Cycling With Fish Big Mistake

[gillyg]

i began a cycle with fish about 4 weeks ago and everything went wrong, bad advice from ifs.

tank is 33 gallons (i think).

lost 3 fish and am left with four tiger barbs which seem to be doing well.

ammonia 0.25
nitrite 2
nitrate 40

havent checked ph for few days, last reading was about 8.

ammonia seems to be staying around the same though think it has decreased slightly and nitrite seems to be staying around the same, goes down a bit then back up.

am doing partial water changes. does it sound like it is all going in the right direction or is something going wrong? seems to be taking such a long time, wish i did a fishless now.

any advice appreciated, thanks guys

 

[Miss Wiggle]

the link in my sig 'what's cycling?' should tell you what you need to know.

sometimes people (particularly with the encouragement of the lfs) are impatient to get fish straight away and don't want to wait a couple of weeks, what they don't realise is that cycling with fish can be much longer and more time consuming, yes you can put fish in straight away but in 2 weeks time when the fishless cycle could have been done you'll probably be cursing your descision!

yours sounds like it's behaving as expected, just keep up the partial water changes and keep your fingers crossed

 

[Tyshow]

i began a cycle with fish about 4 weeks ago and everything went wrong, bad advice from ifs.

tank is 33 gallons (i think).

lost 3 fish and am left with four tiger barbs which seem to be doing well.

ammonia 0.25
nitrite 2
nitrate 40

havent checked ph for few days, last reading was about 8.

ammonia seems to be staying around the same though think it has decreased slightly and nitrite seems to be staying around the same, goes down a bit then back up.

am doing partial water changes. does it sound like it is all going in the right direction or is something going wrong? seems to be taking such a long time, wish i did a fishless now.

any advice appreciated, thanks guys

Yes putting in fish during the cycling proccess is a mistake but go to your local fish store and aqurrie 2 to 3 dannys they are hardy fish and can usaly make it though the cycling process the guy at my fish store told me to leave them in there till the cycling is done then bring the fish back. Their hard to kill so you dont have to worry. But bring them back to the store when your done cause they can be a bit of a bully.

 

[Fishy_7]

I started to cycle my tank with no fish, then added a pair of Cherry Barbs. Then slowly started to add fish once the the Ammonia and Nitrite levels dropped to 0.
I still have the male Cherry Barb 4 years on!