Cycling advice please!

[phinny99]

I have been cycling my tank for what feels like forever!

I have a 15 gallon tank. I have a Fluval internal 30 filter. It is heated to a temperature of 76 and has an air stone going for additional oxygenation. All artificial plants.

I set the tank up and used Quick Start about 3 months ago. After it ran for a couple of weeks I added 5 zebra danio to the tank. I continuously monitored the water and did frequent water changes as well as using an ammonia neutralizer a couple of times.

At one point I thought the tank was cycled and added a couple fish who unfortunately didn't make it.

At the current time my tank has 2 zebra danios and 1 female swordtail who all seem to be happy and doing well.

I am still testing water daily and doing 25-30% water changes every couple of days and adding a small amount of Quick Start to dechlorinate.

My current water parameters:

PH 8.0
Ammonia .25 ppm
Nitrates 20-40 ppm
Nitrites 5+
GH 120
KH 80-120

I did a 30% water change today and a couple hours later tested the water and it hadn't changed a bit.

I am anxious to get my fish some friends but don't want to just kill fish. Where do you think I am in the cycling process and what steps should I take considering the water parameters? What else can I do to keep my fish happy & healthy?

Thanks for any advice. I have had tanks in the past but it's been 10-15 years and I never had one take this long to cycle.

[Aiken Drum]

3 months should have you cycled, but we are where we are.

Im going to start off with why your fish are dying. And then
go on to why i think your cycle hasnt established.

It seems you understand that when you arent cycled you need regular water changes to remove waste because you havent built up enough bacteria to consume the ammonia your fish produce. But, you havent been doing anywhere near enough water changes. 5+ ppm nitrite is very high. At that level it will be causing long term health issues and possibly short term deaths as well. You really need that below 0.5ppm. Based on it being 5ppm you need to do 4 back to back 50% water changes. If its much higher than 5ppm you might need more. Do them an hour or so apart, test 20 minutes after each water change. Once its down to around 0.5ppm retest 24 hours later and see where you are. But, dont do that just yet.

Quickstart isnt a dechlorinator. It is a product that "supposedly" contains bacteria that consumes ammonia. It doesnt remove chlorine or chloramine from your tap water. So before you do those water changes you need to make sure you have a dechlorinator. Are you sure its called quickstart? A lot of products have similar names and are easily confused with each other. Ill also come back later to the "supposedly".

With nothing removing whatever your tap water is treated with (chlorine or chloramine) that water treatment will be killing the microbes you are trying to grow. Every time you do a water change you will be starting your cycle over, or at least setting things back a little. Chlorine or chloramine will also be causing long term harm to your fish and killing them.

The "supposedly" is because most of these bottled bacteria products in reality arent likely to do anything useful. Even if they do have bacteria in there, most products contain the wrong bacteria, and even if they do contain the right bacteria, if they havent been stored and transported in temperature controlled conditions the bacteria just dies off. Save your money and stop buying quick start. There are better products available if you want to go down the bottled bacteria route if thats your wish.

So. Have a read through above. Just confirm what products you have. When we are sure you have a dechlorinator do those water changes. We can then look at making sure you cycle your tank in a safe manner.

[Andy Sager]

Originally Posted by phinny99

I have been cycling my tank for what feels like forever!

I have a 15 gallon tank. I have a Fluval internal 30 filter. It is heated to a temperature of 76 and has an air stone going for additional oxygenation. All artificial plants.

I set the tank up and used Quick Start about 3 months ago. After it ran for a couple of weeks I added 5 zebra danio to the tank. I continuously monitored the water and did frequent water changes as well as using an ammonia neutralizer a couple of times.

At one point I thought the tank was cycled and added a couple fish who unfortunately didn't make it.

At the current time my tank has 2 zebra danios and 1 female swordtail who all seem to be happy and doing well.

I am still testing water daily and doing 25-30% water changes every couple of days and adding a small amount of Quick Start to dechlorinate.

My current water parameters:

PH 8.0
Ammonia .25 ppm
Nitrates 20-40 ppm
Nitrites 5+
GH 120
KH 80-120

I did a 30% water change today and a couple hours later tested the water and it hadn't changed a bit.

I am anxious to get my fish some friends but don't want to just kill fish. Where do you think I am in the cycling process and what steps should I take considering the water parameters? What else can I do to keep my fish happy & healthy?

Thanks for any advice. I have had tanks in the past but it's been 10-15 years and I never had one take this long to cycle.

