Teething Issues With My New Tank

[JoshuaA]

TLR end of the topic

I think I should start with an introduction to who I am, So I am new to the tropical fish forums I found this forum whilst searching frantically a few nights ago for tropical fish troubleshooting, Unfortunately I have no tropical fish for dummies book at hand!

My name is Josh, I'm 19 and I live on the Wirral which for most people I imagine you would have a vague idea where that is. This is the first time I have kept fish myself many years ago when I was younger the family use to have cold water fish and in my memory it seemed to go flawlessly (I'm sure there were deaths that were kept under wraps so that my fragile little young heart was not broken). Once when I was younger me and my brother had a hamster bought for us each and well mine had multi coloured eyes... it died the first night and my mother tried to replace it only forgetting about the eyes... straight away I noticed this and was informed at such a young gullible age that the hamster had simple out growing its colour eye.

Anyway some background to my pet area, I currently have 2 rabbits, 4 gerbils and a Border Collie. Apart from the gerbils everything has gone flawlessly and then it came to these fish. I previously worked in a medium sized pet store working in the pet section for rabbits/guinea pigs as well as birds so if any of you guys have problems or want advice I may be able to help, the store also had a large aquatic selection... in fact the store was based around this fact, as I was on the pet side I unfortunately did not have the chance to delve into learning about aquatic pet care which is now to be my undoing.

So the scenario I am currently facing is....

1) I bought my girlfriend a Hagen Elite Style 60 aquarium from Petsathome
2) Following the advice given by the storeworkers (various ones, I decided I would not listen to just one and would ask multiple to make sure their stories were straight!, there were slight differences in what they were saying.)
3) Took the tank home and I following their advice set the tank up.

The tank setup was like this.... Small sized gravel washed thoroughly until the water ran clean, placed it in the tank across the bottom, filled the tank half way with water then placed in the ornaments which are 2 small ornaments small enough for small fish to get into, a medium sized vase. 2 false plastic plants... I continued to fill the tank to its top and then I submerged the filter into the tank for a minute to make sure it was full of water placed it onto the side of the tank, placed the heater into the tank... Walked away came back 15 minutes turned the heater and the filter on and smiled then finally added my de-chlorinater (Nutrafin Aqua Plus).

4) A week after the initial set-up we were informed that adding fish would be the next stop (Petsathome advice) so we go to the shop ask what fish would be ideal, ask us what fish we intend to keep... end of the day we end up with 5 neon tetras... So we think great... Take them home pop them in the tank in their bag and wait 15 or so minutes, we then open the bag and gently cup some tank water into the bag that they're in and slowly add more and more then some 30 minutes after doing that we gently release them into the tank. My girlfriend is extremely happy with this.

5) The whole week we had no problem... apart from one poor neon had found itself trapped behind the filter whilst we had gone out and unfortunately had perished. There is a small groove on the back of the filter and the filter uses suction cups to hold onto the glass presenting a small gap for a neon to slip into. The neon was stuck in the groove half way down the filter and he could of been in there for anything up to 6 hours. Both me and my girlfriend were somewhat upset about this.

6) We go back to the shop at the start of week 2 with livestock and they say we would be able to introduce 5 more fish to the tank, they said Guppies would get along fine with neons and at this stage in the tank they should be fine. We select the guppies, take a gravel siphon and some additional water treatment and 3 live plants.

7) We get back... Oh dear a Neon has died... again it seems to have got itself trapped under an ornament this time which is causing a little suspicion... I remove it from the tank and place it in a freezer bag (I learnt from where I worked they will always want physical evidence of your fishes death and rather than letting it decompose you may as well freeze it). We think to ourselves we will let this one go.

8) We do a water change using the gravel siphon cleaning the bottom of the tank taking 15% of the water out, we then fill a bag of water up and introduce it to the tank in the bag, I had a small portion of our Nutrafin Aqua safe, give it a small stir put a thermometer inside the bag and see how it is going. Left it for 15 minutes (with the guppies sitting in the water in their bag too doing the same with what I did with the neons). The thermometer in the bag of water showed that it was at the same temperature I added tank water to that bag and then waited 5 minutes and gradually added the fresh water the bag. (I forgot to add I also took the filter sponges out and squeeze them in the tank water I had removed with the siphon). The guppies and the neons were now happily swimming around in the tank... once again my girlfriend was happy.

