aquazen said:Get the fish!!!!! Mweeheeheehee....
TomK2 said:No angel fish for starters! Zebra Danios do well with new tanks, but they will be planning on living there long after they cycle the tank for you, so don't use them if you don't like them. I just added fish to my tank Dec. 3. I am using fish to cycle it, but am using a low bioload and huge buckets of patience! I chose 6 danios and 4 platies as the initial bioload in a 55 gal tank. The zebra danios are high activity fish, and the platies are a beautiful red. The activity of the Danios and the beauty of the Platies helps to make the tank not look so empty. Both will be welcome residents after the cycle when I add Angels and Blood Parrots. Rather than try to speed up the cycle, I am trying to make it so darn slow that there will never be an NH3 or NO2 spike. So far it is going as planned, 16 days of fish and no detectable ammonia. I hope to detect Nitrate at around 45 days, letting me know that the tank has cycled. Then I will slowly add the Angels and Parrots, say one every week or two. At this rate it will be spring before I have the tank stocked the way I want it. Somehow the anticipation and planning make the hobby more enjoyable for me. After all, if I could do it all in one day I probably would, but then what would I do with myself?
I completely agree with that. I have 4 in a 20, and we used them to cycle the 30. It must have taken a half hour to ctach them to move them to the 30, and another half hour for the move back.but they will be planning on living there long after they cycle the tank for you
I had thought of returning them to the LFS, figuring that thier high speed antics would not go well with the peaceful look I was after later on. But just think about chasing them around my 4 foot long tank! I think I would end up uprooting all the decorations just to catch one of the little speed demons.we used them to cycle the 30. It must have taken a half hour to ctach them to move them to the 30, and another half hour for the move back.
Hmmm... had visions of mean old guys standing around shooting helpless little trapped things? 100 years ago that would not have been too far off the mark. The sport started by putting live birds in a trap, then yelling "pull" to have someone pull the door off the cage so it could fly away and be shot at. Now, we still say pull but a machine throws clay targets to be shot at. I don't think I could shoot a live bird unless I was rather hungry! Very addicting sport. Lots of immediate gratification. Guess thats why I can be patient and defer gratification with my tank.BTW, I thought trap shooting was something a LOT different that it turns out to be (yay for the internet) - neat hobby
I sure do hope it is true. It would be nice! I am hearing lots of praise for the product, but some grumblings that it didn't seem to work as well as people hoped. I don't know... and probably won't know unless I try it. Since I have started many tanks the old fashioned way, I have developed a fondness for the slow, patient approach. I also find that I have lots of time to browse the many LFS's in the area and decide which fish to get next. Often I will change my mind while waiting for the biofilter to develope and end up with something completely different than what I had originally planned. Some things are mor fun when you take it slow, and for me it is more fun to make a tank over several months than all in one week. Think of all the excitement people have over adding fish to the tank - I get to make that last for months!I hate to(maybe) burst your bubble, but I think with Bio-Spira, you dump it in, let it sith for maybe 30 mins(?) and then add the fish. I'm not completely sure on this one, so sorry if I'm wrong.
Hmmm... had visions of mean old guys standing around shooting helpless little trapped things? 100 years ago that would not have been too far off the mark. The sport started by putting live birds in a trap, then yelling "pull" to have someone pull the door off the cage so it could fly away and be shot at. Now, we still say pull but a machine throws clay targets to be shot at. I don't think I could shoot a live bird unless I was rather hungry! Very addicting sport. Lots of immediate gratification. Guess thats why I can be patient and defer gratification with my tank.
severum mama said:Tom and Moxie, I think that Psyhampster is right, you add fish pretty much as soon as you use the Bio Spira. It is live bacteria, so if you wait a few days to add fish the bacteria will have no food source and it will die. Make sure you keep it refrigerated. I have never used it myself but I have heard lots of good things about it, so I personally would try it out if I didn't already have 4 tanks to cycle new filters on.
gheitman said:Keep in mind that if you get mollies you will soon have more mollies as they are prolific breeders. Be sure and get 2 females for every male otherwise you may end up having a very exhausted female I would definitely wait on getting your angelfish until after the tank has been running at least several months. That way you can be sure of stable water conditions. As you probably already know, you shouldn't add too many fish at one time otherwise you could get a spike in your ammonia level.
smallfry said:Actually, mollies, swordtails, guppies AND platys are all prolific breeders! You may want to keep that in mind when you are thinking quantity.... female platys (and maybe the other species too) store sperm for months and can be pregnant multiple times from what is stored in them (with no male around).
I found this out when I had ONE female platy give birth to 3 different batches of babies....the last batch was 3 months after I had purchased her! (no male platy in my tank)
severum mama said:If you don't want such prolific breeders in your tank why not go with a school of some tetras? They would get along with angels (whenever you get angels) as long as they are large enough to not fit in the angels' mouths. Neons, cardinals and other smaller tetras would not work. Barbs are also nice schooling fish but most of them are too nippy to be kept with angels. Mollies and platies seem like cool fish but I have never kept them for any length of time. My mollies died due to my newbie mistakes, and I never got any other livebearers because of all the babies!!! 8O
severum mama said:Hey, check out these links:
http://www.liveaquaria.com/product/prod_Display.cfm?pCatId=1113
http://www.liveaquaria.com/product/prod_Display.cfm?pCatId=901
http://www.liveaquaria.com/product/prod_Display.cfm?pCatId=1583
I don't have any glowlights, but they are pretty easy to find. I do keep the green fires and rummy nose, and I think they are beautiful!!! If you are looking for pretty fins, you can't beat the striped fins of the rummy nose. All 3 of these species are really colorful and active. If you are still planning on keeping angels, though, they may be too small. If not, they work out great with dwarf cichlids. 8)
My newbie mistake was not studying up on tank cycling AT ALL. I still have one survivor, a blood parrot that was my 1st cichlid. Tough as nails. Anyway, you are WAAAAAAY ahead of where I was at that time, nothing to learn from there.