Cycling Query

[Wishful]

Hi
We are currently cycling a 330 litre tank. Having run for over a week using Seachem Stability (which says that you can add first fish after seven days) we moved our danios (2 Bengal, 3 zebra, 1 kayathit and 3 glowlight) to help the cycling process. Having moved from a much smaller tank they all look thoroughly delighted with life but I have some questions about the expected water quality test readings during cycling that I've been unable to find answers to.

Currently the test readings are 0ppm ammonia, .5ppm nitrite and 10ppm nitrate. We are testing twice a day and doing water changes every couple of days, but we're confused that we aren't seeing any difference in the ammonia reading (on a couple of occasions it looked to be in between 0 and .25 but that's the highest). I know that we are looking for a 0 ammonia and 0 nitrite reading, but what should we be looking for during the process?

When doing a cycle with fish, how many fish should we use? Is there some kind of relationship to the volume of water and/or the filter that is being used? We are wondering how much difference our little danios are really going to make. Should we be using more fish?

Thanks for any advice.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

i'm not sure what seachem stability is.

it sounds to me that it's an ammonia reducing product, what it will actually do is covert the toxic ammonia into less harmful ammonium. Your filter bacteria will still use this so the cycle should be carrying on, but the test kit may not be able to test for ammonium so therefore you see no ammonia spike, just the nitrite one. Just a theory though, if it's not an ammonia reducing product then it could be to do with the number of fish

the danio's represent about 1/10th of your final stocking in a tank that size. I think you should aim closer to 1/5th for a cycle with fish, otherwise as you've guessed they simply don't produce enough waste to get the cycle going properly and it can then take forever.

you don't make it quite clear in your post, do you have another tank that is currently running? If so are you planning on keeping both running or just upgrading to the new one?

 

[funkyhoney]

has the ammonia reading changed at any time during the cycling?

obviously it's gonna take longer when cycling a larger tank, and the more powerful the filtration the fast the cycle should go as it will spread the bacteria around more. no limits to how many fish to use, if you want to be quick and inhumane use a whole bag of feeders.

if not i'd just slowly add more in, monitor the readings, and see how you go

 

[Wishful]

According to their blurb, Seachem Stability is a product that will "rapidly and safely establish the aquarium biofilter in freshwater and marine systems, thereby preventing the #1 cause of fish death: “new tank syndromeâ€￾. Stabilityâ„¢ contains a synergistic blend of aerobic, anaerobic, and facultative bacteria which facilitate the breakdown of waste organics, ammonia, and nitrate." so I don't think it is an ammonia reducing product.

We do have our 27 gallon tank running in tandem and will keep it for tetras. We still have 2 Boesemani Rainbows to move to the big tank and our plec who has just got too huge (we got him when we were a little less knowledgeable about them on the advice from a guy at an lfs who said that he wouldn't grow too big and grew very slowly). Although I'd love to move him sooner rather than later I'm not sure how he'd cope with a cycling tank, or the Rainbows for that matter - any advice on that would be good?

We are looking to build up the danio shoal so maybe it would be a good idea to do that to increase the stock rather than use the Rainbows or the plec. Thanks for putting some figures on the stocking though, that's really useful!

 

[Miss Wiggle]

in that case i'd put the danio's back in your existing tank, put the filter from the new tank onto the old one and run that there for 2 weeks.

when that's done move the new filter onto the new tank, put the fish that are going to live in there in the same day

no cycling needed

 

[Wishful]

in that case i'd put the danio's back in your existing tank, put the filter from the new tank onto the old one and run that there for 2 weeks.

when that's done move the new filter onto the new tank, put the fish that are going to live in there in the same day

no cycling needed

Yipes - is that our only option? I just suggested this to my other half and he went pale. I think the filter on the new tank is probably far to strong to run on the old tank, it'd blow the fish out of the water! Also, we do have a bit of a nitrate issue with the old tank (not helped by the plec I think) and we'd worry about putting stock back in - this was part of the idea of getting the new tank.
He read yesterday that one way of helping the cycle is to rinse out the sponges from a cycled tank in the water of the new tank - is this a good idea?

has the ammonia reading changed at any time during the cycling?

obviously it's gonna take longer when cycling a larger tank, and the more powerful the filtration the fast the cycle should go as it will spread the bacteria around more. no limits to how many fish to use, if you want to be quick and inhumane use a whole bag of feeders.

if not i'd just slowly add more in, monitor the readings, and see how you go

The ammonia has gone up once, but it didn't go to .25. Are you familiar with the colour charts on the API test kit? The 0 is yellow and it goes through to green. The only showing we've had was when it just wasn't quite pure yellow. That was yesterday and then today it has gone back to pure yellow again.

We do have a very powerful filter on there - the Eheim 2076 Professional 3e. So that should make if faster should it? I hadn't realised that.

When you say use a whole bag of feeders - what do you mean, I've not heard that term before.

