Fishless Cycle Log/Rebuild - Take II

[librarygirl]

Wasn't going to post results for a few days, but I couldn't help it...

Ammonia is 0 again!! This is the first two consecutive nights it's been zero! Wahoo!!!

Nitrite: 5 (hm, getting to the point where I'd kind of like to see some blue again )

Nitrate: 160

Ph: 7.4

Redosing!

Oh, I bought the battery powered aerator that Eco suggested; it must have been the last one b/c I saw it lying on a shelf and didn't see any others in any of the fishing isles. I then went to 7 stores and no one had D batteries. I called my Dad and he had 4 in some old flashlights; they work still but not sure how long I'll have with them, but it's better than nothing. So, I put all of the media in a mesh bag in the tank and then just run the aerator for 5-10 minutes every, what, hour or so? And hope the power comes back on before the batteries die? Or would stirring the tank manually help at all? Ugh. lol

Oh, and gravel question. I posted about it in the General Forum but I thought I'd ask here too:
My black gravel is starting to turn white, like it's flaking off. Not TONS of it, but enough of it to start looking bad. I think I used two types: Estes and Top Fin. Not sure which is flaking or if it's both. So, can anyone recommend a black gravel or sand that won't change color? And would it be safe to change it out (don't want to disrupt the BB but need to change it before I get fish in there). Any help would be appreciated.

 

[JimmyA]

Bazooka! Great you are making more progress!!!!

 

[chrisinmontreal]

I know you were talking about live plants, you could choose Flourite black or black sand, although it could be pricey for a larger aquarium and maybe not worth it if it wasn't going to be moderately planted. Or alternatively there's carribean sea super naturals, there's a black tahitian moon sand listed on the petsmart website.

 

[librarygirl]

I know you were talking about live plants, you could choose Flourite black or black sand, although it could be pricey for a larger aquarium and maybe not worth it if it wasn't going to be moderately planted. Or alternatively there's carribean sea super naturals, there's a black tahitian moon sand listed on the petsmart website.

Great thanks Chris! Yeah I've given up on live plants for now; it's too much to deal with and I don't know if my lighting will sustain them. I can always try again in the future; for now I'm just going to fill in with silk plants. Now that I almost need to change the gravel (well, don't NEED to, but it looks icky) I'm tempted to go with sand; I like the look better, but I want black.

Any drawbacks to sand that I'm not considering (other than it needs to be rinsed very well first). I'll take a look at the Tahitian Moon, thanks!

 

[librarygirl]

Bazooka! Great you are making more progress!!!!

Yep, I'm sooo excited!!!

 

[jetajockey]

I wouldn't worry too much about aeration unless there were fish in there, even still, fish are fine without aeration for quite a while as well, I've gone 8+ hours no aeration while doing flea bombing without any issues at all.

 

[chrisinmontreal]

I believe with sand you just need to rake through it once in a while to prevent compaction which can lead to build up of toxins

Here's a useful link i found:

http://e0.aqua-fish.net/show.php?h=aquariumsand

Sand generally needs A LOT of rinsing too....

 

[librarygirl]

I wouldn't worry too much about aeration unless there were fish in there, even still, fish are fine without aeration for quite a while as well, I've gone 8+ hours no aeration while doing flea bombing without any issues at all.

Thanks Jeta. So I just have to make sure the filter media stays wet right? Like just put it in the tank? I have the aerator thing so I'll use it once in a while until it dies. I'm kind of glad I don't have fish now for this storm!

 

[librarygirl]

I believe with sand you just need to rake through it once in a while to prevent compaction which can lead to build up of toxins

Here's a useful link i found:

Advantages Of Aquarium Sand With Instructions

Sand generally needs A LOT of rinsing too....

Thanks CHris, that's great info. I can certainly rake it once a week. I have a gravel vac too and I've seen videos of people with sanded tanks who hover the vac over the sand so it swirls up and then goes back down. I think sand it is!

 

[jetajockey]

Thanks Jeta. So I just have to make sure the filter media stays wet right? Like just put it in the tank? I have the aerator thing so I'll use it once in a while until it dies. I'm kind of glad I don't have fish now for this storm!

Yeah just keep the filter media wet.

as far as oxygenating the water, you could just stir the tank with a stick periodically as well if you had to, anything to move the water around a little and get some surface turnover.

 

[-Mac-]

I'm tempted to go with sand; I like the look better, but I want black.

Any drawbacks to sand that I'm not considering (other than it needs to be rinsed very well first). I'll take a look at the Tahitian Moon, thanks!

I found that the Tahitian Black Moon sand is extremely fine, as in it's a mere whisper away from being as smooth as cornstarch or powdered sugar in texture. If you're able to find it, I'm uses Estes Marine sand, and yes, it is Freshwater safe, no worries there; it's about as coarse as playground sand, perhaps a bit more fine.

