wheelyfeet
New Member
How long does it take for a 3 gallon Eclipse tank to evolve into a 75 gallon tank? About 3 weeks! My husband inherited a 3 gallon tank when his grandmother passed away about a month ago. It had two platies and a snail in it and it was in horrible condition. His grandmothers care takers NEVER did a water change. They only tried to clean the algae up and kept buying new fish because they kept dying.
We cleaned it up, did a water change and then he decided to add a couple of guppies. One died within one day, the other survived. We also noticed that one of the platies was "shimmying." We both started reading up on fish keeping and learned all about water conditions, tank cycling, fish compatability, etc. My husband went down the the LFS to replace the guppy that died and came home with a 10 gallon setup instead. We put the contents of the 3 into the 10 and did lots of water changes while waiting for the cycle to come into full swing. The platy that was shimmying seemed to get better, but suddenly died. We saw no other signs of illness, so figure it was just too much stress.
After more reading, we realized how limiting the 10 gallon tank is, so for our Christmas present we set out to purchase a 55 gallon tank. We came home with a 75 gallon tank! We let it settle down, aquascaped and added our fish about a week and a half ago. In it are 2 young angels, 2 young pearl gouramis, 5 pearl danios, 9 cory cats (3 ea of 3 varieties), 3 swordtails, and one crazy guppy that is way too active for the 10 gallon tank (the one that survived). We used Marineland's biospira to estabilish the bacteria colony and it really worked. Ammonia and nitrites have been 0 and the nitrates are at about 10 ppm. I was skeptical, but I think I'm a believer now.
The 10 gallon tank now has 2 large type platies, 2 small type platies, 2 guppies, and the snail (that eats anything organic.)
I decided to rescue a betta from a cup of water and put him in the 3 gallon Eclipse. The LFS is out of biospira so I'm cycling the old fashioned way. I am doing 15% water changes whenever the ammonia registers .25 ppm or above. I know this slows the process way down, but I'd rather do alot of water changes than stress the fish. He's actually looking great. He's active, his color has intensified, he has a great appetite, and he doesn't do any fin clamping, or anything else that indicates he's stressed. I'm actually pretty fond of the guy. He sits next to my computer.
We are both excited about fishkeeping. We both had aquariums way back in the dark ages, before we knew of such things as tank cycling. The next set up will be our hospital tank/quarentine tank and I will try fishless cycling to set it up. It's is so nice doing things this way. I know we'll have far less problems with fish health and algae build ups due to poor water quality.
I have some questions about pH, water changes, and ammonia that I will post in the appropriate area. Eventually, I want to start adding live plants, so I'm sure I'll have questions about that as well.
Debra.
We cleaned it up, did a water change and then he decided to add a couple of guppies. One died within one day, the other survived. We also noticed that one of the platies was "shimmying." We both started reading up on fish keeping and learned all about water conditions, tank cycling, fish compatability, etc. My husband went down the the LFS to replace the guppy that died and came home with a 10 gallon setup instead. We put the contents of the 3 into the 10 and did lots of water changes while waiting for the cycle to come into full swing. The platy that was shimmying seemed to get better, but suddenly died. We saw no other signs of illness, so figure it was just too much stress.
After more reading, we realized how limiting the 10 gallon tank is, so for our Christmas present we set out to purchase a 55 gallon tank. We came home with a 75 gallon tank! We let it settle down, aquascaped and added our fish about a week and a half ago. In it are 2 young angels, 2 young pearl gouramis, 5 pearl danios, 9 cory cats (3 ea of 3 varieties), 3 swordtails, and one crazy guppy that is way too active for the 10 gallon tank (the one that survived). We used Marineland's biospira to estabilish the bacteria colony and it really worked. Ammonia and nitrites have been 0 and the nitrates are at about 10 ppm. I was skeptical, but I think I'm a believer now.
The 10 gallon tank now has 2 large type platies, 2 small type platies, 2 guppies, and the snail (that eats anything organic.)
I decided to rescue a betta from a cup of water and put him in the 3 gallon Eclipse. The LFS is out of biospira so I'm cycling the old fashioned way. I am doing 15% water changes whenever the ammonia registers .25 ppm or above. I know this slows the process way down, but I'd rather do alot of water changes than stress the fish. He's actually looking great. He's active, his color has intensified, he has a great appetite, and he doesn't do any fin clamping, or anything else that indicates he's stressed. I'm actually pretty fond of the guy. He sits next to my computer.
We are both excited about fishkeeping. We both had aquariums way back in the dark ages, before we knew of such things as tank cycling. The next set up will be our hospital tank/quarentine tank and I will try fishless cycling to set it up. It's is so nice doing things this way. I know we'll have far less problems with fish health and algae build ups due to poor water quality.
I have some questions about pH, water changes, and ammonia that I will post in the appropriate area. Eventually, I want to start adding live plants, so I'm sure I'll have questions about that as well.
Debra.
Same here. I was already counting how many fish were added to start and thinking how many problems were going to arise.
