Bettatastic
Aquarium Advice Newbie
- Joined
- May 7, 2015
- Messages
- 2
I bought a Betta about 3 weeks ago (my first fish ever!) and right after I found out about the need for cycling, filter, pump etc...
Anyways, we started cycling 3 weeks ago (5 gallon tank w/pump, live plants and a mystery snail). I had my ammonia spike, then my Nitrite spike and now I am down to .25 ammonia, 0 nitrite and my nitrates are starting to show up!! YEAH! I had to do water 20% water changes sometimes twice a day...Anyway, fish and snail are fine but my filter (I swish it out in tank water from time to time) is a carbon filter (actually it's 2, feels like there is gravel in it) it came with the tank/pump and after 3 weeks it looks really dirty and is starting to fall apart...
I don't want to ruin my good cultures by replacing it, also don't want to deal with carbon filters in the future...what should I do?
Thanks in advance, I came here 3 weeks ago and got so much great info about cycling!!
Anyways, we started cycling 3 weeks ago (5 gallon tank w/pump, live plants and a mystery snail). I had my ammonia spike, then my Nitrite spike and now I am down to .25 ammonia, 0 nitrite and my nitrates are starting to show up!! YEAH! I had to do water 20% water changes sometimes twice a day...Anyway, fish and snail are fine but my filter (I swish it out in tank water from time to time) is a carbon filter (actually it's 2, feels like there is gravel in it) it came with the tank/pump and after 3 weeks it looks really dirty and is starting to fall apart...
I don't want to ruin my good cultures by replacing it, also don't want to deal with carbon filters in the future...what should I do?
Thanks in advance, I came here 3 weeks ago and got so much great info about cycling!!