Choosing A Fish Community

[wigger01]

Hi, new to the forum and like what I see.

I have a Jewel tank which is 54 litres in size and was wondering what fish to get for it.
The tank has been set up for 2 months and is now ready to be stocked.
The water is as follows:
GH=120
KH=120
PH=7.0
NO2=0.5
NO3=0
The temperture is stable at 26.

I would like to have a few colourfull fish in the tank to make the wife happy so your help in choosing would be appreciated.

Wiggs

 

[Ian H]

umm i may be wrong here but NO2 = nitrIte and NO3 = nitrAte meaning your tank is not cycled and is not ready for fish?

 

[SJ2K]

+1, read up on cycling first

 

[wigger01]

I have done everything thats in the book. Installed the filter added the tablet etc, added the water safe and had it all running for 2 months. Used the testing kit and that says everything is ready to go....
What else do I need to do??
Someone help me out here... I was under the impression the NO2 & NO3 needed to be as close to zero as you can before adding fish.
What should my GH, KH, PH, NO2, NO3 levels be ?

 

[wigger01]

I think I may have gone about the set up all wrong here peeps.

Can someone tell me in laymans terms what i need to do.
All the Ph etc is listed above. Whats my next step to getting this tank up and running.

 

[rabbut]

I think I may have gone about the set up all wrong here peeps.

Can someone tell me in laymans terms what i need to do.
All the Ph etc is listed above. Whats my next step to getting this tank up and running.

Cycling is the next step. This is the process of setting up the biological filter in your fish tank. This removes the toxic chemicals created by your fish. There are two methords for cycling. Fishless and fish-in. fishless uses an artificial sorce of ammonia to establish the colonie of bactiria, fish-in, uses fish. A fish-in cycle puts fish at risk, thus is only recomended by LFS's, as they hope you will come back to buy more fish as a result of your losses. Fish-less cycleing is risk-free, and has much greater chances of succeding. Here is the links to the topics you need;

[topic="113861"]fishless cycling[/topic]

HTH
rabbut

 

[eschaton]

Well, there are two other options as well.

1. Plant cycling- simply buy a lot of live aquarium plants (real ones from a reputable fish store, not the rubbish they sell in chains). Provided your lighting is good enough, the plant growth will soak up enough waste to add a few fish at a time. Don't be surprised if your tank goes through an "algae cycle" however.

2. Filter switching - Find someone with mature filter media (old, cruddy filter cartage) and swap with them.

 

[Ian H]

I have done everything thats in the book. Installed the filter added the tablet etc, added the water safe and had it all running for 2 months. Used the testing kit and that says everything is ready to go....
What else do I need to do??
Someone help me out here... I was under the impression the NO2 & NO3 needed to be as close to zero as you can before adding fish.
What should my GH, KH, PH, NO2, NO3 levels be ?

right this is what it should be:

Ammonia: 0
NitrIte: 0
NitrAte: anything over 20 - 30 really

PH : depends on what fish your keeping, usually around 7 - 7.5

GH and KH: i've never really checked these to be honest. You dont need to know these to cycle your tank (not as far as i know anyways)

To cycle your tank you will need some source of ammonia, i cycled mine by putting fish food in and letting it rot, this creates ammonia. You will need a constant source of it though. as soon as Ammonia and NitrIte read 0 and you have some NitrAte then your good to go

 

[wigger01]

Thanks people for your help.
I have a much better understanding of what I now need to do. I assume the testing kit I have is no good as it doesn't show an ammonia reading? I will need to source some ammonia also, boots maybe??
As a rough guess how much ammonia would be needed for 54 litres of water??

 

[SJ2K]

Yeh get yourself an API master test kit from your LFS They can seem a little pricey but really you get the most for your money and its the most reliable . Then get yourself the ammonia (yeh boots should do, wilko also sell it) and add little by little untill the test results show 4-6 Ppm.

 

[dwarfgourami]

You won't need a vast amount of ammonia for a tank this size- try adding drops with a pipette, I seem to remember something in the region of 12 drops for my Juwel 60, but ammonia can be different strength so you need to experiment. And if Boots don't have it, try a hardware store.

 

[Luketendo]

You won't need a vast amount of ammonia for a tank this size- try adding drops with a pipette, I seem to remember something in the region of 12 drops for my Juwel 60, but ammonia can be different strength so you need to experiment. And if Boots don't have it, try a hardware store.

The boots ammonia is 9.5% so you'd need 120 drop about.

 

[wigger01]

The boots ammonia is 9.5% so you'd need 120 drop about.

120 drops??? thats about 50 ml yes?

 

[n3ont3tra]

I'm not sure how much you'd need, but after you add it, test the water often until it reaches zero. If this took more than about 12 hours, add more drops and test again. You need to keep doing this until the ammonia reaches zero in less than a few hours.

One last thought -
Filter swapping (aka cloning) is by far the easiest method. The only thing you really need to remember is to keep the filter media wet. It can't dry out. If you rinse it out, make sure you rinse it out in dechlorinated water. Also, fish (or another ammonia source) needs to be added within 24 hours of getting the filter media, or else the bacteria will start to die.