29 gallon tank journal

[Jess1ca]

Keep up on wc's. If Ur using Prime to dechlorinate it will detoxify the ammonia for 48 hours. I have .25 ppm of ammonia in my tap water. I worried about that during my cycle too but I never missed a wc and my fish r doing great once Ur bb builds up it will take care of the ammonia in Ur tap when u do a wc.

 

[ErinMcG]

Right, so old pH test says 6.0 (thought I would check for fun), while the new pH test says 7.2. I pulled out the crushed coral and we will see where things are at tomorrow. No nitrites yet. Still waiting on the ammonia test. I can see that there is definitely ammonia though. The test is turning green and we are only 5 mins in. So I need to work myself up to doing my water change. We had a lot of sun today, so my veg garden would probably appreciate it.

 

[ErinMcG]

So, I was thinking about next steps, once I am cycled again.

My stock plans are ember tetras, Gertrude's blue eyed rainbows, and panda cories. Plus a bristle nose Pleco. I am thinking the embers will come first.

Now, I think the embers will go directly into the tank. I am planning to get 8-10 of them. They are tiny, so I was thinking I could maybe start with 6 and then add the remaining 4 a few days later. Does that make sense? I don't want to overwhelm the bb!

I do have a 5 gallon that I can set up for a quarantine tank for the fish that follow. I am wondering if I can just set it up each time I pick up new fish and just do daily water changes? Or do I have to cycle it and leave it running? I don't really have the space to keep it going. And do you normally put gravel and plants and such in a quarantine tank? I could stick in my fake plants and I do have gravel. I should probably boil it, but I definitely have it. Every tank I have picked up has come with gravel and I haven't used any of it! Odd pinks, blues, greens, etc. Not my thing. But for a quarantine tank, it's probably not an issue.

All my stock plans are small fish and the tank is 29 gallons. Can I follow my plan for the embers with all of them, do you think? And how long should I wait between species? A couple of weeks? More?

 

[derail]

Stock list looks good, i'm sure someone more experienced with those fish will comment otherwise lol. The qt tank doesn't have to run all the time, but if I were to set one up, I would have it cycled and running all the time, just in case something happens.

 

[derail]

Forgot to address stocking plans...i'm not sure if you're doing fish in or fishless cycling, but I remember you mentioning tetras earlier in the journal. I'd start with the corys in a small group or a pleco. Maybe start with rainbow fish. I wouldn't start with half the ember tetras because it seems, IME, that it's much easier for schooling fish to be all at once, and more difficult when adding new members to a school.
As for adding, give it a week or so and monitor the parameters. Fish-in is a slower stocking method, but how I prefer to cycle lol

 

[Jess1ca]

I recommend an active filter from Angels Plus for fish in cycling. They are cheap and ship very fast. Great jumpstart for cycling. I fish in cycled with like 13 Africans and 2 active filters.

 

[ErinMcG]

I recommend an active filter from Angels Plus for fish in cycling. They are cheap and ship very fast. Great jumpstart for cycling. I fish in cycled with like 13 Africans and 2 active filters.

Hmmm.... I will have to check to see if they will ship to Canada. Sure would be nice to speed things up a bit.

 

[Jess1ca]

Hmmm.... I will have to check to see if they will ship to Canada. Sure would be nice to speed things up a bit.

AngelsPlus.com it would help a lot

 

[ErinMcG]

Help! What is this? I was staring at my tank and noticed something on the glass. Looked a bit like the sand was making it dusty. I used my floating magnet thing and suddenly there was a lot of debris! It's weird. Almost linty. Any thoughts?

 

[ErinMcG]

Trying not to get frustrated at the continued lack of cycling. Still just ammonia and no nitrites or nitrates.

On the pls side, I have confirmed that the angels site will ship an active filter to me in Canada. I will need to set up an extra airline. If I get a valve to run it from my existing pump (currently just used when I turn my bubbler on), it would make sense to have the split happen above the water rather than in the tank, right? Then it's easy to choose whether I want water to go to both the filter AND the bubbler, or just the filter.

