Should I start stocking?

[djbrefik]

Ive been cycling a 125g tank for 3 weeks. I have had the levels listed below for about 4 - 5 days now with no change. Ive never seen the nitrites spike. Ive also had some minnows(10) in the tank for about a week. 6 of you them died from being sucked to the intake and stuck. The rest have been fine. Im wondering if its safe to start stocking the tank with some cichlids that I currently have in a different tank. And should I just let the cichlids dispose of the minnows or should I dispose of them beforehand.

Ph- 8.2 ppm
Ammonia- 0 ppm
Nitrites- 0 ppm
Nitrates- 10 ppm

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[schoeplein]

What kind of cichlids?

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[djbrefik]

Peacocks and haps

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[djbrefik]

I appreciate all the input. Thank you very much.

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[jennamckay]

If you haven't seen the nitrites spiked, it more than likely hasn't cycled yet, so I would wait until you see the nitrite spike and the fall

 

[djbrefik]

Thank you!

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[mattcham]

Cycling is not a yes or no condition. Even if you have a "fully cycled" tank, your ammonia and nitrites will climb to toxic levels if you stock it beyond the capacity of your current bacteria population. Sounds like your bacteria can handle waste from a few minnows. A good rule of thumb is to increase bioload by 20% each week to give bacteria a chance to multiply and catch up to the increasing bioload. Or add bacteria manually using tetra safe start or seachem stability or any other brand.

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[squirrilah fish]

I would get some Seachem stability and add only 1-2 per week.

As you add fish it adds to the bioload and you go through what is called mini-cycling where you have small ammonia spikes, and nitrite spikes.

I have added fish after a few days using Stability, I still had Nitrite spikes and had to do daily massive water changes. But no one died. This isn't the best way to treat fish though.

You might try adding a bunch of goldfish and seeing how the system reacts, or putting in some food.

Generally cycling is a 6 week process.

As far as products, in my experience Stability is the best. Never let me down.

 

[mattcham]

Can a massive dose of tetra safe start or seachem stability take the place of a needed water change? Let's say I'm late for work and can't do a water change, would pouring 8 to 16 ounces of bottled bacteria into a 20 gallon work? Let's say ammonia spike of 4 ppm... Anyone ever tried?

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[squirrilah fish]

Can a massive dose of tetra safe start or seachem stability take the place of a needed water change? Let's say I'm late for work and can't do a water change, would pouring 8 to 16 ounces of bottled bacteria into a 20 gallon work? Let's say ammonia spike of 4 ppm... Anyone ever tried?

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Safe start or stability wouldn't do that, but adding a double, or triple dose of prime will give you 12-24 hours before it becomes toxic again.

Safe start and stability will prevent the ammonia spike from happening, but if it happens you need to use prime to detoxify the water until it can be changed.

 

[mattcham]

Safe start or stability wouldn't do that, but adding a double, or triple dose of prime will give you 12-24 hours before it becomes toxic again.

Safe start and stability will prevent the ammonia spike from happening, but if it happens you need to use prime to detoxify the water until it can be changed.

Is that because the bacteria work too slowly to break down the ammonia within a couple of hours?

 

[squirrilah fish]

I don't have the best knowledge of it, but my understanding is the safe start and stability bacteria help to establish and grow the bacteria, but it's the growing and establishing of the bacteria that do the chemical conversions.

So yes, it takes a while once you add the bacteria for it to establish and start working, safe start, and stability greatly speed that natural process up, but it dies take time.

In my experience, I have added fish on the second day of setting up a tank, using stability. I didn't get any ammonia spikes, but I did have nitrite spikes and had to do 1-3 50% water changes a day, I didn't lose any fish. If you have another tank running already you can rinse an old cartridge off onto the new cartridge, I also took my sponge filter out if my large tank and squeezed all the junk into the new tank. It makes the water gross, but that's kinda what you want with a new tank.
So really there's a lot of ways to speed up cycling. Stability has worked great for me, but you still have to monitor it, and do lots of water changes. It took about 3 weeks before my tank was completely cycled and squared away, but I still checked it everyday for 6 weeks because even little changes can throw it off.

 

[djbrefik]

I saw a quick nitrite spike and nitrate spiked and leveled off. In the beginning I addex bacteria, media from another tank and "something" 7, cant remember the name of it. So I gave things a good jump start from the get go. Also, the minnows I added seemed to do just fine. That is until I added some cichlids to the tank and they disappeared. Thanks for the input because it let me know that I was on the right track. And im too lazy to retype this in the body section. LOL

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[djbrefik]

Scratch that body comment.

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