stops. Below 6.0 and the bacteria begins to die and the cycle fails. pH 7.6 to me actually seems like a good average, but I'm fairly new myself. Mine runs about 8.2 constantly.

 

About the PH, the powders are extremely dangerous. What is your PH out of the tap?

The powders make the PH buffer to 7.0 or whatever level the bottle says. This can be a drastic change for the fish and easily stress\kill them. Also, the water will probably eventually go right back up to the normal PH, thus more stress.

PH levels aren't too big of a deal. The big issue is keeping a stable PH. My PH is above 8 and all of my fish are doing great.

 

Thanks again everyone. I will return the giant danios tonight. The Ph out of the tap was approx. 7.6

 

one final question for today. Once the Giant Danios are out should I start adding pure ammonia today (last night the reading was 1ppm) or wait?

 

7.6 PH is great as long as it is stable.

 

If I'm not mistaken, when cycling fishless I think you want your ammonia levels between 2.0ppm and 4.0ppm.

 

I think you're right jdhef.

I could swear I read somewhere that it has to hit 4.0ppm to really get a stable cycle going. Anything less and not enough byproducts are produced to support the additional types of bacteria.

Again can't guarantee that, but I'm 99.9999% sure I read that in an article somewhere.

edit: Also, this may seem like common sense, but make sure you test the water prior to adding the day's dose of ammonia, not afterwards. The daily water test is to evaluate how well the bacteria processed the ammonia from the day before. Also once you determine how much is necessary to add to bring your ammonia ppm up to 4.0 in your tank, ensure you add that exact same amount daily. Don't increase the daily amount to try to get the water to read 4.0 PPM every day. The goal is to get the daily reading at 0 ppm ammonia, 0ppm nitrite, and a positive nitrate reading using a fixed amount of ammonia.

 

Anytime you mess with a tanks pH you are setting yourself up for a pH crash which is almost always deadly to the fish. It is much safer to leave the pH alone because most fish will adjust to it and it is for sure easier on you if you live it alone. You only need to be concerned about a tanks pH if you want to have fish that are wild caught from a very low pH area and you are placing them in a very high pH water. (and visa versa) Then I would just advise against the choice of fish.

I don’t know how you tested your tap water pH but there is a right way and a wrong way. If you test it right out of the tap then you are not getting a true pH test result. To properly test tap water you need to put some tap water into a bucket with a bubble air stone and aerate it for 24 hours before you test it. This will allow time for some gas exchanges to take place and the results would be more accurate. These gas exchanges have already taken place in your tank water.

The pH in your tank is normally the lowest in the morning and at its peek in the evening so you need to get into a habit of testing around the same time of day every time you test or you might end up thinking you have pH stabilization problem. This is a very common mistake that beginners make and it always ends up causing them to create even bigger problems when they start trying to fix it.

A stable tank is a safe tank and isn’t that what we want to start with.

 

hI welcome!

yes don't use any ph stuff. yours is just fine.

and good luck catching the danios. I have giants in my 40g...and that would be verrry tricky. but in a 10g, there's not as much room. use two nets! one for catching, one for chasing.

 

I think you're right jdhef.
edit: Also, this may seem like common sense, but make sure you test the water prior to adding the day's dose of ammonia, not afterwards. The daily water test is to evaluate how well the bacteria processed the ammonia from the day before. Also once you determine how much is necessary to add to bring your ammonia ppm up to 4.0 in your tank, ensure you add that exact same amount daily. Don't increase the daily amount to try to get the water to read 4.0 PPM every day. The goal is to get the daily reading at 0 ppm ammonia, 0ppm nitrite, and a positive nitrate reading using a fixed amount of ammonia.

This is very true. The amount of ammonia you put into a tank to cycle it is just trying to simulate a number of fishes output. The goal is to get enough good bacteria growing in the filter media to convert that amount of ammonia into nitrites so that another type of bacteria starts growing that will convert the nitrites into nitrates. If you keep increasing the amount of ammonia your putting in the tank to get the cycle started you are just simulating added more fish so the process of growing the proper amount of bacteria to do the job is lengthened.

The reason behind the 4.0ppm being better than 2.0ppm is that it takes more bacteria to convert it which makes for a more stable and safer tank end the end.

 

Good afternoon,

Some great information above by other members.

Yes, your pH is good without any chemicals and don't let the ammonia go over 4.0 while cycling. If it goes higher than 4.0 it could delay the process.



Ken