How Much Longer?

[chrisbassist]

Right, so I got my tank, followed the LFS advice, which other than the fish in cycle, has been pretty good (mostly) and when my nitrite spiked they said not to get any more fish, and do daily water changes

they advised to get a test kit, although directed me towards a cheap one (to save me money) that did the same as the more expensive ones, it was a test tube and tablet thing. did the job, but since using up all of the nitrite tests, I have replaced with a liquid one, which seems to be mroe accurate (also prob cheaper in the long run since it'll do more tests)

now at the stage where I'm hoping it'll finish the cycle soon...

so my readings...

Ph - a steady 7.5 (approx)
Ammonia - been reading zero for over 3 weeks now
nitrite - was recently reading 0.25 at the 12 hour point, and over the last few days this has droppedto 0.1

should i be looking out for more major spikes? or am i coming to the end of the cycle?

i really want to get fully stocked soon. (and not have to do water changes every day)

so any ideas where i may be in the cycle and how long may be left?

 

[waterdrop]

Hi Chris,

Your fish-in cycle sounds pretty textbook to me, moving to smaller and smaller traces of nitrite at 12 hour mark, with the traces possible appearing intermittantly on different days even. And the fact that this is happening at 3 weeks is also pretty textbook with a typical best case month cycle. So the usual test for end of fish-in should apply: when you get two full days in a row of true zero ppm with no traces and you didn't change any water, you can consider yourself to have started your qualifying week of watching it continue to do that. Some people like to get it down to 8 or even 6 hour clearings but we feel that a week of solid 12 hour clearings is enough qualification of the solidity of the cycle.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[chrisbassist]

so the nitrites normally take about a month to clear properly?

so in theory, given another week, i can stop my daily water changes, and only do them when the readings show some up? give it a week of no readings, then add a couple more fish each week til I'm fully stocked?

that's good news, if thats right, since I'll be able to cheer myself up next week and top up the shoal of tetras... or possibly the corys.

I'm gonna need cheering up...

luckily, recently found another LFS where the fish look much healthier, with a better selection (they even had a couple of bamboo sharks... one day)

thankfully that means I don't have to get any from the previous place, I recently noticed their bettas, and was disgusted enough not to want to buy any more fish from there ever again. they were in tiny tanks, smaller than most lfs i've seen, they were about 0.2 gallons each less than a litre, right next to each other so they can see each other... I realise they're in tiny tanks everywhere, but this was downright disgusting...

 

[waterdrop]

so the nitrites normally take about a month to clear properly?
so in theory, given another week, i can stop my daily water changes, and only do them when the readings show some up? give it a week of no readings, then add a couple more fish each week til I'm fully stocked?
that's good news, if thats right, since I'll be able to cheer myself up next week and top up the shoal of tetras... or possibly the corys.

Hi Chris,
Basically, everything you've expressed here is technically correct but I feel its not quite how I "think" about it (which may just be me being an old man compared to you, lol, if so please forgive me ) So I'm gonna touch on them again just in case it makes us see it the same way better or if we already do then it can be ignored...

In the fish-in cycle situation I would not usually think of it as a "daily" (or any other interval) required water change. Instead I think of it as a reaction to a test result: for example, if I see ammonia or nitrite getting close to 0.25 or above, I perform about as large a water change as I possibly have time for. BUT, if by daily what you mean is that you already kind of know from recent testing and changing that that's what its going to take to keep it below 0.25 then that's fine, 'cause that means "ya got it!"

And again, right along with that, I would only stop after another week if I... went a day with no traces, did no water change, went yet a second day with no traces and was just testing, not water changing, so I knew that the bacteria did it, not my water change. That's what I mean by the two days tipping you off that you are into your final week where you should be just testing and not water changing because it keeps showing no traces all week!

So its the testing and not any fixed time periods that is the definitive thing. (This is probably me just being picky with words, because I think you were probably already thinking this way.)

OK, if you're still bearing with me, a third thing: Ideally what's meant by reaching the point of the main tank being "cycled" again is that new fish can be moved to it from your quarantine tank. The idea of a "Q-tank" is that you've already had the new fish (2 or 3 medium ones or fewer bigger ones or a few more if they're smaller like neons) quarantined for a couple weeks to prove that they are not bringing ich or fin rot or some other disease into your main tank where your main community resides. Now if you don't have a Q-Tank then that's just going to sound mean-spirited but I don't mean it that way - if your main tank population is not all that old or that expensive and you just don't have plans for a Q-Tank yet then its understandable to just acclimate them right on in to the main tank from the LFS. Just wanted to grab the chance to describe the ideal so you'll have heard it at least once from our beginners section!

~~waterdrop~~

 

[chrisbassist]

Thanks

pretty much what I was thinking...

I've come to the conclusion that at the moment I need to do daily changes to keep an acceptable level for the fish (I'd prefer not to give them the stress of large water changes, but figure thats better than letting them die from excess nitrite). Seems to be working at the moment.

since my ammonia has been a stead zero for about 3 weeks now, I'm testing that about weekly now just to double check, but when I slow down water changes I'll prob do it daily for a while to keep an eye to make sure the water changes aren't knocking that down too much. to make sure it can do it itself...

my nitrite, since I've gotten myself into a routine of doing water changes for the nitrite being high, I'm now doing it about once every couple of days. if it's higher or lower than expected I'll then test for the next few days...

So I'm pretty much doing changes in response to tests... just I tend to know what the results are going to be before doing them... currently doing Ph about once a week since it was holding pretty steady or the first few weeks (and still is) although may do a few more once I drop the W/Cs to double check those too...

But when I say a week, what I mean is, that'd be the estimated time that my tests will start showing a zero reading... rather than just do it next week regardless... if that makes sense.

and lastly, thank you, I'velearned a lot fromyour posts everywhere in this forum, especially in regards to cycling. either you're one of the most knowledgable here, or you care enough to take the time to help people, either way,

 

[waterdrop]

OK, good then, its very good to be in tune enough with your cycle and what the results are likely to be that you usually anticipate them correctly. In fact that's the best of all, to be anticipating but to still do tests and pay attention to their results. That principle will be a good one over a long time.

Thanks for the kind words and I wish you best of luck wrapping up your fish-in cycling.

~~waterdrop~~