Hi!
I'm sort of new to fishkeeping and sort of not. I've had a tank before but I followed the advice of the pet store employees and family members whom I thought were knowledgeable only to end up with a big tank mess in the end. Now many years later I decided to give it another try with the help of the internet. Basically, we've bought a 30 gallon (I decided a 10 gallon doesn't give much) and I read up on fishless cycling. Being a peace loving vegetarian I always thought the thought of buying "expendable" fish to start the aquarium was unsettling. So I set it up about a week ago with a cup of squeezed out water from my mothers small established tank's filter sponge. Aside from a messy situation with being sold terrarium plants and not aquarium plants (and ending up with a brown gooey mess and slightly greenish yellow water) we seem to be doing well. I'm desperately hoping for some help with some burning questions though.
1. I've maintained my ammonia levels at 4.0 since the beginning. The nitrites showed up two days ago at .25 and have now jumped to 1.0 overnight. My ammonia has stayed level though and I haven't had to add anything for two days. I read on the board that nitrite levels at this stage are unreliable BUT is it normal to not need to add ammonia to maintain the 4.0/5.0 level? Is there anything else I should be testing for or adding right now or is it just be patient time? I have a PH kit but I haven't bothered to test for it yet.
2. I have four Amazon Swords in the tank still. As far as I can tell these plants are doing well still. I do have regular gravel on the bottom. Is that sufficient for them? What other plants do well in aquariums? My husband would love to have some more plants in there but I want to keep it lower maintenance since we both work 40 hours a week and have three kids. Also can you buy plants online reliably? The pet stores around me are obviously clueless on the plant realm.
3. This tank is a gift to my sons for Christmas. They love fish and lost their beloved hamster last year. Since we don't have a place in the house suitable for small animal right now the fish tank seemed logical. They're being surprisingly patient for two seven year olds and a three year old and understand the tank needs time to be livable for fish. We've taken them to look at fish though and get ideas and they seem drawn to Mollies. I read Mollies are brackish though which kind of scares me. Is there any other fish compatible with brackish water and Mollies? Anything about Mollies that makes them a bad choice? I was edging more towards tetras myself because I think they come in more interesting varieties. I also don't want a lot of little babies. We had livebearers when I was little in our tanks and they seemed to have lots of little babies (most of which got eaten even with the fry grass my mom put in) so I get kind of jittery about them. Would all female/male Mollies get along fine and can you even tell them apart? They really like Bettas too. I know Bettas aren't brackish but what fish go well with a Betta? You probably don't want aggressive nippy fish in with him. I also was thinking we might need an algae eater (the tank is near a window) and a bottom feeder. My old method was just going to the store and picking whatever looks interesting which I know to be a bad idea. I'm not really sure where to start researching this though. What are good (easy!) fish for a 30 gallon?
Any advice would be wonderful. My past tank was a 10 gallon that I let run overnight (as I was advised) and then dumped in a goldfish (again on advice) and added, a month later, a bunch of neons and a catfish. Poor neons went belly up immediately so I returned to the pet store, was sold more test kits (originally told I only need a PH kit), found high levels of ammonia (I know, duh) and shelped back to get ammo-loc which did nothing. Shortly after the water went all murky and gray so they sold me some solution to clear up the water (mind you this is with the state of the art corner filter they sold me) which I used to clear up the water just in time to find a dead catfish. Now little goldie is the last holdout but 400 water changes, 2 months and a remurkified tank later and even he didn't make it through. The ammonia stayed off the charts and I assumed I somehow messed it up and cleaned out the tank. I'm trying for a happier ending this time around!
Thanks in advance!!
Mary
I'm sort of new to fishkeeping and sort of not. I've had a tank before but I followed the advice of the pet store employees and family members whom I thought were knowledgeable only to end up with a big tank mess in the end. Now many years later I decided to give it another try with the help of the internet. Basically, we've bought a 30 gallon (I decided a 10 gallon doesn't give much) and I read up on fishless cycling. Being a peace loving vegetarian I always thought the thought of buying "expendable" fish to start the aquarium was unsettling. So I set it up about a week ago with a cup of squeezed out water from my mothers small established tank's filter sponge. Aside from a messy situation with being sold terrarium plants and not aquarium plants (and ending up with a brown gooey mess and slightly greenish yellow water) we seem to be doing well. I'm desperately hoping for some help with some burning questions though.
1. I've maintained my ammonia levels at 4.0 since the beginning. The nitrites showed up two days ago at .25 and have now jumped to 1.0 overnight. My ammonia has stayed level though and I haven't had to add anything for two days. I read on the board that nitrite levels at this stage are unreliable BUT is it normal to not need to add ammonia to maintain the 4.0/5.0 level? Is there anything else I should be testing for or adding right now or is it just be patient time? I have a PH kit but I haven't bothered to test for it yet.
2. I have four Amazon Swords in the tank still. As far as I can tell these plants are doing well still. I do have regular gravel on the bottom. Is that sufficient for them? What other plants do well in aquariums? My husband would love to have some more plants in there but I want to keep it lower maintenance since we both work 40 hours a week and have three kids. Also can you buy plants online reliably? The pet stores around me are obviously clueless on the plant realm.
3. This tank is a gift to my sons for Christmas. They love fish and lost their beloved hamster last year. Since we don't have a place in the house suitable for small animal right now the fish tank seemed logical. They're being surprisingly patient for two seven year olds and a three year old and understand the tank needs time to be livable for fish. We've taken them to look at fish though and get ideas and they seem drawn to Mollies. I read Mollies are brackish though which kind of scares me. Is there any other fish compatible with brackish water and Mollies? Anything about Mollies that makes them a bad choice? I was edging more towards tetras myself because I think they come in more interesting varieties. I also don't want a lot of little babies. We had livebearers when I was little in our tanks and they seemed to have lots of little babies (most of which got eaten even with the fry grass my mom put in) so I get kind of jittery about them. Would all female/male Mollies get along fine and can you even tell them apart? They really like Bettas too. I know Bettas aren't brackish but what fish go well with a Betta? You probably don't want aggressive nippy fish in with him. I also was thinking we might need an algae eater (the tank is near a window) and a bottom feeder. My old method was just going to the store and picking whatever looks interesting which I know to be a bad idea. I'm not really sure where to start researching this though. What are good (easy!) fish for a 30 gallon?
Any advice would be wonderful. My past tank was a 10 gallon that I let run overnight (as I was advised) and then dumped in a goldfish (again on advice) and added, a month later, a bunch of neons and a catfish. Poor neons went belly up immediately so I returned to the pet store, was sold more test kits (originally told I only need a PH kit), found high levels of ammonia (I know, duh) and shelped back to get ammo-loc which did nothing. Shortly after the water went all murky and gray so they sold me some solution to clear up the water (mind you this is with the state of the art corner filter they sold me) which I used to clear up the water just in time to find a dead catfish. Now little goldie is the last holdout but 400 water changes, 2 months and a remurkified tank later and even he didn't make it through. The ammonia stayed off the charts and I assumed I somehow messed it up and cleaned out the tank. I'm trying for a happier ending this time around!
Thanks in advance!!
Mary