Help with water quality

[Stanman227]

Test strips check out fine alkalinity just a tad high other then that it’s fine. My orandas aren’t very active so I’m worried the water quality might be bad should I do a water changed? This is a freshly setup tank I just put the fish in yesterday

 

[Aiken Drum]

Unfortunately the test strip doesnt test for ammonia which will where water quality issues will first show up.

Test strips are generally not very accurate, they could easily be showing things are fine when in reality they arent.

Your nitrate is zero, which is a sign you arent cycled. Did you cycle the tank before getting the fish? If so, how did you do this? Or are you going to cycle the tank with fish? If so, do you know how to do this? Or is this the first you have heard of the nitrogen cycle and cycling a tank?

Without a reliable test for ammonia change half the water every day until you can test for it. I would get a liquid test kit rather than strips. API freshwater master test kit is a good one to go for. It covers what you need, is fairly reliable and easy to use, and as you get 100s of tests from the kit much more cost effective long run than strips.

How big is your tank? How many orandas do you have in there?

 

[Stanman227]

Reply thanks for the help

Unfortunately the test strip doesnt test for ammonia which will where water quality issues will first show up.

Test strips are generally not very accurate, they could easily be showing things are fine when in reality they arent.

Your nitrate is zero, which is a sign you arent cycled. Did you cycle the tank before getting the fish? If so, how did you do this? Or are you going to cycle the tank with fish? If so, do you know how to do this? Or is this the first you have heard of the nitrogen cycle and cycling a tank?

Without a reliable test for ammonia change half the water every day until you can test for it. I would get a liquid test kit rather than strips. API freshwater master test kit is a good one to go for. It covers what you need, is fairly reliable and easy to use, and as you get 100s of tests from the kit much more cost effective long run than strips.

How big is your tank? How many orandas do you have in there?

I have 2 orandas in a 75 gallon i attempted to start the cycle before I got the fish with cycle booster and little bits of food. But I’m not sure I did everything right cause the tanks very cloudy

 

[Aiken Drum]

The cloudiness is a normal part of the cycling process and is bacteria feeding on nutrient imbalances and growing in such numbers you can see them in the water. It's called a bacterial bloom. The cycling process grows a different bacteria that will outcompete the ones causing the cloudiness which will die off as your cycle establishes and the water should become clear over time.

Cycling a tank before you get fish can take a few weeks, maybe months. And adding cycle booster and a bit of food isnt going to do it. You are now doing a fish in cycle.

What cycle booster did you use?

For now, do those daily water changes. When you have a reliable test kit that tests for ammonia, nitrite and nitrate you can start to cycle the tank. Test daily for ammonia and nitrite. Add those test results together. If the combined total of those 2 tests is higher than 0.5ppm combined change enough water to bring it below that 0.5ppm combined target. Once you are seeing zero ammonia and nitrite in your daily tests you are cycled.

Adding some more of the cycle booster might help. They dont always work very well, but some are better than others. If you know anyone who keeps fish, assuming their fush are healthy, see if you can get a little filter media or a sponge from their filter and either put the filter media in your filter, or squeeze the dirty sponge into your aquarium.

 

[Stanman227]

The cloudiness is a normal part of the cycling process and is bacteria feeding on nutrient imbalances and growing in such numbers you can see them in the water. It's called a bacterial bloom. The cycling process grows a different bacteria that will outcompete the ones causing the cloudiness which will die off as your cycle establishes and the water should become clear over time.

Cycling a tank before you get fish can take a few weeks, maybe months. And adding cycle booster and a bit of food isnt going to do it. You are now doing a fish in cycle.

What cycle booster did you use?

For now, do those daily water changes. When you have a reliable test kit that tests for ammonia, nitrite and nitrate you can start to cycle the tank. Test daily for ammonia and nitrite. Add those test results together. If the combined total of those 2 tests is higher than 0.5ppm combined change enough water to bring it below that 0.5ppm combined target. Once you are seeing zero ammonia and nitrite in your daily tests you are cycled.

Adding some more of the cycle booster might help. They dont always work very well, but some are better than others. If you know anyone who keeps fish, assuming their fush are healthy, see if you can get a little filter media or a sponge from their filter and either put the filter media in your filter, or squeeze the dirty sponge into your aquarium.

I used fluval cycle booster and bio enhancer I used both. I have to go get another bulb for my light I will purchase the better test kit then. I have a 25 gallon tank that’s crystal clear and has been established for a year there’s plenty of algae and bacteria on the filter should I shake some off into my tank? Also do you think the cycle is affecting the gold fish? They’re still eating and sifting and what not but they don’t swim around much, maybe they’re still getting used to their tank? Also I did a 65% water change today I was almost gonna do more but it’s too cold out and I’m on well water so my water is cold and I didn’t wanna swap out too much of the warmer water.

I had just squeezed the fikter from my established tank in with the orandas hopefully that will help the cycle a little

Should I use a clarifier?

 

[Aiken Drum]

Im not sure what fluval bioenhancer is, cant find much reference to it online. It may be an identical product to Fluval Cycle, but in a different branded bottle. Fluval cycle is a bacterial booster that claims to cycle a tank, but i wouldnt say its one of the better ones. Ive used it, with no noticable effect. Fritz have several products that come highly recommended. Ive used Dr Tims One and Only to good effect, and Tetra Safestart is essentiallt identical to One and Only as Dr Tim is the developer of both products.

