Im At My Wits End - Been Told To Post Here Instead

[hopkigg]

Hi. You are probably all getting fed up of me as i keep posting problems but im at my wits end now. Here is my tank details from one of my other posts

We have a 3ft x 1ft x 1.5ft. 120l tank. In there we have one cory, 2 adult kribensis and 2 juvi kribensis. We also have a bgkf in there temporarily as it was being picked on in our other tank.

The amonia is 0.25
nitrates are 80 and nitrite is 5. PH 7.6 We have been doing constant 50% water changes for over a week now but the nitrites are not coming down. We have one fluval 4 internal filter and one fluval 3 internal.

We also have another 4ft tank which is mature and the stats are fine. However when the kribensis and bgkf were in there they got very poorly as i presume they were getting attacked. If you see my photos on my post "sick black ghost knife fish and kribensis", you will see just how ill they were. A lot of people thought the krib wouldnt make it. So anyway i thought i was doing the nice thing by starting up a new tank for them so they wouldnt get attacked, they perked right up. But me being a newby didnt realise i was starting a whole new cycle and was actually poisoning them.


My daily routine as advised by the lfs is 50% water change daily, adding sera aquatan water conditioner, then an hour later i am putting in sera nitrivec and an hour after that sera toxivec. After doing this for over a week the lfs advised me to only do partial water changes ie 10-15% as the bacteria isnt having chance to form or something. So yesterday i did that. Still the nitrites are high. They have been at 5 for over a week now and dont look like they are going to come down.

Please what am i doing wrong. If it is still in the middle of a cycle then how long does it take for the nitrites to come down. And i get so much conflicting advice about water changes, so how much should i do. One of the pinned topics on here im sure said to do 10-15% but some other people say 50% and some even say 90%. I cant really do 90% with the bgkf in there as he is so big.

Also if it is in the middle of a cycle then why is my nitrate high. Tap water nitrate is 20

Would it be better to put my fish in the mature tank, the only reason i havent done this is because im worried about them getting attacked again.

I know youve probably had enough of me by now but i just love my fish and want to help them and dont really know what to do for the best

 

[minxfishy]

If your other tank is mature and has mature media, immediately take 1/3 of the media from the filter and place it in the new filters.

I would also say stop adding anything to the water apart from dechlorinator, as the other additives could be giving you false readings (cant say for sure as I dont know those products).

Do a 50% w/c, test one hour later (what test kit are you using?), if the levels are still high, do another 50% w/c and keep this up until the ammonia and nitrIte are 0.25ppm or lower. Temperature match the water going back into the tank so as not to shock the fish.

What fish do you have in the other tank?

NitrIte always takes twice as long to process as ammonia, as ammonia bacteria grows faster than nitrite processing bacteria, some is being processed as the nitrAtes are rising, but this will take a few weeks until the nitrite bacteria have grown enough, taking 1/3 of the mature media from the other tank will significantly help with this and should only take a few days and some good water changes to bring the levels down already in the tank before the tank finishes its cycle.

To be honest, Im amazed the ghost has survived this as they are extremely senstive.

 

[hopkigg]

If your other tank is mature and has mature media, immediately take 1/3 of the media from the filter and place it in the new filters.

I would also say stop adding anything to the water apart from dechlorinator, as the other additives could be giving you false readings (cant say for sure as I dont know those products).

Do a 50% w/c, test one hour later (what test kit are you using?), if the levels are still high, do another 50% w/c and keep this up until the ammonia and nitrIte are 0.25ppm or lower. Temperature match the water going back into the tank so as not to shock the fish.

What fish do you have in the other tank?

NitrIte always takes twice as long to process as ammonia, as ammonia bacteria grows faster than nitrite processing bacteria, some is being processed as the nitrAtes are rising, but this will take a few weeks until the nitrite bacteria have grown enough, taking 1/3 of the mature media from the other tank will significantly help with this and should only take a few days and some good water changes to bring the levels down already in the tank before the tank finishes its cycle.

To be honest, Im amazed the ghost has survived this as they are extremely senstive.

I know he was the one we were worried about as he is about 3 years old now, 12 inch. I know he is too big for that tank but if you had seen how he looked before and since being in the new tank he is looking so much better. His fins were all shredded and he would just hang at the top of the water. Now he hides in his tube most of the day and is out swimming happily at night and is eating really well. Just need to get a 6ft tank now.

The reason i havent taken the media out of the mature tank yet is that i have an exteranl fluval 403 and everytime we clean it out a few days later it seems to stop working, its ok when we are here coz we give it a bang and it starts again, but i go on holiday on friday and dont want it stopping whilst im away, otherwise i will come back to a tank full of dead fish. Do any lfs give mature media away if so is this an option.