(Forgot to add we also got 1 replacement neon with the guppies as he said in the store it would be fine).

9) At the end of the night from adding the guppies I had noticed one of the guppies had a split tail. Next night all the fish were happy going along until one of the guppies seem to stop swimming and gradually edge its way to the bottom of the tank... it took 30 minutes for this guppy to pass away (turned on its side and gills had stopped move and lay on the gravel). I was furious and insisted I would go back to the shop and complain, unfortunately it was around 22:00pm at the time and that wasn't really an option so the next day I tell my girlfriend to come pick me up in the morning and we will go and complain, unfortunately during the night another guppy with split tail had died. We were so confused I told my girlfriend to get a sample of water. (At that point I had realised the shops advice was complete bollocks, I looked through learnt everything there was to know about the Nitrogen cycle. I had then suspected the ammonia to be causing a problem with this.)

10) The man in the shop said they would replace the guppies however I said I didn't want to replace them until my water was ok to add them, I asked about bringing them until the water was suitable and apparently it was not an option. I asked them to do a water test, Ph/Nitrite/Nitrate all came out fine... infact nitrate was at 0ppm, however Ammonia was around 1ppm. I had asked is this ok? He said unfortunately your ammonia is a little high but thats it, he advised against using a ammonia remover as it wasn't necessary at this stage. Turned to my girlfriend asking... how come this guy hasn't picked up on the fact there is no nitrite, this is nearly 2 weeks with livestock and he hasn't commented on the fact it hasn't even moved a stage up in the nitrogen cycle. I began to ignore his advice he advised against doing water changes and the information I had read on various websites all pointed towards "Water change nao! 50%!".

We bought an API master test kit and went on our way. Got home did a 20% change... left it for a few hours... 1ppm on the ammonia.

Next day after reading over advice to counter ammonia they I got the idea of doing a 50% water change... from doing Chemistry and Physics at A level I really thought... Goodbye Ammonia... I'm going to half your concentration.... We do the change make sure the water is correct temperature etc, a few hours later I say lets do our test... My eyes were astonished, I did a second take, I rubbed them I did everything possible.... 1ppm on ammonia everything else the same... Woah I thought #136###?

Next day another guppy died, freezer bag for the guppy! Both me and my girlfriend were getting distressed over this now. I had got in contact with an old friend for many years ago and found out he had 3 large tropical aquarium tanks... he offered to give me some help. So in preparation we did another 50% water change... few hours later still 1ppm on the Ammonia.

I got to my friends with a clean plastic tub (not washed with chemicals and dry), He takes me to an aquarium tank with Parrot fish, plecos and some sort of catfish and says I'll give you a good squeeze off the filter, he filled my tub up half way with tank water and then gave it a big squeeze from the filter sponge into my tub. So I rush back to my girlfriends house take our filter apart and put the filter sponges in this pot, I shake the pot up and leave them in the pot for a few minutes ( still warm ). I then reassemble the filter with the sponges in place and pour the remaining water into the filter housing and close it up. Put the filter on and think to my self Ahhhh I can relax now.

Next day we do a water test... 1ppm Ammonia... So I think perhaps there might be some Nitrite? Nope.... 0ppm ... perhaps nitrate? nope 0ppm.

My friend is somewhat confused how after nearly 3 weeks in what appears to be Ammonia rich water there has been no signs of the nitrogen cycle taking place, he also is confused also by the fact that at a 50% water change hasn't affected the levels of ammonia at all!

That night my friend offered for me to take a big scoop of his gravel, So I go to his house with a bigger tub (The sort of plastic tub those chinese take aways give you (but double sized!) He puts a few cups of water into it and then nets out 2 large nets worth of gravel. The tub is full to the brim with this gravel. I then take this gravel instantly back to my girlfriends and spread it out around the tank across the top of our gravel....

