Cycling a 29g fw with Platys and ATM Colony

[Meelar]

So I'm making an assumption here, and that's that aqauarists, not unlike dog owners, refer to each other by their "setup". "Oh, that's spike's owner." Feel free to call me "29g freshwater 4 mickey mouse platys". Or Meelar.

I'm currently cycling my first ever home aquarium. It's a 29 gallon tank (30"x12"x18"), with a bunch of equipment (you can check my profile for the complete list. I'm 5 days into my cycling and just finished doing my fourth water test, and I'm using 4 Mickey Mouse Platys for the process. They seem to be tolerating the cycling quite well.

I wanted to post to this forum specifically to let you know how the cycling is going because I got advice from my "aquarium guy" (at Big Al's in Ottawa) to use ATM Colony to help the cycling along. I'd like to post my test results and let you, the experts, comment and give advice! So here goes.

I've been feeding the fish a few times a day with tropical flakes and testing the water daily for pH, Ammonia, Nitrites, and Nitrates.

I'm on day 4 of testing with the fish in the tank and my temp is 76, pH is 7.8, ammonia is 1.5ppm, nitrites 0ppm, nitrates 5ppm. So far I've dumped a whole 473mL bottle of Colony in the tank in the hopes that the ammonia will drop.

The Colony seems to be keeping the ammonia steady (the daily values in ppm were 1, 1, 1.5, 1.5). I have yet to see any nitrites which suggests to me that the Colony is doing a good job supplying Nitrobacter. And the Nitrates are already climbing (0, 2, 2, 5). I should point out that my heater broke a couple of days into the process, so my temp was (72, 72, 72, 76).

I'm wondering what you all think about the status of the tank. IMO I should wait until ammonia is at zero before adding new fish. I'm guessing an ammonia of zero will indicate that the Nitrosomona culture will be established only when I get consistent readings of zero. But I'm pretty happy with the Colony. I was skeptical at first after having read a bunch of mixed posts all over the web about starter bacteria colonies in a bottle.

I'm also a bit concerned about the ammonia being so high, but the fish seem active, hungry and happy. No real signs of stress.

Opinions?

 

[cmw9787]

sounds like that stuff may have worked. I tried a starter bacteria thing and I don't think it did much good. you say you're feeding a few times a day though... that could be a bit too much which might be holding the ammonia values above 0. if you're ever worried about ammonia levels, don't pour crap into the tank, just do a water change.

definitely wait until ammonia levels are consistently 0 before adding new fish though. And when you do decide to add fish, don't go buy a ton of em and add em all at once. i think i've seen a lot of people recommend that you only add 2 or 3 a month. I personally added them to my tank a bit faster than that though.

 

[Meelar]

you say you're feeding a few times a day though... that could be a bit too much which might be holding the ammonia values above 0.

I think you're right. You're confirming what I've read in a bunch of places now. Being a newbie I was worried my fish might get sick if I didn't feed them enough. Sounds like they can go a couple of days without food for now until things stabilize.

 

[cmw9787]

yup. you don't wanna starve them but they most likely don't need as much as you might think.

 

[Meelar]

Update and proposed "instant" cycling experiment

So today is day 10 of my tank cycling. My ammonia levels have definitely spiked and are remaining steady at around 1.5ppm. I added some Nutrafin Cycle to try to bring the ammonia levels down a bit and it did nothing.

Here's the interesting thing. I've never had any nitrites show up but I have had to do a 15% water change to remove some of the nitrates that built up. I'm assuming that the bacteria responsible for converting the nitrites are healthy, but that my ammonia converting bacteria are still getting established. I'll be watching for a nitrite spike to see if that occurs at all.

Just a recap, so far I've used a huge dose of ATM Colony (though I'm not sure I added it all at the right time, as there are no clear instructions on how to use it and I'm a complete newbie) and a bottle of Nutrafin Cycle.

I have definitely NOT experienced an "instant" cycle. I think the manufacturers of that stuff need to be held accountable for the claims they're making. I'd love to do a test to see how the various products compare. Surprisingly I can't find any reference anywhere online to anyone having done a comparative experimental test setup to see how well they can cycle a tank with ATM, Nutrafin, and Tetra FreshStart.

Here's how I'd do it, and I'd love to get feedback on the setup and procedure in case you see anything I might have overlooked:

Procedure:
1) Email each manufacturer to get detailed instructions on how to use their product.

2) Purchase and set up 3 20g (separate cycling products in each tank) tanks with equal amounts gravel, same heaters, same filters, same aeration, etc. (basically I'd buy three 20g starter kits)

3) Set equal temp, fill each tank with same conditioned (tap) water and run tanks for 2-3 days empty.

4) Place three live fish (platys) in each tank.

5) Begin adding "instant cycling" products according to manufacturer's instructions.

6) Monitor daily water readings and report results.

7) Cycle is considered complete once the tank reads 0 ammonia, 0 nitrite, and >20ppm nitrates for 4 days.

My hypothesis is that none of the instant cycling products will instantly cycle the tank, though I suspect they will shorten the process. The key is to see by how much!

Comments?

 

[cmw9787]

None claim an instant cycle. Instead they only say it will help establish it. So regardless of how effective or ineffective it is there isn't much you can do. What would be best is to find someone else with an established tank and ask them to give you a piece of their filter media. Your local fish store may even do this for you for a small fee. If you put that in your filter your tank would be cycled much faster.

My tank cycled in about 2 weeks because I bought it used and the bacteria were apparently still alive in the gravel the girl provided.

Since you're doing a fish-in cycle, don't let ammonia levels get above 2 ppm. Even though platys are tough fish there's still only so much they can take. Above everything else, just be patient. I'd recommend not dropping anymore cycling products into your tank and just letting it do what it's going to do. It will most likely take another several weeks to cycle though.