Emergency Water Change Advice

[Easy]

I need to do a fish in cycle I have already lost fish. My question is if I have a suspect water source for PH,GH,KH what do I add to the water going in? I also have about 5 gallons of bottled water ! Should I just use that? If so is there anything that needs to be added to that?

Sorry I have this question edited into another post but the responses I have gotten there warrant a double post in the emergency forum . Indeed advice ASAP on this thank you

Also as I understand it I basically don't have enough mature bacteria to get rid of the ammonia produced by my fish. Should I therefore stop or drastically cutback feeding the fish until my tank cycles?..

 

[Tolak]

First test or have your tap water tested with a liquid reagent test kit. From your previous posts the advice from the shop you've been dealing with is more suspect than the tap water. The advice for returning some of the fish previously given in a topic should be followed.

A traditional cycle with fish is going to require large daily water changes with the stocking you have. The suggested stocking for this is 1" of hardy slim bodied fish that grow to no larger than 3", per 5 gallons of water. Prime is a good dechlorinator/water conditioner, any of the cycling products you've been buying are going to do nothing for cycling.

There's tons of tricks for making water changes easier & quicker. A clean 5 gallon bucket, larger bore siphon, keeping an eye out for fish, and you've got the tank nearly empty in 4 buckets, a couple minutes per bucket to drain. Temperature match using the hot & cold tap for the refill, by feel is generally fine. Add Prime to the bucket, put a large clean ceramic or metal bowl in the bottom of the tank, slowly pour into that to refill, the bowl keeps substrate from being knocked around. There's a product called a Python that hooks to the sink, works similar to a waterbed fill & drain kit, but for aquarium use that works quite well.