The only draw back to black sand is detritus shows up rather well, so you'll be vacuuming weekly if you want things to be pristine.

 

[librarygirl]

@Mac - Thanks for the tip! I'll take a look around for it. I have no qualms about weekly vacuuming so that's ok; will the gravel vac work ok or do I need a special one for sand? I've read and been told you need to shift the sand around periodically anyway or toxins can buildup, so if I do weekly vacs that'll kill two birds.

Irene blew threw RI this morning. At least 3 smaller trees in the back have broken in half. Lots of leaves and debris around. My work is closed tomorrow. I lost power here from 9 AM this morning EST to about 4 PM this afternoon. All in all I'd say I was very lucky; I hope others fared well also.

Due to the power out, I took all the filter media and put it in a pile in the tank. I then used my new battery powered aerator by placing the stone under the filter media and aerated the water for about 15 minutes every hour. It must have worked because....

Ammonia is about 0 again!! (it MIGHT be a hair above 0 and close-to but not quite 0.25 which I"m happy with given the power outage)
NitrIte: 5
NitrAte: 160
PH: 7.4-7.6

Redosing!!

 

[eco23]

One word, 3 letters...yay

Really, this thing is going absolutely flawlessly since the water switching (not counting the pH drop).

Here's my thought of the day. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. Personally, I would take the CC and swish it around real good every couple days, this will hopefully dissolve in a healthy amount to keep your water buffered and prevent any other pH drops. Also...a tiny pinch of super finely ground up fish food once in a while should keep the water full of phosphates and other nutrients. Hopefully this will go a LONG way in preventing stalls without having to change water. Now, this is where the issue of potential nitrIte toxicity comes in. IMHO...it's not something I would personally worry about unless something goes wrong. People cycle every day without changing a single drop of water. It might potentially take a bit longer without pwc's...but I'm 100% confident it will cycle as long as the pH is stable and you're refreshing nutrients in the water occasionally.

And yeah, my power was out from 4pm till about 9am...we got some board game and card playing time in . Other than half a tree in the pool and sticks all over the yard...no real damage. Luckily my neighbor has a generator I hooked up to and I ran our sump pump so my basement wasn't under water.......and the fish tank

Glad it seems everyone is alright from the storm.

 

[librarygirl]

One word, 3 letters...yay

Really, this thing is going absolutely flawlessly since the water switching (not counting the pH drop).

Here's my thought of the day. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. Personally, I would take the CC and swish it around real good every couple days, this will hopefully dissolve in a healthy amount to keep your water buffered and prevent any other pH drops. Also...a tiny pinch of super finely ground up fish food once in a while should keep the water full of phosphates and other nutrients. Hopefully this will go a LONG way in preventing stalls without having to change water. Now, this is where the issue of potential nitrIte toxicity comes in. IMHO...it's not something I would personally worry about unless something goes wrong. People cycle every day without changing a single drop of water. It might potentially take a bit longer without pwc's...but I'm 100% confident it will cycle as long as the pH is stable and you're refreshing nutrients in the water occasionally.

And yeah, my power was out from 4pm till about 9am...we got some board game and card playing time in . Other than half a tree in the pool and sticks all over the yard...no real damage. Luckily my neighbor has a generator I hooked up to and I ran our sump pump so my basement wasn't under water.......and the fish tank

Glad it seems everyone is alright from the storm.

Good idea thanks Eco! PH seemed to have dropped slightly (seems lighter than the 7.4 reading) but the high PH is still coming in a light blue. I'll swish around the CC bag and add some fish food. I checked my log and nitrites have been 5 for two weeks. Which probably isn't too long in the grand scheme of things and they aren't off-chart yet (the solution goes in blue but then immediately starts changing to purple), so I won't worry yet. I'm trying to slowly stock-pile a good amount of spring water for the future.

Not sure if you read the posts from yesterday about my gravel; I guess it's cheap black colored gravel that is now turning white and looks horrid. I think I'm going to change over to black sand while I can. If I take all of the current gravel and put it in mesh bags and leave them in the tank until it cycles and then slowly remove one bag each day to make sure it stays stable, that should be OK, right? (I know you're gonna say leave it alone lol).

Glad you're OK from the storm too!

 

[eco23]

Good idea thanks Eco! PH seemed to have dropped slightly (seems lighter than the 7.4 reading) but the high PH is still coming in a light blue. I'll swish around the CC bag and add some fish food. I checked my log and nitrites have been 5 for two weeks. Which probably isn't too long in the grand scheme of things and they aren't off-chart yet (the solution goes in blue but then immediately starts changing to purple), so I won't worry yet. I'm trying to slowly stock-pile a good amount of spring water for the future.

