Bristlenose pleco

[Ashes2ashes]

Ammo levels must be kept under .25ppm no mater how many water changes it takes. Almost none of the beneficial bacteria is in the water column. Back-to-back water changes, multiples in one day, can sometimes be necessary
to keep ammo levels low enough if you are cycling with fish, not too mention nitrite which needs to kept as close to 0 as possible.

Yep! With fish in cycling, water changes are your friend. It is neccessary to keep the ammo and nitrite low as to not damage the fish. Most of the beneficial bacteria lives in the filter and some in the gravel. and other surfaces, but like Siva said, very very little in the water column.

 

[AquaOne]

+1 Ashes, I misread when commenting not to 'pwc' so often. Trouble is your ph levels will be a bit 'up 'n' down' while doing lots of pwc. Save the more fragile fish stock until you have conquered the cycle stage, even then I would give it another month or so before placing a BN plec.

 

[elaine5182]

Bad news in that I think fish are dying the big danio looks disorientated and seems to be dying.

 

[AquaOne]

Do you know anyone with an established tank ?
It does sound as though your water condition is not great, maybe if you can get the fish to another established setup they would be better off. Lot's of links from AA's for fishless cycling, I think you should take a look and consider doing fishless. There's something just not happening right, so at least fishless you aren't killing fish while you battle with getting the water condition right. A work colleague once told me when I was starting tropical, "get the water condition right, the fish will do the rest", worth remembering I'd say.

 

[Ashes2ashes]

Agree. Cycling is SO much easier if you know someone with a healthy, established tank that you can borrow some media from to quick cycle your tank. Your friend was def wise on the that one aqua. As long as I keep my water params right, my fish do wonderfully on their own. I rarely have to do much outisde of keeping up water quality and feeding.

 

[elaine5182]

Ok well hopefully when I go home my fish will be alive still but if not then ill definitely do fishless cycle. I guess it is all about gettin it right with water but it just seems so difficult to start with. Tropical fish keeping is hard business. Will update my fish status when get home.

 

[BeavisMom62]

Yeah, it does seem hard when you're starting out. I remember being so overwhelmed with all of the information. I thought that you filled up a tank with water, used a heater and filter and added fish! If the tank needed cleaning, I figured a total break down was in order. Remove and rinse gravel, scrub the tank, scrub filter, refill, add fish. I bought goldfish for my son about 15 years ago (before internet!) and somehow was able to keep ONE (out of four) alive for two years, so I figured I was an expert!

Fast forward to 3 years ago and an internet connection. Oh, the things I didn't know! Cycling? Water tests? Partial water changes? What the heck? LOL. Just stick with it Elaine. It does get easier, especially after the tank is cycled. Just continue researching, reading and asking questions and soon it will become (almost!) as easy as breathing.

 

[elaine5182]

Went to lfs to get some bogwood to help ph level it's the highest it can be it's dark purple on test kit so this is probably been why danios upset. The fish are all Alive though. Also been advised to turn temp up to 28-29 to get rid of the ammonia that's there (0.25) and to keep light off for couple days

 

[Ashes2ashes]

I have never heard of turning up the heat to get rid of ammo....Maybe I am wrong? I think the only way to lower your ammo and keep it below .25 is to do a PWC. If you have fish in the tank then you need to be keeping the ammo below .25. I am not sure the purpose of turning out the light either?

 

[siva]

No - turning the temp up is a bad idea! That's just a load of BS..seriously. Water changes is the one and only way you want to deal with ammo in the water.

Wood usually takes a long time to lower pH and doesn't lower it by much. It should settle after your cycle completes, and then if it still needs lowered, you'll probably want to use peat.

 

[AquaOne]

Yes, pwc asap, but really the best answer is get fish into a friend's established tank if you can. Please stay with it, you will get there but I sympathise with your situation, best wishes...

 

[jetajockey]

Yep! With fish in cycling, water changes are your friend. It is neccessary to keep the ammo and nitrite low as to not damage the fish. Most of the beneficial bacteria lives in the filter and some in the gravel. and other surfaces, but like Siva said, very very little in the water column.

Agree completely. Change as much water as you have to until you get the toxin levels down and go from there. You don't want to be doing multiple daily water changes, but you can find a happy medium (every day or every other day) that will keep the toxin levels low and also bound by a detoxifier.

