Hilary

[Hilary]

I am new to this forum, I kept tropical fish years ago, about 15 years ago my husband and I kept a 6x2x2 ft marine tank breeding clown fish, which we were quite sucessful, although breeding rotifers was a nightmare.
I have returned to a tropical tank, I am in the process of setting this up, it is a 4' x 25" x 20". I put under the gravel a plant fertilizer level and I have a fluval 402 external filter. I have added quite a few plants as I wanted these to be established before introducing any fish. I am looking to add clown loaches (5) pearl gourami's and cardinals.
I feel like an old lady returning to school (I am 61) as so many things and opinion have changed. I have a problem with white cloudy water. I have done water changes using Aquasafe and also added nutrafin cycle as an attempt to start my filter in the absence of fish. All stones and wood are safe and have been cleaned. I have a King British test strips and according to them ammonia, nitrite levels are at zero.
I would love to add some fish but am extremely worried until this problem stops. Any help would be very welcome, please aid an old lady to enjoy her hobby.

 

[mdawg75]

Hi Hilary,, as I have only used the API master test kit, I say this as I have heard many say before the test strips are unreliable. Again I do not have personal experience with the test strips. I also do not know about plants but do you have a Nitrate reading? Don't take this the wrong way but read on here http://www.aquariumadvice.com/forums/f15/fishless-cycling-for-dummies-103339.html it will tell you what your looking for. Good Luck and welcome to AA

 

[redsea]

Welcome to Aquarium Advice!

 

[Hilary]

Thank to both of you for your advise and welcome, I have had my water checked at my local pet shop and they say everything is fine and fish can be introduced, I went ahead and bought 10 Cardinals (small) and a pair of Pearl Gourami's. The Cardinals are shoaling and within half an hour the gouramis were eating bloodworm from my hand, wether this was because they were hungry, I don't know. None of the fish lost any colour and the male gourami has started to check out my floating plants.
I would like advise on DIY CO2, this is something not heard of when I last kept fish and KH and GH are alien to me. All help would be really appreciated.

 

[mdawg75]

Hilary,

There is a great DIY section too that you can type search in and put co2 it will pull up any threads with that.

 

[starquest]

Hi Hilary, and welcome to the AA forum from a fellow "old lady" (I'm 71)! Not to overload you on information, but there are some excellent resources on this forum for planted tanks. They have articles on CO2 setups, lighting, ferts, and whatever else you might want to know at:http://www.aquariumadvice.com/forums/f24/read-this-first-resources-and-references-83826.html. Be sure to check it out...it's great. Have fun with your renewed hobby.

 

[starquest]

Here's another sticky you might like:http://www.aquariumadvice.com/forums/f24/how-to-set-up-a-co2-system-137982.html

 

[melosu58]

Welcome aboard. We are glad you found us here at AA.

 

[00youknowit00]

Welcome to AA!!