Next day... (Today)

Ammonia : 1ppm
Nitrite : 0ppm
Nitrate : 0ppm
PH : 7.6
Ph (high range) : 7.4

^ Little confused about the PH bit, I know they can't be perfectly accurate.

Anyway this morning it really baffled me the Ammonia hadn't gone Up or Down and there was no sign of a nitrogen cycle forming. My girlfriend questioned whether the two plants the tank are perhaps absorbing all the nitrate in the tank and in fact the cycle is going but we've just overloaded the bacteria.

I didn't know the answer to that one, however what I also didn't know the answer to was...

I have a 2 litre bottle, 1 litre of coke and 1 litre of water... I take 50% of this mixture out and replace it with water. I now have 25% Coke and 75% water correct? Why has the Ammonia not been affected by these water changes.

I did multiple tests this morning I tested from the top area of the tank and then put my finger over the edge of the vial and went to the bottom of the tank and tested it from there.

The results were no different.


Please help, I unfortunately have no place to rehome these fish and my friend has said the neons are adapting quite well to the conditions as they are lively all day long but the last guppy is likely to die even though it is very active. He doesn't have any tanks to take them.

The final theory I have on this one in my mind is that the Nutrafin Aqua plus is somehow effecting the results of the test? I'm using an API Master Test kit and that water conditioner... is there any known issues with these two products?

Will my water changes of helped even though the results show it hasn't? Has my filter squeeze and gravel helped introduce the bacteria I need?

tl:dr - Poor advice from shop resulting in multiple fish dying on new aquarium setup. What ever I do the ammonia won't change from 1ppm even after 50% water changes it still is at 1ppm. I introduced some mature gravel from a friends aquarium I also took a squeeze from his filter sponge and soaked my filter sponges in it. I am using Nutrafin Aqua plus for a water conditioner and I'm using an API master test kit. I currently have 4 Neon Tetras left and 1 Guppy fish.

Any advice would be helpful, I've been trawling through your forum for a day or so now and noticed some great advice so will welcome it with open arms. However, I currently finding issues for re homing these fish so preferably a way of doing this without.

P.s Sorry for the Wall of Text.

Edit: Also sorry for poorly constructed sentences and spelling mistakes. I don't proof read until after I have posted.

 

[ravkular]

I know that the Elite Tanks come with Stingray filters. Have you tried removing the zeolite/carbon cartridges from the filter, and replacing this with some more sponge? I think that the carbon can cause problems when it becomes full...

 

[JoshuaA]

I know that the Elite Tanks come with Stingray filters. Have you tried removing the zeolite/carbon cartridges from the filter, and replacing this with some more sponge? I think that the carbon can cause problems when it becomes full...

I read something similar to that and that they need to be replaced after 4 weeks, also that if they expire or degrade they end up releasing. I had bought another carbon cartridge so I could try grab some filter sponge.

If I were to buy new filter sponge would you recommend me placing it in my friends filter for a day or so in the hope to attract some bacteria?

Thanks for the fast response also.

 

[Twinklecaz]

I've got exactly the same tank as you and I replaced the filter with a Fluval. Dont know how much difference this makes because I'm having a difficult cycle myself but the water definitely looks cleaner.

Mind you, I think the Fluvals have that carbon sponge crap in them too. I don't really understand about all that.

What do you think of the light in the Elite 60?

 

[JoshuaA]

I've got exactly the same tank as you and I replaced the filter with a Fluval. Dont know how much difference this makes because I'm having a difficult cycle myself but the water definitely looks cleaner.

Mind you, I think the Fluvals have that carbon sponge crap in them too. I don't really understand about all that.

What do you think of the light in the Elite 60?

The water looks perfectly clear if I take a clear glass worth out and look at it I could easily mistake it for nice toasty glass of healthy water! It has that fishy smell involved with it though.

I was considering changing the filter on day one I was somewhat unimpressed when I looked at it after opening the box up. I was expecting something a little bit more... more well designed I guess? Feels like the design is pretty poor inside. The stingray 15 though has the carbon/zeolite cartridges either side of the motor/impeller pump thing and can easily be removed, however as someone suggested by adding more filter sponge inside I am unsure whether this will drastically decrease water flow.

