Cycle Update

[waterdrop]

wooo race to the finish for lioness and waterdrop!!

the whole gH, kH, pH thing baffles me you know, think i'm v lucky with my tap water tbh, pH is steady as anything at 7.4 even through fishless cycling, got 0 nitrate (pretty much unheard of in the UK) and it never fluctuates. I'm glad I've never had to go in depth with my understanding of hardness.

just glad both of you guys seem ot be getting a handle on this.

and yes waterdrop, i said after it happened i reckon the little bump is more a mini cycle than an actual cycle, takes much less time to get sorted.

Yes, MW, you really called it on that one - you had good timing, perking me up after the disaster and I once again thank you for it. We were really seriously close to chucking the whole hobby that night when the tank broke but I think my involvement here was one of the things that saved us and now we are back to being happy and talking each week about whether the weekend might work for the big beginning of fish (which unfortunately this weekend won't!)

You know, its interesting, at first I thought monkey_biz, over in my thread in the scientific section was going to get me all confused about KH, alkalinity and all of it but I ended up learning some great stuff from him and from the couple of web pages on hardness that we see links to from time to time here on TFF.

Another thing you'd be interested in I think is that I still plan to have a big "talk-out" in the future with you and the other experienced members about my own KH,pH situation. I've still yet to decide for sure whether I will go with my straight tap water parameters with fish or whether I will attempt to go with an altered chem in one direction or another. Its way to complicated for me to talk about today but I'm really planning to take it on pretty soon.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[LionessN3cubs]

yeeeeehaw. .....


added 5mls of ammonia at 8:30 am.....3:30 PM only a TRACE amount left.

my Nbacs must be getting very close. Im still at 1.0 nitrite even after 4ppm of ammonia processed in the last few hours.....getting close :::creepy music::::

 

[waterdrop]

what fish are you thinking of buying first?

 

[LionessN3cubs]

Waterdrop



since your so interested in the scientific aspect of the water/ph/kh thing....here's a good one for ya.

This morning I tested PH and KH. PH 7.6 KH 5 right?

Retested just now at almost 4pm....KH is 7 PH holding steady at 7.4/7.6

Water out of my tap is now KH 0 ph 7.6<----called the water authority but missed them for today. They close at 3 apparently so that call will have to wait until tomorrow

I dont get how my KH in the tank went UP today tho. I definately am very careful to perform the tests exactly the same every time. I also make sure to wash my tubes very well after each testing

 

[waterdrop]

Good grief Lioness! Doesn't make any sense to me!

Any chance you added baking soda close to the morning test?

"... water authority but missed them for today. They close at 3 apparently ..."

That IT! We've figured it out! Those guys are doing nothing and leaving at 3 in the afternoon!

 

[backtotropical]

Lioness,

I'm pretty certain that the raise in kH is due to the Bicarb.

In theory, it should work almost instantly, but that assumes that every last bit of the bicarb has dissolved into the water. You probably have little bits of residual Bicarb dissolving throughout the day.

Try dissolving the bicarb in a bucket of water overnight and then adding it in the morning. That should test my theory.

Let us know as usual.

BTT

 

[LionessN3cubs]

Lioness,

I'm pretty certain that the raise in kH is due to the Bicarb.

In theory, it should work almost instantly, but that assumes that every last bit of the bicarb has dissolved into the water. You probably have little bits of residual Bicarb dissolving throughout the day.

Try dissolving the bicarb in a bucket of water overnight and then adding it in the morning. That should test my theory.

Let us know as usual.

BTT

I'll try that thanks BTT. My tap PH is back up to 7.6 today so I think it was just a blip as mrs wiggle suggested.

BTW...do you happen to know if its a bad thing if I have super bacteria that is processing 4 ppm of ammonia in like 6-7 hours? That happened today and Im worried that if I wait until tomorrow morning to feed them more ammonia that they'll start dying off or something...spastic yes I know.

 

[backtotropical]

I'll try that thanks BTT. My tap PH is back up to 7.6 today so I think it was just a blip as mrs wiggle suggested.

BTW...do you happen to know if its a bad thing if I have super bacteria that is processing 4 ppm of ammonia in like 6-7 hours? That happened today and Im worried that if I wait until tomorrow morning to feed them more ammonia that they'll start dying off or something...spastic yes I know.

Hi Lioness,

If your pH is back up to 7.6 as you say, you can probably ditch the Bicarb for now. Just keep an eye on the pH from the tap (or faucet as i believe you call them across the water) and in the tank. If the tap pH drops again, you'll need to re-start the Bicarb, but if only the tank pH drops, you can just use the higher pH tap water to raise it again.

I wouldn't worry that your bacteria are processing too fast. It just means you have a really good colony built up. When the cycle is finished and you add fish, the colony will die back to only enough bacteria to handle the waste your fish produce. The point of fishless cycling is to intentionally build up a colony which is too big to be sure all the fish waste will be dealt with once you add your fish. If some dies back after the fish are added, because the fish aren't producing enough ammonia to keep them alive, then nothing lost. If the colony is too small when you add your fish, you would suffer ammonia / nitrite spikes.

So your A-Bacs are super strong, how are the N-Bacs doing? Any updates?