 

[Jess1ca]

Trying not to get frustrated at the continued lack of cycling. Still just ammonia and no nitrites or nitrates.

On the pls side, I have confirmed that the angels site will ship an active filter to me in Canada. I will need to set up an extra airline. If I get a valve to run it from my existing pump (currently just used when I turn my bubbler on), it would make sense to have the split happen above the water rather than in the tank, right? Then it's easy to choose whether I want water to go to both the filter AND the bubbler, or just the filter.

Hang in there! I have totally been there and you will get through it just fine I never saw Nitrites while cycling... Probably because of the active media. When it arrives you are gonna wanna skip the airline and cut the sponge up and pack it into your filter.

 

[ErinMcG]

Awesome! I will happily chop it and stick it in my filter. I was kind of dreading running a sponge filter off my pump anyway. My pump is a bit noisy, so I only run it when I feel the need for bubbles.

Added a new plant today, by the way. I forget what it is called, but it's pretty. The guy I got it from assures me that it should do ok in my current tank set up, though he's a big fan of CO2. He has the most gorgeous tanks. It was hard not to drool on them.

My tank looks a bit murky because I stirred up the substrate to plant the new plants.

 

[Jess1ca]

Pretty plant! I'm planting a 10g, but my lfs doesn't really stock plants so I can't get my hands on stuff like that!!

 

[ErinMcG]

I keep getting my plants on-line from shops or from Used Victoria. I only bought from my LFS twice and both times the plants died.

 

[ErinMcG]

More water changes today and still no sign of cycling. So frustrating.

 

[Convict2161]

More water changes today and still no sign of cycling. So frustrating.

What signs are you looking for? Sorry I didn't read through your whole post. This is fish in or out?

 

[ErinMcG]

It's fish in. I had to replace a tank and I transferred media from an established tank, but it didn't seem to work.

29 gallons, with 3 neons in it. I keep having ammonia readings of 0.3 but no traces of nitrites or nitrates. My other tanks are cycled. I have regular readings of about 5ppm on the nitrates and zeroes on the nitrites and ammonia. Just this one that won't go. I am doing water changes almost daily. Essentially, I do them any time my ammonia hits 0.3, so it is most days.

 

[Convict2161]

It's fish in. I had to replace a tank and I transferred media from an established tank, but it didn't seem to work.

29 gallons, with 3 neons in it. I keep having ammonia readings of 0.3 but no traces of nitrites or nitrates. My other tanks are cycled. I have regular readings of about 5ppm on the nitrates and zeroes on the nitrites and ammonia. Just this one that won't go. I am doing water changes almost daily. Essentially, I do them any time my ammonia hits 0.3, so it is most days.

Again I'm sorry if you already stated this or this has been said before but you can use your media from the established tanks and put it in your filter in the 29. When I did a fish in cycle on my 55 I never saw Nitrites or NitrAtes. So IMO you may see them. Now I see nitrAtes an ammonia just because of stock. Have you read the thread about fish in cycling? I don't think you should stress out over the whole nitrites and nitrAtes just keep an eye on the ammonia.

When you say 0.3 ammonia you mean?

Fresh water API kit is 0ppm, 0.25ppm, 0.50ppm, 1.0ppm, 2.0ppm,4.0ppm. This is a freshwater kit correct?

 

[ErinMcG]

Thanks for the quick response.

I have a nutrafin ammonia test (liquid). It is for freshwater and salt water.


The scale for the fresh water goes: 0, 0.1, 0.3, 0.6, 1.2, 2.4, etc.

Actually, why don't I just take a pic!?

I did read the fish in cycle info, but it is possible I skimmed parts. I may have been assuming I knew more because I had done fish less cycling. I will go re-read now.

 

[ErinMcG]

Here's the bit from the link on fish in cycling that I have been looking for:
"How do I know when my tank is cycled? Your Ammonia levels will gradually give way to higher Nitrite levels. Nitrite will lower to zero and Nitrates will start to rise. When you consistently test zero for Ammonia & Nitrite and have increasing Nitrate, you have a cycled tank! (Woohoo!)"

And the author does mention using media from an established tank, but doesn't say anything about maybe skipping the nitrites.