The light though... I quite like it, it's a solid white light for me and looks great when the rest of the room is dark. Seems to be the second heater of the tank though. Have you had a bad experience with the light? Can I expect it to explode and spill powder out everywhere?

Back in the petstore I use to work in whenever one of these bulbs blew or expired we use to get a few of them together and then smashed them all at once for the vaccuum pop in the bin. Sad minds....

Can I ask how you angled your filter outlet? I have my filter on the back left and the heater on the back right. Currently the filter propels water towards the front right so diagonally (I thought that having it propel into the largest path/largest area of free water would allow it to dissipate the filtered water better than just hitting the side of the tank straight away). Anyway would you suggest changing it to a Fluval filter as well or at least a better quality more up market filter? I don't mind splashing cash out on this thing as long as it doesn't end up with me having to replace the whole tank.

If I were to buy a new filter would you recommend me running the filter in my friends tank for a week before putting it in my tank so that it would home our much wanted friendly bacteria?

 

[waterdrop]

Hi Josh and welcome to the beginners section,

I'll write more when I get time later today. Above info is correct, you need to get rid of the Zeolite. Please read the article by rabbut about Fish-In Cycling in the Beginners Resource Center. You are in a Fish-In cycling situation and need to be doing much, much larger and more frequent water changes with good technique (conditioner at 1.5x the instructed amount and roughly matching the water temp - your hand is good enough for this.)

~~waterdrop~~

 

[Twinklecaz]

Lol i had all mine positioned exactly the same. I think the Fluval seems a good filter yeaha A lot of people here seem to like it. Yeah if you put it in your friend's tank I would have thought it would pick up some bacteria, good idea.

No prob with the light, I just thought the same as you - that it seems to heat the tank a bit. I havent had it on while I've been cycling and I've noticed that the temperature of my tank has stabilised. Not sure what to do about that really coz I thought Halogen bulbs wern't supposed to emit any heat.

Mind you, you can touch it! So maybe not!

 

[JoshuaA]

Hi Josh and welcome to the beginners section,

I'll write more when I get time later today. Above info is correct, you need to get rid of the Zeolite. Please read the article by rabbut about Fish-In Cycling in the Beginners Resource Center. You are in a Fish-In cycling situation and need to be doing much, much larger and more frequent water changes with good technique (conditioner at 1.5x the instructed amount and roughly matching the water temp - your hand is good enough for this.)

~~waterdrop~~

Hi, thanks for your welcoming approach!

I indeed use something along those lines of that quantity of water conditioner if not more, I use the thermometer to match the water temperatures perfectly because I'm pretty poor at gauging it with my hand and want to minimise stress as well as letting it settle.

I have been doing many water changes and the big big problem I am getting is... its making no difference? Using the API Master test kit, I have had no other reading but 1ppm of Ammonia. That is the only read out I've ever had from my tank water. I will test the tap water though next time I am at my girlfriends just in case there is something more in depth going on. However I just can't understand how doing a 50% water change, effectively halving the concentration of Ammonia still results in exactly the same ammonia reading.

I will phone my girlfriend immediately to tell her to remove the Zeolite/Carbon chip cartridges then. Shall I replace this with more foam?

Edit: After reading the guide, I will be removing the cartridges and performing another large water change. Will the introduction of mature gravel and filter squeezee perhaps helped the tank begin to cycle? Or having introduced the mature gravel and having the zeolite/carbon cartridges reduced the chances of it ever happening?

There is also a comment on the guide topic about the fact Nitrate will be very low and ammonia should be absorbed by the plants. Would it be more ideal to leave the plants in during this stage to help contribute to lowering the ammonia levels or should I remove it so that I know when the nitrate levels are increasing?

 

[JoshuaA]

Unfortunately my girlfriend just phoned me after worked to say the 5th and final guppy has passed away. He was very lively this afternoon...

I'm so frustrated with myself for listening to the LFS worker on this, its ridiculous they guide people into these situations, probably so they can flog them craptons of additional products.