If you can get some filter material from an existing "clean" tank, that would help finish cycling your tank quickly. You could also use products like Fritzyme #7 or Turbostart 700 which are live nitrifying bacteria and that will speed up your completion time. Unfortunately, doing it the " natural" way can take months to fully cycle.
But here's the thing: you shouldn't be having that much nitrate when you have that much ammonia and nitrite. Make sure you are getting accurate readings. Take a sample of your water to your local shop and let them test it for you. Ask them for the values in case they just say "It's good" or " it's bad". Also check your source water to see if that is where the ammonia and/or nitrate is coming from.

[phinny99]

Scratch the Quick Start....I'm a moron! lol It's actually Stress Coat+ that I am using and it says on the front that it had a dechlorinator. Does that change any of your thoughts?

I will do additional water changes ASAP. I hate that information online from people (I don't mean you!) who say they are "experts" is so contradictory....you never know what to do!! If you research cycling tanks it is a nightmare figuring out what to do! Thanks for the advice...off to do a water change!

Originally Posted by Aiken Drum

Quickstart isnt a dechlorinator. It is a product that "supposedly" contains bacteria that consumes ammonia. It doesnt remove chlorine or chloramine from your tap water. So before you do those water changes you need to make sure you have a dechlorinator. Are you sure its called quickstart? A lot of products have similar names and are easily confused with each other. Ill also come back later to the "supposedly".

With nothing removing whatever your tap water is treated with (chlorine or chloramine) that water treatment will be killing the microbes you are trying to grow. Every time you do a water change you will be starting your cycle over, or at least setting things back a little. Chlorine or chloramine will also be causing long term harm to your fish and killing them.

[phinny99]

Originally Posted by Andy Sager

But here's the thing: you shouldn't be having that much nitrate when you have that much ammonia and nitrite. Make sure you are getting accurate readings. Take a sample of your water to your local shop and let them test it for you. Ask them for the values in case they just say "It's good" or " it's bad". Also check your source water to see if that is where the ammonia and/or nitrate is coming from.

It's so weird! I am using the API Freshwater Master kit and I have gotten those results over and over. I will do what you suggested and take a water sample in. Is there a better test kit I should try?

[Aiken Drum]

Stresscoat is a dechlorinator. A very expensive one, but it will do the job.

You still need to get the nitrite down though. Andy has given good advice on a product that will help cycle the tank, or getting some established filter media. I concur with that.

Going forward, your target should be ammonia + nitrite combined no higher than 0.5ppm. So 0.25 + 0.25 or 0.0 + 0.5. If your test exceeds this target then water changes to get things safe again.

[phinny99]

Is this something that would work? I am not finding either of the products recommended that I can get quickly. I only have a Petco in town and they don't have it and none of the online sites will have it here for a few days.

[Aiken Drum]

I would wait and get one of the products that andy recommended. Tetra safestart and Dr Tims One and Only are good products too, but people seem to be having the best results recently from the products andy suggested. A few days wont make much difference as long as you keep up with your water changes to keep water quality good.

[phinny99]

Originally Posted by Aiken Drum

I would wait and get one of the products that andy recommended. Tetra safestart and Dr Tims One and Only are good products too, but people seem to be having the best results recently from the products andy suggested. A few days wont make much difference as long as you keep up with your water changes to keep water quality good.

I will order some right now and keep up the water changes in the meantime. Thank you both for your help!!!

[phinny99]

One last thing...is it ok that I am using spring water?? I felt like it was the safer alternative for them since our water isn't the best.

[Aiken Drum]

Spring water is usually ok. Make sure its not flavoured or carbonated. You might want to find out what the water parameters of the water you are using is, including general hardness (GH) and carbonate hardness (KH). Springwater is usually quite hard.

15 gallon tank isnt that big, but say 50% water changes every week you would have to consider the cost of buying water against getting a RO filter installed and remineralising your own filtered water. Long term an RO filter will probably be cheaper.

[Andy Sager]

Originally Posted by phinny99

Attachment 325231

Is this something that would work? I am not finding either of the products recommended that I can get quickly. I only have a Petco in town and they don't have it and none of the online sites will have it here for a few days.

Check here: https://fritzaquatics.com/ and use their " Find store" link to see where you can get them close to you.

[Andy Sager]

Originally Posted by phinny99

It's so weird! I am using the API Freshwater Master kit and I have gotten those results over and over. I will do what you suggested and take a water sample in. Is there a better test kit I should try?

The API kits are usually the better ones but I will say that from personal experience, the nitrate reagents tend to go bad faster than the other reagents and you really have to shake the crap out of them to make sure any element that came out of solution is dissolved back into solution. I would not use reagents that are past their expiration dates. ( When buying replacement reagents, make sure you get ones that have a long time to their " exp dates".)