Transferring Media

[RobStark]

Hello,

I've been thinking about this lately and wanted to ask a question. Back when I got my calico fantail from walmart, he had ick and gave it to my two comets as well. I used Ick Guard for 4 days and cured them. I then put a new whisper cartridge with carbon into the filter after a WC to clear the meds.

Now about 10 days ago I took that cartridge and the sponge from that filter to help seed my AC70. My question is this.

Is it OK to leave that cartridge in my AC70 even though I used it to help pull the meds from the last tank it was in. Does that Carbon and filler have traces of medication in it. And would it hurt the fish over time?

I was thinking of taking it out and opening it to dump out the carbon and putting it back in. I just don't really want to mess with it if I don't have to because I have .25 or less of ammonia, 2 to 4ppm of nitrite, and 10-20ppm of nitrate right now. Nitrites have been varying slightly but staying barney the dinosaur purple for days now and my nitrates are slowly rising. I'm using Prime to help with the WC and keep the fish happy.

Thanks for any help

 

[RobStark]

I've heard multiple people say a cycle should take about 2 weeks.

I'm on day 11 now. I had Nitrates at day 2. But everyday my Nitrites are at least 2ppm-5ppm.

So I guess seeding my new filter got some bacteria started since it only took 1 day to get Nitrites and NItrates. I thought Nitrites spiked at 5ppm 6 days ago, but it's still reading what I think is 2ppm.

Am I just getting impatient or could something be stalling my cycle?

 

[Masha]

Every time I've cycled a tank, it's taken longer than 2 weeks.

Sounds as though your cycle is on track.

I don't think you need to worry about the meds , but next time you have ick (hope you don't!) investigate using the heat method. Works well, no meds needed.

Sent from my GT-I9190 using Aquarium Advice mobile app

 

[Mebbid]

The carbon won't release the meds so there's no worry there. I would just ignore it. However you might want to do a few more water changes to get those nitrites down. They are quite toxic to fish.

 

[RobStark]

Well that's good news on the meds. I do daily water changes, I was doing 25% at first, then when the nitrites spiked I started doing 40-50%. Also increased dosages of Prime to detoxify it. I'll just keep it up and wait,no big deal really, I don't mind doing the water changes.

 

[Mebbid]

Wow, quite high for daily water changes. How much do you feed?

 

[RobStark]

I've been feeding aqueon pellets, small pinch, around 10 pellets, 3 times a day, for 3 goldfish
one when I get up, one when I get home from work, and one before bed. I watch them to make sure they all get at least 1 pellet and they do. And they eat all of it then scour the bottom for anything they may have missed.

Is this too much? It seems they are ravenous for it.

 

[Mebbid]

I've been feeding aqueon pellets, small pinch, around 10 pellets, 3 times a day, for 3 goldfish
one when I get up, one when I get home from work, and one before bed. I watch them to make sure they all get at least 1 pellet and they do. And they eat all of it then scour the bottom for anything they may have missed.

Is this too much? It seems they are ravenous for it.

For any fish other than a gold fish I would say yes. However that sounds about right for them. How large of a tank is it?

 

[RobStark]

29 gallon bowfront. They are all around 2.5 inches right now. I plan on getting a larger tank down the road for the goldfish and using the 29 gallon for my first saltwater tank. Probably a year from now.

 

[Mebbid]

Does your tap water have any ammonia or nitrite in it? You might run into problems with high nitrates once your tank is fully cycled.

Each 1ppm of ammonia is converted into 2.7ppm of nitrite then to 3.6ppm of nitrate.

 

[RobStark]

I tested the well water for ammonia, but not nitrite or nitrate yet. I'll test it when I get home for sure. The PH is around 7.4 and no traces of ammonia.
Thanks for the formula as well, I didn't know the conversion.

 

[RobStark]

No nitrite in my well water. Got what Ive been judging as 2ppm reading just now from the tank..same reading the last 7 days..WC time again. I took my filter apart and moved the seeding media on top of the ammonia remover insert instead of under it..and removed some food pellets that were under the sponge. I did all this in a bucket of tank water. When I was done the bucket was pretty gnarly. Lots of what looked like carbon soot in the bottom. Did a 50% change..ill test the water again in an hour.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N900A using Aquarium Advice mobile app

 

[PNWaquarist]

Does your tap water have any ammonia or nitrite in it? You might run into problems with high nitrates once your tank is fully cycled.

Each 1ppm of ammonia is converted into 2.7ppm of nitrite then to 3.6ppm of nitrate.

Where did you get this from? Unless I'm missing an important piece of information, you're creating extra nitrogen atoms out of thin air.

EDIT: Nevermind, it's the formula weight of each ion. I was thinking in terms of moles.