Can someone tell me whether doing something over 50 - 75% water change would be ok to help run out the ammonia? I feel taking the neons out and just smashing this tank on the floor its caused nothing but heart ache for my girlfriend.

I've got the dead fish in a freezer bag as evidence and I will be throwing them at the store worker when I see in the next few days. Is this blatant disregard for helpful and useful advice concurrent throughout the entire country?

Edit:

Guppy had sadly passed away, the 4 remaining Neons "appear" fine, lively and active happily investigate my hand when I put it in the tank to clean so I assume the signs are good. I have removed one of the plants as it appear to be weakening at the leaves and would run a risk of rotting. I trimmed one of the plants and re-potted the trimming after I was informed that this plant would continue to grow from its trimmings.

Me and my girlfriend scrubbed the glass edges and took all the ornaments out cleaned the heater and the filter casing everything possible. We then used the gravel filter to remove 50% of the water (whilst cleaning the gravel of course). We then added water back up to full volume at the same temperature with generous amounts of water conditioner allowing time for it to work. We then repeated the steps by once again doing another 50% water change and continued to vacuum the gravel little if not nothing at all was removed this time from the gravel. We then filled the tank back up repeating the same previous steps.

Neons are actually swimming around even more than before and seemed more than happy to come have a good sniff of my hand. Left the water to settle for an hour (watched Graham Norton) then ran another water test. Test showed a result of between 0.25/0.5 Ammonia. We will be doing the same tomorrow as a standard 50% never made a difference. We're going to be both very annoyed if we come back tomorrow and find the ammonia back up at 1.0ppm.

Following the advice from a previous poster we also removed the Carbon/Zeolite chip cartridges and discarded them.

 

[Macro]

I may have missed it above but what do your straight tap water parameters test at?

 

[Gvilleguy]

Joshua - I have no helpful advice as I am a beginner and still doing my first fishless cycle. I am glad I snooped around this forum and just happened to read up on cycling before trying to buy fish. I'm sorry you lost the guppies and have had all this trouble. I'll be looking forward to more news on how it's going for you.

 

[waterdrop]

Yes, sorry to be so long. You are using excellent technique with your water changes - very glad to hear that. Also glad that you are using a gravel cleaner (I assume a gravel cleaner siphon that helps you clean the gravel as you siphon water out, right?) You need to deep clean the gravel each time as the way the water comes out - this will help make the water change even more effective. To answer your question, yes, you can absolutely go higher than 50% when you change. A lot of people misunderstand this. When you get ammonia as high as 1ppm it becomes much more of a hazard to the fish than the danger of shock from the larger water change. So don't hesitate to change water down as low as you can go and still have your fish in a reasonable little bit to swim around (an inch or so.) More percentage and greater frequency of water changes will be your friend (well, your fish's friend if not yours )

Don't know how much of your other water conditioner you bought or how fast its going down, but I like to recommend Seachem Prime as the conditioner of choice, especially for both the fish-in situation and because its a beginning tank for the first year. Prime is very concentrated so it will last and last, but the important part is what a good job it does neutralizing problems and since you'll be doing a lot of water changes, it will get used a fair amount.

OK, now for the bad news. We've had a fair number of members who have given up on the stingray filters in frustration after trying to make them work for weeks on end. There are others who have just replaced them immediately but there are also a few who seem to have the touch and have been able to modify then (replacing the zeolite/carbon mixture with little special cut sponges or something else (not sure)) and then get them to work in an understocked tank. Most people replace them with Fluval internals which are the filter of choice when doing internals and doing small tanks such as yours. (Although a small external cannister or small HOB could work too.) Filters are a complicated subject but are core to the hobby. The general pecking order in quality is internal, HOB, external cannister(EC) and then sump. But internals and external cannisters are quieter than HOBs or Sumps. (Sumps of course are for much larger tanks.) HOBs and ECs have the greatest ease of maintenance and ECs are probably the nicest in terms of media flexibility. In most filters we try for 5x tank turnover assuming we can find the true flow rate spec from the vendor. This means it pumps the volume of the tank times 5 in one hour. If you stick with the stingray then no, you don't want to stuff sponge in such that you clog its passageways I don't think. Instead the replacement media should attempt to occupy the same positions and allow flow in much the same way.