Cheers

BTT

 

[Miss Wiggle]

Yes, MW, you really called it on that one - you had good timing, perking me up after the disaster and I once again thank you for it. We were really seriously close to chucking the whole hobby that night when the tank broke but I think my involvement here was one of the things that saved us and now we are back to being happy and talking each week about whether the weekend might work for the big beginning of fish (which unfortunately this weekend won't!)

You know, its interesting, at first I thought monkey_biz, over in my thread in the scientific section was going to get me all confused about KH, alkalinity and all of it but I ended up learning some great stuff from him and from the couple of web pages on hardness that we see links to from time to time here on TFF.

Another thing you'd be interested in I think is that I still plan to have a big "talk-out" in the future with you and the other experienced members about my own KH,pH situation. I've still yet to decide for sure whether I will go with my straight tap water parameters with fish or whether I will attempt to go with an altered chem in one direction or another. Its way to complicated for me to talk about today but I'm really planning to take it on pretty soon.

~~waterdrop~~

no problem, i may not always be able to give scientific answers but I hope I can give a bit of encouragement if nothing else.

OK, well be my guest, I'll probably mostly just nod and smile politley as I reckon it'll all go over my head, but you know I'll always try and help out where I can

"... water authority but missed them for today. They close at 3 apparently ..."

That IT! We've figured it out! Those guys are doing nothing and leaving at 3 in the afternoon!

lmao!!!! that's it

 

[LionessN3cubs]

I'll try that thanks BTT. My tap PH is back up to 7.6 today so I think it was just a blip as mrs wiggle suggested.

BTW...do you happen to know if its a bad thing if I have super bacteria that is processing 4 ppm of ammonia in like 6-7 hours? That happened today and Im worried that if I wait until tomorrow morning to feed them more ammonia that they'll start dying off or something...spastic yes I know.

Hi Lioness,

If your pH is back up to 7.6 as you say, you can probably ditch the Bicarb for now. Just keep an eye on the pH from the tap (or faucet as i believe you call them across the water) and in the tank. If the tap pH drops again, you'll need to re-start the Bicarb, but if only the tank pH drops, you can just use the higher pH tap water to raise it again.

I wouldn't worry that your bacteria are processing too fast. It just means you have a really good colony built up. When the cycle is finished and you add fish, the colony will die back to only enough bacteria to handle the waste your fish produce. The point of fishless cycling is to intentionally build up a colony which is too big to be sure all the fish waste will be dealt with once you add your fish. If some dies back after the fish are added, because the fish aren't producing enough ammonia to keep them alive, then nothing lost. If the colony is too small when you add your fish, you would suffer ammonia / nitrite spikes.

So your A-Bacs are super strong, how are the N-Bacs doing? Any updates?

Cheers

BTT

well as far as the Nbacs...what I decided to do was add 5ml's (4ppm) of ammonia today, and then tomorrow cut back to 2 as you all have suggested to do while Im waiting for my Nbacs to start dropping.....However, I tested Nitrite this morning and its down to .25. Im assuming that is because there's been such a big period of time between ammonia dropping to 0 and the next add. As I said yesterday, I added 5mls of ammonia about 8:30 am, and by 3:30 the ammonia was 0 so that means there was 17 hours in between drop/add for the Nbacs to process. So basically, Im not cutting back to 2ppms..just going to continue on with the 4 ppm. I'm getting excited about being SO close to finishing!

Now if I were only sure what Im going to stock! All this time I had planned on about 5 platys, a cory and an otto but I keep reading on here that cory's do best in groups so I think that leaves him out....and now that my boys have had a trip to the pet store I dont think they want platys (sigh...keep trying to remember this is THEIR tank not mine..I'd have mollies)

So I think what Im going to do it head to the fish store this weekend with pen, paper and all 4 kids ...stepdaughter will be here this weekend...have them all pick the fish they want, come home and see if I can figure out how to make what each of them prefers compatible.

I SO wish I could've gotten a bigger tank...wish I'd have found this site before I bought the tank!

 

[backtotropical]

That sound fine Lioness. I'd recommend that you should figure out a 12 hourly schedule now for monitoring purposes, so you can add ammonia, then test 12 hrs later.

For example

8am - Add ammonia to 4ppm
8pm - Test ammonia and nitrite
8am - Add ammonia to 4ppm
8pm - Test ammonia and nitrite
etc etc.

That way, when you test and get ammonia 0, nitrite 0, you know you are cycled, as you know it has processed in under 12 hours.

Cheers

BTT

 

[waterdrop]

Lioness,

I went to the Petsmart one day with my little notebook and pen (I decided to do it without kids so I wouldn't be distracted) and I wanted to share one interesting thing that came out of it:

Literally half the tanks there had fish which I later figured out would have mature growth sizes too big for my 28G tank. In fact it worked out rather nicely that the entire right half of aquariums had fish that would grow too big and the entire left half had liverbearers, tetras and other fish that would not grow too big. In this way I was able to realize that I could set a simple rule for Oliver later when he would see them - not hard and fast but a way to get started on simplifying the process.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[Miss Wiggle]

yeah the cory would definatley be happier with some company, when the tanks mature you could get a trio of one of the dwarf species though.

you're right to go, pick what you and the kids like them come back here with a list. remember where possible get scientific names as common names are often inaccurate, if you've got a camera you could take pics of the ones you like which can help with identification if the name given by the fish shop is made up.