The raising the temperature thing might've been on the premise that bacterial activity significantly increases with temperature, although I don't really recommend doing that with a fish-in cycling tank.

 

[siva]

Well with a fish-in cycle you often have to do more than one water change per day to keep ammo and nitrite under .25.

 

[jetajockey]

Well with a fish-in cycle you often have to do more than one water change per day to keep ammo and nitrite under .25.

Coming from someone who has done dozens if not hundreds of fish-in cycles, multiple daily water changes aren't necessary if you are dosing with Prime or Amquel+ and doing large %s.

If Ammonia/nitrites are skyrocketing to uncontrollable levels for even a toxin binder, then there is something wrong in the tank, whether it be overfeeding, decaying organics, or just plain overstocked.

 

[siva]

Well I'll just agree to disagree The only level of ammo or nitrite that I would rely on a toxin binder for is less than .25. More than that should be tackled with water changes. If you stock a tank that isn't cycled, you can easily need daily water changes to keep the ammo that low. Also, often during a cycle your pH skyrockets or plumets, which can make large % pwc's less favorable than more frequent smaller ones, as to not cause a pH shock.

 

[jetajockey]

Ph shock? Really? That's another can of worms in itself. Assuming that ph shock is a proven issue, there's not going to be a major ph shift if the person is already doing daily or every other day water changes.

Prime is designed in a normal dosage to bind 1ppm ammonia. Trust it or don't trust it.

If someone is having that big of an ammonia problem there are other issues that need to be dealt with first and foremost.

You can disagree with me if you want, I'm speaking from experience as a breeder and not just pure conjecture or some guy that did a fish-in cycle one time and is a self proclaimed internet expert at it. (not suggesting that you are, lol)

 

[siva]

Yes, I do want, thank you. In fact, I would expect most everyone I highly respect on this forum would disagree with atleast some of that. I stand by everything I said. Though I would never do hundreds of fish-in cycles, I have a fair bit of experience myself.

 

[jetajockey]

If they disagree with anything that I'm saying they are welcome to correct me, I just ask they do me the courtesy of having factual evidence when doing so. I can show evidence proving my points, the one about prime is directly on the seachem site. But its apparent that this isn't really a learning exchange at all in either direction, so I'll save the data for those interested in learning more about the hobby.

Also, adding seeded media/heavily planting startup tanks is considered a fish-in cycle, and I can guarantee that most people both hobbyist and in the industry, do them.

Just because I don't always go along with the bandwagon on certain topics and don't have thousands of posts in a few months doesn't mean that my input is invalid.

 

[siva]

Well sure, take stabs at me because my opinions are a little different than your own, that's fine with me.

I haven't been referring to, or hearing others referring to, starting up a tank with seeded media as a fish-in cycle, so I did not realize that. Good to know.

I do apologize since what I have said seems to have bothered you so much. By all means, ignore my posts if you think I have nothing to add. Sorry we can't have a learning exchange, or a friendly one.

 

[jetajockey]

I'm not trying to take stabs at you, for that I apologize also.

I just honestly believe I make valid provable points and they are completely ignored or invalidated without any cause other than them being contrary.

I think I made my case of why multiple daily water changes are unnecessary if you are treating with the proper amount of Prime.

This isn't the first post I've seen that goes along these lines, it seems like there are quite a few that basically parrot the same information to people without really considering how accurate it is.

There is no magic number for what level of ammonia/nitrite is deadly or causes permanent damage, it's totally relative to the water chemistry.

In the same way that Prime temporarily converts free ammonia (NH3) to ammonium (NH+4), as the Ph level in the tank drops below neutral, it also converts NH3 into NH+4. Water temperature also plays a role in amount of free ammonia as well.

Any number over 0 for either ammonia or nitrite is too much, obviously, but there has to be some in there for the bacteria to process. But as evidenced in the last paragraph, to draw a line in the sand with an exact level is inaccurate at best.

I've spent a good amount of time and effort both researching and testing the nitrogen cycle. I've tested multiple bacteria supplements as well as filter seeding methods, and even completely fishless. I don't expect this to qualify my posts on the subject as expert by any means, but I do have a good bit of experience in it.

I didn't mean to get personal and I apologize for any offensiveness.

I think I'm just going to write a primer on the subject of nitrogenous waste and call it a day.