not cycled -- please help

[youpey]

I had a green chromis as my starter fish, which eventually died. I checked my levels and after a short while my ammonia was at 0, nitrites were at 0, and my nitrates where about 5 or 10

I purchased my percula clown about 5 days ago, and he has been doing great, even today. He is eating and swimming nicely. I checked my levels today because I wanted to get him a friend, but I found my ammonia is at about 1ppm, my nitrites are at 0 and my nitrates are back to 0. I feed this fish 1 time per day (frozen brine shrimp). Obviously I am not going to add another fish yet because it is not completely cycled. I dont think I am over feeding him because he eats all of the food with in a minute or so. My question is, should I not feed him everyday until the ammonia goes down, maybe just every other day. And do you think this fish has a chance to make it through the cycle. I really am not sure if I should do a water change because it will just prolong the cycle. I am also not sure why the nitrates would go back to 0, maybe the last test I did prior to today was not accurate. PS. this is a fish only tank, my filters are the eclipse 3 filter, and a fluval 304, the tank is 30 gallons.

 

[ellisz]

How long did it take your tank to "cycle" the first time? I would watch the ammonia and if it keeps going up, you will have to do water changes or take the clown back to the LFS.

The water changes will prolong the cycle if it is indeed doing this but it will keep the fish alive ...

 

[Apollo]

Reduce feeding

Reduce your feeding to every other day.

Also you can buy AmmoLock which renders ammonia
as non-toxic instantly.

Another thing you can also try when starting up a new
tank is use "Live Sand" it is sold for about $17.00 per
20 pounds. This speeds up the biological process tremendously.
Also you can buy Stresszyme which has bacteria in it.

Just add it to your water as it will speed up bacteria colonization.

 

[pm64971]

If you add a bag of live sand, your ammonia will spike. Do not do this with livestock in the tank. Do you have any LR in the tank? If you have LR, then the levels will drop soon. With respect to feeding your clown, I wouldn't start feeding him every second day. I think you should continue to feed him as you have been so that he is strong enough to fight the ammonia.

If you are worried about your ammonia level, then change the water. The reason that you have ammonia in the water is because the critters can't eat it all. You have an excess. If you remove the excess by doing a water change, the critters will still get what they need, and the fish will be safer.

Phil

 

[jks1]

i would continue to feed your clown as normal. Just be careful not to overfeed. Water changes will reduce ammonia, and i would not advise adding chemicals to the tank if you can help it. JMO

 

[youpey]

I had a freshwater tank and I tried the chemical thing, and everything was unhealthy to the point i had to start over. I retested the water last night and found my ammonia to be OK. I must have made a mistake on the test. I did a 25% water change anyway, and I am going to test the water later today. Thanks to all that helped