Squeezing a sponge from your established filter into the water close to the filter intake will get a lot of those microbes you need into your filtration, and speed up the process considerably.

Impossible to say if not being cycled is effecting your fish. Ammonia is the first waste product to show up and you can't test for it. All we can say is that your test shows zero nitrite and nitrate, so none of the ammonia your fish are producing is being cycled out. Observing your fish will be a good indication, but if you did a big water change things should be ok for a day or 2. Its a big tank, with 2 smallish fish, so there is quite a lot of dilution.

Clarifiers clump together fine particles so that your filtration can more easily remove them. Your cloudiness is caused by bacteria, so a clarifier wont do anything. As long as the cloudiness isnt a long term thing its not going to be harmful. Water changes will clear it up a bit temporarily, and getting cycled will clear it up longer term. The cloudiness might be around for a week or 2. As said its normal, most new tanks through this.

 

[stevehernes]

If your test strips show that the water quality is generally fine with just a slightly elevated alkalinity, and considering the tank is newly set up with the fish introduced only yesterday, it's normal for fish to take some time to acclimate to their new environment. Fish, including orandas, may exhibit less activity initially as they adjust.

 

[stevehernes]

Another crucial aspect to consider is regularly testing your water for lead. It's an important routine that contributes to the overall safety of your water supply. I recommend using lead test strips, which are conveniently available on amazon. These strips provide a cost-effective solution, and a single purchase can last for a considerable period.

 

[Aiken Drum]

Another crucial aspect to consider is regularly testing your water for lead. It's an important routine that contributes to the overall safety of your water supply. I recommend using lead test strips, which are conveniently available on amazon. These strips provide a cost-effective solution, and a single purchase can last for a considerable period.

Ive never heard of anyone testing for lead in an aquarium. What level of lead would you say is safe in aquariums?

 

[Andy Sager]

Ive never heard of anyone testing for lead in an aquarium. What level of lead would you say is safe in aquariums?

There is an issue here in the States with lead pipes that have corroded and releasing lead into the water. I was looking around to see if anybody came up with a definitive answer on it's safety in aquariums and see a lot of misinformation. So here's the poop on what I know about lead because I use it in my business: PURE lead ( a.k.a. Soft lead), like the kind they use for plant weights, has no other chemicals in it and unless you are using a lot of it, should not be toxic in a FRESHWATER aquarium IF you use it in higher Ph water ( 8.0 and higher). The lower the Ph falls from 8.0, the faster the lead will dissolve. Lead is a heavy metal so unless you are using a product that continually removes heavy metals 24/7 in lower Ph water, there is a possibility of lead contamination in the tank.
The use of lead sinkers made for fishing is a whole other animal. It is not PURE lead. Lead fishing sinkers are mainly made of Hard lead. Hard lead is a combination of lead, antimony and often another metal. Since the other metals are not disclosed, it's hard to definitively say that they are aquarium safe at any Ph. So to answer your question of " How much is safe...?" the answer would be 0 of dissolved lead is safe. Thankfully, many water conditioners deal with dissolved heavy metals from the start but only the polyfilter ( that I know of) removes them continually.

 

[Aiken Drum]

I have professionally dealt with lead contamination and risk assessing mitigation measures. I also work with water supplies and my wifes job is organising lead pipe replacement for our local water company.

The concentration of lead that is hazardous is difficult to quantify, because lead builds up and its repeated exposure over a long period of time that the risk comes from. You can be exposed to very high levels of lead with no harm if it isnt frequent, and you can be exposed to very low levels of lead and it build up to toxic levels if you are frequently exposed over an extended period of time.

We had a school site that was contaminated to higher levels than should be allowed on a school. It was determined that a child would need to ingest a bucketfull of contaminated soil every day for 30 years before there was a realistic risk of health issues though. We obviously erred on the side of caution because we are dealing with children, so we carried out ground remediation. But the risk was very low despite the lead levels being considered toxic.

Fish are smaller than people, so smaller quantities of lead will be toxic. Fish also don't normally live as long as people, so they won't be exposed to it over decades which is where the risk would come from in people. If you arent thinking about eating the fish, i wouldnt be concerned about lead in the water. You will never get to a level of zero lead if you are using water from the tap, but if your water does come down a lead pipe then run the tap for a minute or 2 before drinking it, and if you can get the pipework replaced with a safer alternative then do so.

 

[Andy Sager]

Here in the States, there is a move towards replacing the lead pipes. Thankfully, I'm almost 100% PVC pipe at my well into the house. It's a mobile home so I doubt there is much lead piping in here. I had a water company here a while back and they found no lead or other metals in my water. ( They found other things to try and sell me a filtering system. LOL )

 

[Aiken Drum]

10ppm of lead is allowed in our tap water and we have 0.7ppm out of our tap which would be lower than an over the counter lead test could detect. From recollection, you need to let water sit in a degraded lead pipe for several days before it would get above that 10ppm limit, but thats possible if you had a tap you didn't regularly use. If that was the case id be more concerned about legionnaires disease though.

 

[Andy Sager]

But we are not fish and fish are not humans.