Adding Fish

[Lobster.Lounge]

I have some questions with regards to adding fish. my cycle is in the middle of its process, ammonia 0 nitrites high and nitrates high. can fish be introduced when the nitrites drop but the nitrates are still elevated of does everything have to essentially be 0. also, i am getting exodons, so its recommended that they are introduced to the tank as a shoal instead of at separate times. ive read that adding alot of fish at once can put stress on the filter and cause the tank to have to re-cycle. it will be 20 exodons in a 55 gal. i have 2-penguin 350 filters running. just want to make sure the tank doesnt go crazy when i put the fish in. Thanks, Lobster.Lounge

 

[symon_say]

You have to do a massive water change before introducing fish to your tank, you're almost there, if you're doing the cycle with 4-5ppm of ammonia you can introduce your full fish load if you want, cause fish won't put that much ammonia into water, if you finish the cycle and introduce just a few fish the bacteria will adapt to that ammount of waste and lower the colony numbers, and you'll have to introduce fish slowly like happens to me.

 

[Lobster.Lounge]

so if i were to do a 30 % water change in the middle of the cycle if wouldnt do anything to the cycle? and then i could just add all the fish? even with the high nitrite and nitrate? im not entirely sure. water change, add fish, good to go? haha im new

 

[waterdrop]

No, you've got the picture wrong. You must fully finish the fishless cycle before performing what we call the big water change, after which you can add any amount of fish up to and including what would be a full-capacity stocking of the tank.

In practice, hardly anyone ever fully stocks a tank as a first stocking right after their fishless cycle. Instead, there are usually other circumstances that change that plan. For instance, there are some species that should not be introduced until the tank has reached a certain age, regardless of it's state of cycle. There are other fish that are better introduced -after- other species they will be sharing the tank with. All these considerations are part of the black art we call "stocking plans." Stocking plans contain not only lists of fish but also the planning of the timing of fish introductions, ideally. A fairly typical scenerio is to do a significant stocking of the most hardy fish, including whole shoals perhaps, and then wait to introduce more delicate species or species that are expensive or will be your "centerpiece" fish. Since fish always have a greater likelihood of survival in a more mature tank, it makes sense for the most expensive fish sometimes to be introduced significantly later.

In the course of fishless cycling, the members will sometimes advise a water change to raise your pH or to remove excess nitrates or to otherwise refresh your fishless cycle and give it a kick. That type of water change is always down to the gravel, a partial water change has no meaning if you don't have fish of course.

But before you end your cycle and get fish, you want to "qualify" the biofilter you've been creating. A biofilter "qualifies" when it can drop 5ppm of dosed ammonia down to zero ppm ammonia and zero ppm nitrite within 12 hours of when the ammonia was dosed for 7 days in a row. (Thus we call that the "qualifying week.") This is the big ending you will see people talking about on and on in all the many fishless cycle threads here in our subforum.

Good luck and I'm sure the members will help you out, they're great! Just keep asking questions.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[Lobster.Lounge]

Wow, just learned a whole lot. definitly going to read that again a few times. i should have specified more though. i am doing a fish in cycle, 10 red eyed tetras, after which i will be giving them to a friend. i will definitly be introducing the cory before the exodons to give them a good amount of time to get comfortable before the exodons are introduced. i suppose more patience is required. i just feel sort of rushed because the lfs is holding them for me. i guess i could always just order more, but theyre not always available. i started my cycle january 12. currently my ammonia is 0 consistently, and my nitrite seems to be starting to get lower, with my nitrate being maxed. would a water change be beneficial to the cycle? theres also a slight cloud where the water pours into the tank from both filters, which ive heard is good? bacteria colonizing or something along those lines. hopefully im going to finish this cycle soon. im too excited! any more advice would be great. that was a great read! Thanks Waterdrop

 

[Lobster.Lounge]

bump

 

[fishkeeper35]

i dont think the red eye tetras are going to last that long with the exodons... or the cories looks like they will be the exodons lunch...

 

[waterdrop]

Hello L.L, Sorry, more or less first time I've been back on in a while. Let us (the other members will probably help before I can get back to it) know what kind of numbers you mean when you say your nitrites(NO2) are high in the middle of your fish-in cycle.

Nitrites will of course try to spike on you and will be very random about when they do this but your job as a fish-in cycler is to never let this get away from you!

The goal of fish-in cycling (fish-in cycling is all focused on the fish, not really the cycling) is to figure out a pattern of percentage and frequency of gravel-clean-water-changes that will constantly keep the ammonia(NH3) and nitrite(NO2) levels (as measured by a good liquid-reagent kit, not paper strips) below the 0.25ppm limit (gills and nerves are being damaged by the fish being in the tank for the cycling is complete, but above 0.25ppm we start to get permanent damage or death coming in to the picture.) Not only do you want to establish this pattern but you also need to keep up the watching, because the spiking is unpredictable and changes over the course of the cycling process.

What we typically do is test (mostly just ammonia and nitrite, with occasional pH and nitrate(NO3) tests) twice a day, usually morning and evening, and always log these numbers to our aquarium notebook log. It's pretty useless to "feel" the results, much better log them and examine them over time.

Anyway, you want to limit those times that NO2 manages to spike above 0.25ppm, as those are when the nerve and brain damage occurs.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[Lobster.Lounge]

once again waterdrop couldnt be more thankful. ill make sure i get everything under control.

i dont think the red eye tetras are going to last that long with the exodons... or the cories looks like they will be the exodons lunch...

the red eyes would be lunch, however i will be giving them to a friend to take care of once i get the exodons. as for the corys, ive done lots of research, and im confident that they will work. after speaking with a bunch of exodon keeps, alot of them actualy keep shoals of cory with them. i would try if i didnt think it would work, dont want to have any fish injured. im hoping to have my cycle completed around feb 9th. my nitrites seem to be on a steady decline so thats a good sign. geesh im so impatient! too excited. and now all of this excitement has made me start looking at bio cubes! when will it end!

 

[fishkeeper35]

once again waterdrop couldnt be more thankful. ill make sure i get everything under control.

i dont think the red eye tetras are going to last that long with the exodons... or the cories looks like they will be the exodons lunch...

the red eyes would be lunch, however i will be giving them to a friend to take care of once i get the exodons. as for the corys, ive done lots of research, and im confident that they will work. after speaking with a bunch of exodon keeps, alot of them actualy keep shoals of cory with them. i would try if i didnt think it would work, dont want to have any fish injured. im hoping to have my cycle completed around feb 9th. my nitrites seem to be on a steady decline so thats a good sign. geesh im so impatient! too excited. and now all of this excitement has made me start looking at bio cubes! when will it end!

k

lol

 

[guppy love]

when will it end!

Hopefully not with dead corys!

I really, really hope it all works out but I love corys too much to put them at risk. I've recently seen corys getting picked on by other fish and it wasn't pretty, they had almost no fins left at all.

Maybe when you get the corys you will inevitably fall in love with them and forget all about the exodons!