Not sure if you read the posts from yesterday about my gravel; I guess it's cheap black colored gravel that is now turning white and looks horrid. I think I'm going to change over to black sand while I can. If I take all of the current gravel and put it in mesh bags and leave them in the tank until it cycles and then slowly remove one bag each day to make sure it stays stable, that should be OK, right? (I know you're gonna say leave it alone lol).

Glad you're OK from the storm too!

You'll only lose a small portion of by totally replacing the substrate...so it won't be the end of the world if you don't leave the old in the tank. It might tack on a few more days...but after all this time...a few days is a drop in the ocean . That's your call, either way probably won't have a major impact.

 

[JimmyA]

That's terrible your power is out. How long is that expected?

 

[-Mac-]

@Mac - Thanks for the tip! I'll take a look around for it. I have no qualms about weekly vacuuming so that's ok; will the gravel vac work ok or do I need a special one for sand? I've read and been told you need to shift the sand around periodically anyway or toxins can buildup, so if I do weekly vacs that'll kill two birds.

I use my aqueon water changer and usually pull out about a teaspoon or so of sand if I get too close to the substrate, as the Estes is light; I'll get better at it I'm certain.

As for shifting the sand, seriously, get some MTS, you'll rarely see them so you won't have to be squeegie about them, that will help with the sand movement.

I rolled through my local Petco today, needed some filter floss for my 5g, anyhow I tripped over, of all things, aquarium sand. It looked about as coarse as pool filter sand, perhaps a bit less, definitely a step up from grain size on the Estes. YMMV as everything is different from store to store/state to state.

 

[librarygirl]

Ammonia is 0 AGAIN!!! WOOHOOOO!!!
NitrIte: 5
NitrAte: 160
PH: 7.6

I went to PetSmart today and found black aquarium sand. It's GORGEOUS. I rinsed the dickens out of it but then got tired and haven't put it in yet lol. I bought some spring water too, enough to do a 50% water change. So sometime this week I'm going to change half the water and switch out the gravel to sand. Ideally the water would be lower when the sand goes in, but it is what it is unless I feel like getting more water before I do the switch, we'll see. Next week I'll order the new stand and some awesome silk plants I found from a seller on eBay. I'm considering the Marineland LED lights too; it has a moonlight setting which is what I wanted also. Not sure yet though, we'll see. The tank should be set up the way I want it in a couple of weeks so hopefully by then the cycle will be done (ha!) and I can order my CPDs!!!

I'm almost positive I'm going to start with a large school of Celestial Pearl Danio (CPD) about 8-10. Let them establish for a few weeks then get some cobra guppies (ideally a variety of colors if I can find them), I'm thinking 1 male and 3-4 females. Also two horned nerites and lastly in the future maybe some ottos or small corys (I like the look of the Otos better than corys I think). That should be a fine looking tank! (but um if anyone foresees any issues please let me know now lol). Then I'll work on my ADF tank. lol

 

[eco23]

Your cycle =

I like the thought of a ton of CPDs. My friend had about 4-5 and never saw them, but now he has 10-11 and says they're awesome little fish. Personally I don't care for livebearers, but if you like the Guppies...go for it . You wouldn't regret Corys. Pandas stay small and add some awesome life to your tank. You can also add Otos because they're totally different from Corys...different food source, different behavior, etc... I'd say those and a nice, peaceful centerpiece fish...and you've got yourself a beautiful, cycled and stocked tank

 

[librarygirl]

Your cycle =

I like the thought of a ton of CPDs. My friend had about 4-5 and never saw them, but now he has 10-11 and says they're awesome little fish. Personally I don't care for livebearers, but if you like the Guppies...go for it . You wouldn't regret Corys. Pandas stay small and add some awesome life to your tank. You can also add Otos because they're totally different from Corys...different food source, different behavior, etc... I'd say those and a nice, peaceful centerpiece fish...and you've got yourself a beautiful, cycled and stocked tank

Thanks Eco! I hope I see the CPDs lol I fell in love with them when I saw them but know they can be shy, so I figure a larger number and putting them in first might help.

You know, I've never liked guppies. Then I saw the cobras at the LFS and wow so pretty, the colors and their long fins are stunning. I'm still undecided on them really, but I haven't seen anything else that has caught my eye either (recommendations welcome, btw ). I was going to go with a centerpiece (dwarf or honey gourami) but given all of the issues people are having with them I've decided not to do it. Hm, I never thought of adding Otos and Cory's, that's interesting! I know the CPDs are going in first and I'll be content with them for a while until I figure everything else out.

I'm excited!!! Now all I need is a blue tube.