OK, getting back to the fish-in cycle. The goal of a fish-in cycle of course is to reach a state where ammonia and nitrite are always zero and nitrate(NO3) is somewhere about 15 to 20ppm -above- whatever the tap nitrate level is. Your goal as a fish-in cycler is to be a bit of a detective and figure out what percentage and frequency of water changes will keep your ammonia and nitrite(NO2) below 0.25ppm until you can be back home for the next test and potential water change. As you've already seen this can take some pretty large and intense water changing. BUT, I think you'll find that if you do some of that it will settle down and become easier to maintain -- in the beginning its worse. Be aware that there are products like the "Python" that can make water replacement easier and people also make homemade versions of these. With your size tank though that may be overkill.

A fish-in cycle can be very frustrating because the water changing essentially hides the progress feedback from your testing. You have to just go on faith that it will eventually get there after a month or two. The way you know the cycle is over is if you can go two days without changing any water but get zero ppm ammonia and zero ppm nitrite all through both days (4 tests 12 hours apart more or less.) When that happens you know you are probably cycled and you just have to watch it continue to do that for a week to prove itself.

Good luck and hang in there. I'm sure our many great members here will help and I'll of course try to pop back in when I can.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[JoshuaA]

Just a quick one

Tap water is at

Ammonia 0ppm
Nitrite 0ppm
Nitrate 0ppm

After the multiple water changes

Amoonia 0.25ppm
Nitrite 0ppm
Nitrate 0ppm

- Waterdrop

Me and my girlfriend did multiple 50% water changes over the last few days sometimes twice a day to decrease the ammonia levels. We have got it to down to around 0.25 we've pretty much took everything out and cleaned it each time. The gravel siphon is indeed what you say, the technique I use is to get the siphon going and then dig the siphon head into the gravel until the water that is extracted runs cleans, then move the head and repeat. We've pretty much got to the stage not much at all is being removed but water with the gravel siphon.

The neons are happily swimming around still and even during the water changes they're easy to herd into the corner I set up a corner with plants to convince them to stay in that section of the tank and it works.

I will be going to replace the filter sometime today with my girlfriend will avoid any filter that boasts carbon and zeolite chips! Will also purhcase the water conditioner what you reccomend online. With the frequency and quantity of water changes I think we've gone through near half a bottle of this aqua plus.

I have noticed since last night that when looking at the string ray filter most of the water flow seems to divert the sponges and instead it goes through the top of the case and out through the pump, I guess if this is the case for the majority of the water flow then there isn't much use with it. Should I consider putting the stingray media into the new filter in case there are a few bacterial colonies or just throwing it away?

Thanks for the help again!

 

[JoshuaA]

Hey Again

Just bought a Fluval U2 for my tank and am a litle bit stumped, it has 3 slots.. two are the same with a foam filtering pad and then the centre has something called "Poly/Carbon" I don' want to sound too stupid but from what I know that basically is a substance with plastic qualities correct?

It has something called "Biomax nodes" To me it just sounds like a fancy word for something a little less spectacular. Anyway I got this filter for £16 from petsathome as they owed me back on the fish and the cartridges from the stingray.

Finally, this one is directed at waterdrop. I have acquired some more thick plastic bags (The kind you get your fish in) so that I can speed up the water changing process and add 3 x as much water. However me and my girlfriend are wondering... will this stress the neons out more the fact that their water level drops to say 20/30% and then magically rises to 100% in say 15 minutes? I was advised from the shop worker to keep the stingray filter running whilst I added this filter, however from the fact that there is clearly no trace of the nitrogen cycle taken place and no real point leaving a poorly functioning filter in the tank?

Thanks for the advice again, followed the 5 x flow rate as well and th filter apparently can do 400L/H, obviously manufacturer claims are different to reality but it will at least be above 300L so it could be somewhere between 5 - 6 x an hour.

God bless these neon.

 

[Twinklecaz]

Well now we not only have the same tank but the same filter so let me know how you get on. I think the biomax is meant to be quite good though something else can shed some more light on there.

I hope you love the silence of it.