Something is Growing On the Inside of My Tank

[vcorey04]

do you have a friend with an established tank? can you get some of his gravel or some of his filter media? that would help kickstart a healthy bacteria colony to get your ammonia down to zero.

You need to test ammonia and nitrites more for the cycle. Nitrates in low quantities dont harm fish.

i don't. i only have the LFS, and i don't trust their substrates cause of the constant inandouts of fish...

my nitrites have been at zero since i first cycled.

.25 --> 0 is not much of a jump right? i'm in the safe zone

is it important to mention that since est. the tank i've never siphoned the gravel? only PWC?

 

[vcorey04]

ammonia back to zero

just went to check on my test. they've been sitting for about 30 minutes <i don't know if that effects the reading> but they are back to zero...

nitrates stayed solid at 5.0... but that's ok right?


...well, just found out that the first 5 minutes of the test are the most accurate <makes sense> i'm going to do another 50%PWC and test again later...

 

[Purrbox]

i don't have a test kit to test for Chloramines.

No need to test the tap water for Chloramines, just test it for Ammonia. This will tell you whether or not these small levels fo Ammonia are a result of your waterchanges and can be handled with a good dechlorinator.