New Tank, Goldfish, Auto-Feeder, Nitrogen Cycle

[goonsquad]

Hi Group,

I'm a new member and this board is great. Here's my problem.

My wife bought a 5.5 gallon tank and a small (1 inch) fancy goldfish on a whim for her preschool class. I'm trying to help her figure out how to keep the fish from dying while surviving the nitrogen cycle. So I have two questions.

1) Since the tank is already set up, is there anything I can do to keep the fish alive during the first month or so other than frequent dechlorinated partial water changes?

2) Since the tank is set up at my wife's preschool, this means that she will not be there to feed them for 2 days every week. I've heard that fish can survive for a couple days without food but assume that 2 days out of every 7 without food will not be good for them. Can anyone comment on this? I'm looking at one of those aquachef auto-feeders to be set up and turned on every weekend.

Thanks!

 

[jsoong]

Welcome to AA!!

The easy question first: You can skip feeding for the WE without problem. Some people routinely skip feeding a day a week to help clean out the fish's digestive system. If that makes you uncomfortable, you can use an auto feeder. Alternatively, you can feed a bit of veggies on Friday afternoon <say a slice of cucumber or zucchini (blanched), spinach on a veggie clip, etc.> I generally leave veggies in the tank for a couple days & remove uneaten portion before it disintergrate. You can do this over a weekend.

The difficult part - how to keep a goldfish alive in a small tank during cycling.

First - a 5 gal is small for goldfish, and will require good maintenance even after cycling. During cycling, it is a challenge to keep parameters under control. My suggestions:

1. Get a bigger tank - a 20 gal is min for goldfish if you want low maintenance. I assume that this is not an option.
2. Consider getting a different fish - a betta is much better suited to the 5 than the gold, or maybe a few whitecloud or other small fish.
3. If you want to try keeping the goldfish in the 5, the best thing you can do is to seed the tank. If you have access to another mature tank, get some seeding material - part of a filter pad, squeezing of the gunk from the filter, etc. and put that into the 5's filter. The more you seed, the less severe the spikes will be during cycling.
4. Monitor NH3 & NO2 daily & do pwc as needed to keep levels below .5/.25. You will likely have to do daily water changes of 50-70%. In a cold water tank, you are looking at 6-8 weeks if you are cycling form scratch. (vs. a week or so if seeded).
5. You may consider using Prime or other conditioner with ammonia binding capability if you have unmanageable ammonia spikes.
6. You may consider adding low level of salt (0.05% or so) to protect against nitrite poisoning if you can't manage NO2 levels with pwc's.
7. Once all is settled, you will need to monitor the tank at least weekly (including nitrates) to know when the capacity of the tank is being exceeded. I would think that you will need to do 50% pwc once or twice a week after the tank is cycled, and even then, you would need to move the fish to bigger digs when it gets to be 3-4". <Maybe a year or 2. BTW, exceeding the carrying capacity of a small tank is the usual cause of the demise of goldies ... this gives rise to the usual estimate of a goldfish's live span to 1- 2 years ... A fancy gold in a proper setup should live 7+ years.>

 

[darkmule27]

1) Prime conditioner can help. Ammo-lock also can. Do not get ammonia removing filter cartridges as they do exactly what they say, thus stalling a cycle. PWCs will help a lot, especially with a goldfish. If you know anyone with a tank, see if you can get a handful of their gravel or an old filter cartridge to jumpstart the cycle. I like putting the seeding material in the fitler as it is hidden that way.

2) Not feeding one day is often actually recommended, so I don't think twice a week would be bad. Fish are cold-blooded, so they don't need daily meals like our warm-blooded friends do. With a preschool class, I would buy the autofeeder and have it run every day, so the kids are discouraged from giving the fish more food.

If the tank doesn't have a heater, it would be wise to invest in one to minimize temperature swings since many schools don't run heating/AC on weekends.

Also, it would be advisable to see if she can get a larger (10+ gallon) tank. I looked into getting a single fancy goldfish and many, many sites recommend 10-20 gallon at least for one. Make sure you can offer it some stimulation as they are social animals; flat marbles come highly recommended.
If a bigger tank isn't possible, then it would probably be best to return the goldfish and look into smaller fish, like neon tetras or guppies.

 

[goonsquad]

jsoong, thanks for the reply. The larger tank is not at option for the time being, but I'm fully prepared to upgrade the tank size when the fish increases in size. I'll probably just set up a new tank at home and bring the fish home. I wish we had known that a betta was a "betta" option at the time of the purchase, but as I said, it was an impulse buy--mind you not one I agreed with.

I'll have her continue monitoring ammonia, nitrites and nitrates daily over the next several weeks and try the conditioner if we can't keep the ammonia levels low with PWCs. If I continue with an unseeded tank, at what point should I see ammonia spike and then nitrites and then nitrates? Should the ammonia spike begin immediately, several days later, or what? I don't have access to seeding material since I don't really know anyone with aquariums.

Also, with regard to the temperature swings, this is definitely a concern for me. My wife and I went over the weekend to see what it was like and it was pretty comfortable. When it turns to winter though, I'm not sure what will happen with the temperature but we'll need to monitor it.

With regard to the sociability of goldfish, is it then recommended to keep at least 2 per tank, of course factoring the appropriate volume? Do marbles, plants, rocks, etc help?

 

[jsoong]

When you see your ammonia spike depends on the amounts fed, tank size & pwc's, and temp. I would expect to see it rising within the first week. With diligent pwc's, you won't see any high spike, but more a long plateau. This will slow down the cycle, but is better for the fish. If you keep the ammonia levels low, you will prob get a prolonged ammonia phase of a couple weeks before the nitrite phase. In a cold water tank, it might take a month or two for the nitrates to appear, esp. if you keep the levels low. <It took me over 10 weeks for the nitrite phase to finish when I did my original cycle. Someone once tried fishy cycling while maintaining near undetectable levels, and he reported a time of over 3 months before nitrates!>

Definitely watch the temp, esp. in a small tank where it is likely to swing. Fancy golds like to be kept in the low 70's, so if you are in a cold climate & they set back the thermostat at night, a heater is a good insurance.

Goldfish are schooling fish, but they tend to do OK on their own. They will learn to interact with the kids, coming over to check them out when they get near, etc. My kid's old school has a little indoor pond with golds & the fish all come up & "play" with the kids. <Just make sure the kids don't feed the fish their lunch!> I think if you have some gravel the fish can root around in, and maybe a plant or two (plastic/silk), he should be fine.