Introduction and question :)

[serobb]

Hello All,

I love fish from my childhood, and when I got the chance, I was keeping a few guppies, however back 20years ago was not so much information available as today, so the hobby was slowly disappering. Part of that I had "other" priorities come up, part of lost interest and get tired to change water and clean the full tank every 2 weeks or so... (Anyway at that time I had no idea how to do...)
Now I getting picking up again and decided to set up a freshwater tank, for my self and most importantly for my kids (they also love the tiny fishes )
I got most of the stuff already and about 1.5 weeks ago the tank was started. No fish, but have quite a number of live plants.
I measured the NH3, NO2, NO3 and the pH almost every day. And seemed the NH3 was high at the beginning and after a week I saw it was 0, but the NO3 and NO2 went high. pH is stayed most of the time between 7.2 and 7.3. In the same time the water got clouded so I changed about 15% of water.
Yesterday the water was still cloudy and stared some brown stuff floating on the surface, so I did again a 20-30% water change. Today I get back home and saw the water is still cloudy, NH3 is 0, NO2 is 0, NO3 also seems to be 0.
Any suggestion what to do next? Just wait? Or change the water again?

Thanks for all the help and happy to be in this community!

[Krissycakes]

Hmmm, hard to tell if your tank is cycled yet. Sometimes it can take months to cycle a tank. How big is your tank? And did you use any kind of seeding material? Like a enzyme starter, Or Beneficial bacteria in a bottle? Or a recently used filter from a friends tank? That could help you with your cycle. The cloudiness, I am not to sure. Could you post a picture?

And welcome to AA!

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[GreenLily]

Welcome to AA!
Is the cloudiness a white color? Or a green color? If it's a white color, it is most likely a bacteria bloom. This happens quite a bit during cycles. You can continue to change the water, but I've always just waited it out until the end of the cycle (unless it's just really cloudy). If it's a green tint, it's most likely an algae bloom. This is possible since you have plants in there and you probably have the lights on. How long do you leave the lights on? I'm not sure just how much light your plants require, but usually 6 hours a day is plentiful for plants. Otherwise, you can have the lights off. Hope this is helpful!

[serobb]

Originally Posted by Krissycakes

Hmmm, hard to tell if your tank is cycled yet. Sometimes it can take months to cycle a tank. How big is your tank? And did you use any kind of seeding material? Like a enzyme starter, Or Beneficial bacteria in a bottle? Or a recently used filter from a friends tank? That could help you with your cycle. The cloudiness, I am not to sure. Could you post a picture?

And welcome to AA!

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Thank you Krissycakes!
My tank is about 270-280L. When I was setting it up I used ADA products, like penac W and penac P for the plants and substrate. As well Ada Turmaline BC, Bacter 100 and Clean Super for bacteria. These added at the very first layer of the substrate. After that was coming the power sand and the soil. Is that possible that the cycle is finished? Its been say about 2 weeks and now all my measures of Ammonia, Nitrite and even Nitrate are 0. I did not add any fish food or anything during this period, so I wonder if the beneficial bacteria are all dead?

For the cloudiness: seems getting better!

[serobb]

Originally Posted by GreenLily

Welcome to AA!
Is the cloudiness a white color? Or a green color? If it's a white color, it is most likely a bacteria bloom. This happens quite a bit during cycles. You can continue to change the water, but I've always just waited it out until the end of the cycle (unless it's just really cloudy). If it's a green tint, it's most likely an algae bloom. This is possible since you have plants in there and you probably have the lights on. How long do you leave the lights on? I'm not sure just how much light your plants require, but usually 6 hours a day is plentiful for plants. Otherwise, you can have the lights off. Hope this is helpful!

Thank you for help!
The cloudiness was white and very intensive. I could not see anything in the tank, but after the bigger water change 3 days ago started to become better. Today I checked and seems almost clean, I would say about 5% the water is cloudy.
For the lights, well I have 3x40W white florescent and 1x40W red florescent lights on about 12hrs a day. To be honest I was out of town for the weekend last week and when I came back saw the cloud was developed, but since I did not set any timer, the lights were off for 3 days...Possible this was contributed?

[Krissycakes]

Really nice tank set up you got there!!! I love the plants!!!
You should have some level of nitrates. I don't think your plants could take in all your nitrates that fast. It could be possible that the bacteria is dead. But I would try doing the pinch of fish food and keep testing your water for any increase. With a tank like yours though, I would be wanting to put fish in it already;D lol (of course guppies, because they are the hardiest fish I know) then as my cycle came to an end, give them away for a shoaling group of fish As for your lights, I like to keep mine on for 7 hours. 12 hours of lights can cause algae to out grow your plants. And we don't want that to happen! I left my lights on (leaving my tank care to my parents isn't the best idea but… anyway) for maybe 14 hours and my anubias had a coat of algae on it. I had to rub it off with my fingers and took me a good amount of time to get it all off.

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[serobb]

Thanks Kristy! I have got a timer for the lights and have set to 7 hrs per Day. will try to add some fish food for the coming days and monitor the levels, I hope the bacteria will start to grove again...
Believe me, I also wanting to add fish, but I want to make sure they can survive, if everything goes well end of next week I planning to buy some guppies

thank you all for the very helpful advice! Will keep posted on the progress!

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[Krissycakes]

Great! I should invest in timers! Lol And I am glad you want the cycle finished before adding fish

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