The fish in the mature tank is

1 polypterus, 2 cory, 1 rainbow fish, 1 gourami, 3 small bala sharks (will be upgrading before these get too big), 1 african knife fish, 1 apistogramma, 1 silver dollar, 1 angel fish, 2 common plec.

Oh and im using the api freshwater master test kit

 

[saz326]

The reason i havent taken the media out of the mature tank yet is that i have an exteranl fluval 403 and everytime we clean it out a few days later it seems to stop working, its ok when we are here coz we give it a bang and it starts again, but i go on holiday on friday and dont want it stopping whilst im away, otherwise i will come back to a tank full of dead fish. Do any lfs give mature media away if so is this an option.

This is interesting. I wonder - are you just cleaning teh filter media, or are you actually pulling the impeller out and giving that a clean as well?

The impeller has a cover over it. You need to remove the cover, and then lift the impeller out every now an then to ensure that the green sludge you get growing in filters doesnt stop the impeller from turning.

Clean the cover (quick scrub with tankwater), and pull the impeller out. Wipe around the impeller magnet (grey bit) to remove any muck, and use either an old toothbrush or cotton buds to clean the recess the impeller lives in. You will get lots of green muck out. This should help the impeller to turn freely when the motor is switched on.

 

[hopkigg]

The reason i havent taken the media out of the mature tank yet is that i have an exteranl fluval 403 and everytime we clean it out a few days later it seems to stop working, its ok when we are here coz we give it a bang and it starts again, but i go on holiday on friday and dont want it stopping whilst im away, otherwise i will come back to a tank full of dead fish. Do any lfs give mature media away if so is this an option.

This is interesting. I wonder - are you just cleaning teh filter media, or are you actually pulling the impeller out and giving that a clean as well?

The impeller has a cover over it. You need to remove the cover, and then lift the impeller out every now an then to ensure that the green sludge you get growing in filters doesnt stop the impeller from turning.

Clean the cover (quick scrub with tankwater), and pull the impeller out. Wipe around the impeller magnet (grey bit) to remove any muck, and use either an old toothbrush or cotton buds to clean the recess the impeller lives in. You will get lots of green muck out. This should help the impeller to turn freely when the motor is switched on.

Oh ok will try that, my husband was in charge of the fish, however they kept dying. The rainbow fish etc were kept in a shoal, now i have one. I watched him doing the filter and he scrubed the filter media clean until there was nothing left on it, under tap water. Tut tut tut. I guess thats why a lot of our fish were dying. Also he would only do a water change once a month. Now i do a water change every week or earlier if tests show any problems. I only rinse the media out under tank water, and the fish are all healthy with no deaths.

 

[minxfishy]

What test kit are you using? Is it liquid test kits or strip tests? With nitrIte being that high, I would expect the fish to be dead frankly, the african knife would most likely have been the cause of the Black ghosts problems in that tank, what are the parameters in that tank have you tested lately.

If your going on holiday Friday then if the parameters are better in the larger tank, then the fish would be better off going back into it rather than leaving them in too high nitrIte.

 

[hopkigg]

What test kit are you using? Is it liquid test kits or strip tests? With nitrIte being that high, I would expect the fish to be dead frankly, the african knife would most likely have been the cause of the Black ghosts problems in that tank, what are the parameters in that tank have you tested lately.

If your going on holiday Friday then if the parameters are better in the larger tank, then the fish would be better off going back into it rather than leaving them in too high nitrIte.

that was what i was thinking. I have got the liquid api kit, i have also got the tablet version tetra i think and i took a sample down the lfs, they all said the same. The parameters in the other tank are nitrite 0, amonia 0, nitrate 50 and ph 7

 

[minxfishy]

Well your two choices are, either take some mature media from the fluval 403 (which I know your worried about) and perform a lot of w//c to get the levels right in the 120L before Friday, which could be a stretch even with mature media, or take the fish out and place them back in the other tank. Is there a way you can temporarily divide the main tank, so you have the ghost on one side and the african on the other to stop any aggression issues whilst your away.

 

[OldMan47]

If you are going away in a few days you are going to lose fish. Your choices are lots of water changes to get ammonia and nitrites under control or give the new filters a good jump start from your existing cycled tank's filter. It sounds like you have issues with the older tank that keeps you from cloning its filter and without the frequent water changes the fish in the newly set up tank will die. I don't hold a lot of hope for any significant time without massive water changes in the newer tank for several weeks to come. Your best bet, if you can do it, is to try to get water pollutants down to not detectable the day before you go and do a 75% water change when you walk in the door on your return. If the fish are still alive when you get home, that may be enough to save them.