Citylover's Fishless Cycle Diary

[citylover]

Day 1 (Aug 05):

Mine is a 55 gallon starter kit, comes with light, heater and filter. Bought a 2nd filter for backup. Everything has been running for over a week. Was to put fish in last weekend but lucky enough to get advice from people in this forum to start a fishless cycle. Now I'm holding back from putting fish in right away and starting my 1st fishless cycle process!

Added 25ml ammonia this evening.

Reading:
Ammonia: 4.0ppm
NO2: 0
NO3: 0
PH: 7.5
GH: 60-80
KH: 40-60 (Got a 5-in-1 test strip, but the GH and KH readings were really hard to tell. I could be sure that they were at least 60/40 but might be higher. Color in color chart was hard to differentiate... Not sure if it is going to be a problem, but the cichlid fish I'm interested in prefer KH 18-20...)

I guess now all I can do is to wait. I'll probably re-test in a week. In the mean time, I'll go back to my cichlid fish selection.

 

[OldMan47]

Be careful with your units on hardness. Some people use ppm and others use degrees when talking about hardness. It takes over 17 ppm to equal one degree of hardness. I seriously doubt that any fish needs a KH as low as 18 to 20 ppm. Your results look like very soft water expressed in ppm terms.

 

[citylover]

Thanks a lot, OldMan. What you said made a lot of sense. I think I'll buy a new test kit to try again. I wasn't sure I was getting the correct reading anyway...

Day 4 (Aug 08):

Test ammonia again, still at 4.0ppm.... Oh~~~~ not a bit of dropping...

 

[OldMan47]

You are doing fine at 4 ppm in a fishless cycle. It can easily take 2 weeks before you will see any change.

 

[citylover]

You are doing fine at 4 ppm in a fishless cycle. It can easily take 2 weeks before you will see any change.

I see! I have a feeling this is going to be a tough test for my patience

 

[waterdrop]

You are doing fine at 4 ppm in a fishless cycle. It can easily take 2 weeks before you will see any change.

I see! I have a feeling this is going to be a tough test for my patience

This is exactly what our beginners forum is for citylover! Showing your fishless cycle log and chatting with the many members helps to make the time seem to go a little faster and helps make the time productive. Deciding on a stocking plan and learning the many skills needed for keeping a good tank can be tricky to learn and often you can get a better start at it by asking questions and talking. The two species of bacteria we want are very slow growers unfortunately and although we all yak about many things to "speed up" the process, the truth is that the bacteria themselves are really the bottleneck. The month or two you spend waiting for them though allows you time for all sorts of "figuring out" of new stuff you need to know in the hobby. Good luck with the patience thing!

~~waterdrop~~
edit: typo

 

[OldMan47]

Great advice there WD. i seem to always forget the personal touch that you give things.

 

[citylover]

Day 11 (Aug 15): No change. Ammonia is still at 4.0ppm...

The water turns cloudy and greenish color, looks dirty... Friends coming to my home start to wonder why my fish tank has no fish residing while the water is still turning dirty...

Well, quite hard to explain to them what I'm working on...

 

[waterdrop]

Hi citylover,

It is quite normal to get a grayish/sort-of-white type of cloudiness that we call a bacterial bloom during the first few weeks of any new tank. This is caused by the heterotrophic bacterial species (these are different from the two species we are trying to grow in the filter, which are autotrophic) finding organics in the water (believe it or not they actually like to eat the leftovers from the modern sealants that are used to glue the glass tank panels together!) This is normal and will clear up on its own.

The greenish part of your description concerns me a little as it might indicate that you are turning your lights on, or on too much. Is that the case? Do you have live plants in the tank? Lights are only needed for live plants and otherwise will cause algae that you will have to clean later (light plus ammonia triggers algae spores to bloom.) The autotrophic bacteria in the filter to not need or like light, which is the reason better filters usually guard against full light. There's nothing wrong with turning the light on when you want to look or work in the tank and all of this will totally change after the biofilter finishes, you do the big water change at the end and stock the tank with fish!

If you do have plants I would limit the light to 4 hours, delivered in one single period.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[citylover]

Thanks, Enthusiastic "Re-Beginner"! I turn on the light some times to "appreciate" my tank (with only water and some decorations in it + my imagination), but I do not know it could interfere with the fish-less cycle I'm working on! Thanks for the tip!

 

[citylover]

Day 28 (Sep 01): Ammonia is at 1ppm now!

I'm finally seeing some noticeable drop! Cannot believe this first step takes me this long and it is still not at 0 yet!!! Almost a whole month already!!!

 

[frogmarch1987]

what temperature is your water? I think the optimum temperature for growing the bacteria is about 30C. If you are not at that temperature, turn your heater up, it may speed things up a little, but just make sure you turn it down again before you add the fish

 

[waterdrop]

Yes, frog is right, the optimal fishless cycling temperature is 29C/84F and at a pH of 8.0 to 8.4 (although we don't try to alter pH directly if its not close to that.) There are a number of advantages the cycler gains by sharing the daily log (although its tiring of course) in that the members can spot a pH crash happening or a few other potential problems. Of course, sometimes the biofilter formation is just straight-out slow!

~~waterdrop~~