 

[Wishful]

Also - having thought about it only when I first mentioned it in an earlier post - I'd be really interested to know what members think about whether rainbows or the plec could go into the new tank while it's still cycling?

 

[TerraDreamer]

When you say use a whole bag of feeders - what do you mean, I've not heard that term before.

You can buy cheap feeder danios (danios that are used to feed larger fish) from a lfs to move the cycling along. The only problem with them is they aren't the healthiest of fellows and may introduce something undesirable to your tank. I agree with Miss Wiggle in that you don't have enough fish in there to get it going. I used five danios to cycle a 29 gallon tank and it took five weeks to the day. Your tank is what...close to 90 gallons?

Your ammonia should be up for 7 to 12 days or so, followed by a much lengthier nitrite spike as the bacteria which consumes that is much slower to grow. I'm not familiar with the Seachem Stability product; I used similar while cycling my tank and to be completely honest, it really didn't make much difference.

http/fins.actwin.com/mirror/begin-cycling.html

Regards.

EDIT: Link

 

[MHunt]

What many people forget is that you are cycling the filter, not the tank. Why not move all your fish into the new tank for the time being, and run the old and new filters together in there for a couple of weeks? That's if the filter will come out of the old tank, but that is the better option IMO and is what i have done with my goldfish recently.

Edit - Just to add, in the UK feeders are so close to being illegal that most fish shops don't sell them.

 

[Wishful]

When you say use a whole bag of feeders - what do you mean, I've not heard that term before.

You can buy cheap feeder danios (danios that are used to feed larger fish) from a lfs to move the cycling along. The only problem with them is they aren't the healthiest of fellows and may introduce something undesirable to your tank. I agree with Miss Wiggle in that you don't have enough fish in there to get it going. I used five danios to cycle a 29 gallon tank and it took five weeks to the day. Your tank is what...close to 90 gallons?

Your ammonia should be up for 7 to 12 days or so, followed by a much lengthier nitrite spike as the bacteria which consumes that is much slower to grow. I'm not familiar with the Seachem Stability product; I used similar while cycling my tank and to be completely honest, it really didn't make much difference.

http/fins.actwin.com/mirror/begin-cycling.html

Regards.

EDIT: Link

Thanks for that. I'm not sure I like the idea of feeder fish and the possibility of bringing something horrid into the tank makes that a no-no. The tank is actually 66 gallons. I think we'll go and find some White Cloud Mountain Minnows that will shoal with the smaller danios.

Great link - thanks.

 

[Wishful]

What many people forget is that you are cycling the filter, not the tank. Why not move all your fish into the new tank for the time being, and run the old and new filters together in there for a couple of weeks? That's if the filter will come out of the old tank, but that is the better option IMO and is what i have done with my goldfish recently.

Edit - Just to add, in the UK feeders are so close to being illegal that most fish shops don't sell them.

That suggestion made my other half go pale again but I think it may be worth pursuing. We'll have to think it through. One of the main problems we have which I didn't mention earlier is that the new tank is an AquaOne Windsor 88 corner tank. It's huge and very difficult to reach to the lower back part of the tank. I fear we may have real problems catching the fish that we wanted to return to the smaller tank! It was to avoid this that we were looking at the possibility of rinsing out sponges from the old tank in there. What do you think of that idea - would it help?

 

[Miss Wiggle]

running both filters together on either tank would work. or getting the mature media from the old filter and dividing it between the 2 filters. or putting the danio's back into the old tank and doing a fishless cycle on the new tank.

however you do it as you already have a mature filter you shouldn't need to cycle with fish. IMO it's dangerous and cruel and when you have other options available to you you really should take them.

 

[MHunt]

Yeah, i thought about dividing the mature media option too. That is probably the better of the options here. You should then be able to stock the new tank without suffering a complete cycle.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

Yeah, i thought about dividing the mature media option too. That is probably the better of the options here. You should then be able to stock the new tank without suffering a complete cycle.

yeah, you'd still need to stock slowly, check the water conditions etc etc but you should be able to ge through it relativley quickly and painlessly

 

[Wishful]

Yeah, i thought about dividing the mature media option too. That is probably the better of the options here. You should then be able to stock the new tank without suffering a complete cycle.

yeah, you'd still need to stock slowly, check the water conditions etc etc but you should be able to ge through it relativley quickly and painlessly

Dividing the mature media between what? We've looked at the possibility of putting the old filter on the new tank, but the hoses just won't physically reach over the top of the tank to do it.

Miss Wiggle - I didn't realise that running a cycle with fish was cruel? I know it carries risks but we've cycled two small tanks without any losses or apparent stress on the fish.

I've read about hanging bags of gravel from established tanks with undergravel filters in a new tank as they have bacteria in. Could we not do the same thing with sponges from the existing tank - hang them in the tank and allow the bacteria to get into the water and thus the new filter?