Is My Tank Now Cycled?

[danb]

Hi,

I have a juwel 240 litre tank with standard filter and heater. It has been running for nearly 2 months now (18th october setup then a week later added 21 fish) i have 7 neon tetras, 6 glow light, 2 black widow, 6 danios and more recently 2 siler shark. Im wanting to know if my tank is cycled? I havent lost any fish and they all look really healthy and are all eating. I havent seen much movement at all with the water levels, there is a small trace of ammonia; nitrite, nitrate are at 0 and the ph is about 6.8.

Thanks,
Danny

 

[mattlee]

is the tank planted? because if not then you should be getting nitrates showing on the tests.. also with low levels of ammonia i would say its not cycled, this in any amount is toxic to your fish so i would do an immediate water change to reduce the level wait an hour then re test. if you still get ammonia even if its 0.25 then another water change is needed, keep going until it reads 0 if the tank is cycled then the ammonia, nitrites should read 0 and nitrate should read something as this is the biproduct of the cycle. its ok to have low levels of nitrate but people say not to let them go above 60 if poss. also test your tap water as this may contain nitrates in which case you will never get it lower than the level in the tap water unless its a planted tank then the plants will use up some of the nitrates.
how did you cycle the tank in the first place? it sounds like you set it up then left it a week then added fish, is this correct?
if so i bet this is what the fish shop told you to do!!!!! which is incorrect..... as you have fish already in there you will need to do daily water changes to keep the toxic ammonia and nitrite levels at 0, if the level reads 0.5 and you do a 50% water change this will half the levels down to 0.25 then another water change is required to get it lower and so on and so on until 0.
there is a pinned topic on here letting you know how to do a fishless cycle and a fih in cycle which by the sounds of it you are involved in.
also i think the tank will be too small for the silver sharks eventually so i would think about rehoming them asap to give them a better quality of life.....
good luck, Matt

 

[danb]

is the tank planted? because if not then you should be getting nitrates showing on the tests.. also with low levels of ammonia i would say its not cycled, this in any amount is toxic to your fish so i would do an immediate water change to reduce the level wait an hour then re test. if you still get ammonia even if its 0.25 then another water change is needed, keep going until it reads 0 if the tank is cycled then the ammonia, nitrites should read 0 and nitrate should read something as this is the biproduct of the cycle. its ok to have low levels of nitrate but people say not to let them go above 60 if poss. also test your tap water as this may contain nitrates in which case you will never get it lower than the level in the tap water unless its a planted tank then the plants will use up some of the nitrates.
how did you cycle the tank in the first place? it sounds like you set it up then left it a week then added fish, is this correct?
if so i bet this is what the fish shop told you to do!!!!! which is incorrect..... as you have fish already in there you will need to do daily water changes to keep the toxic ammonia and nitrite levels at 0, if the level reads 0.5 and you do a 50% water change this will half the levels down to 0.25 then another water change is required to get it lower and so on and so on until 0.
there is a pinned topic on here letting you know how to do a fishless cycle and a fih in cycle which by the sounds of it you are involved in.
also i think the tank will be too small for the silver sharks eventually so i would think about rehoming them asap to give them a better quality of life.....
good luck, Matt

Thanks for the reply.

I ran the filter with media from my goldfish tank for a week before adding fish. When i say small amounts of ammonia, 9 times out of 10 it reads 0, a couple of times i have seen a very small amount, still yellow but not as yellow as usual.

 

[waterdrop]

Usually in a fish-in cycling situation the members suggest watching for zero ppm ammonia and zero ppm nitrite(NO2) for two days in a row during which you do not perform any water changes. That's usually a good sign that you're cycled and if it can do it for a week that's even better. To me, your tank sounds like its cycled but that maybe you're just being overly critical about the shade of yellow. Its a situation where it would be wise to keep testing frequently and perhaps a situation where it would be interesting to understand what's going on with nitrate(NO3) but its not one that sounds like its still cycling. Anyway, hope I'm not wrong on that!

~~waterdrop~~

 

[Amberleaf]

Haha, yeah; my test kit used to do that *all* the time. It really worried me; but, I think it's fine. ^^;

 

[danb]

Usually in a fish-in cycling situation the members suggest watching for zero ppm ammonia and zero ppm nitrite(NO2) for two days in a row during which you do not perform any water changes. That's usually a good sign that you're cycled and if it can do it for a week that's even better. To me, your tank sounds like its cycled but that maybe you're just being overly critical about the shade of yellow. Its a situation where it would be wise to keep testing frequently and perhaps a situation where it would be interesting to understand what's going on with nitrate(NO3) but its not one that sounds like its still cycling. Anyway, hope I'm not wrong on that!

~~waterdrop~~

Thank you for the reply. The ammonia is yellow, most of the time just pure yellow, very seldom a small minute amount of pale green but that just goes the next day without water change. So you think my tank is cycled? or could it be the way in which i have the sponges positioned in the filter? maybe i set it up wrong ?

 

[waterdrop]

You are understocked for a 240L/63G tank, so I'd not expect the filter to be straining, but what is a "standard" filter? Things we might look for would be overfeeding, lack of understanding of gravel-cleaning technique, too few gravel-clean-water-changes (they should be performed weekly) or possibly frequent failures of live plantings. Any or some combination of these things might be overtaxing the filtration system. Of course it could also be that the filter media just needs more frequent cleaning.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[danb]

You are understocked for a 240L/63G tank, so I'd not expect the filter to be straining, but what is a "standard" filter? Things we might look for would be overfeeding, lack of understanding of gravel-cleaning technique, too few gravel-clean-water-changes (they should be performed weekly) or possibly frequent failures of live plantings. Any or some combination of these things might be overtaxing the filtration system. Of course it could also be that the filter media just needs more frequent cleaning.

~~waterdrop~~

Okay, by standard filter i mean the one that came with the juwel rio 240 tank. All readings are nill, and more or less have been from the start. Does it mean im cycled? or does it mean im doing something wrong ? i do a water change maybe once every week and every other week do the gravel.

 

[OldMan47]

After 2 months of running with no build up of ammonia, it seems that your filter has enough biofilter for the present stock levels. I would try keeping a sharp eye on the water chemistry and introduce a percentage of the load that you already have. If all goes well, you will see some nitrates and the ammonia and nitrites will stay at zero. If you are not really cycled, the ammonia or nitrite levels will move slowly, that's why the small change, and you will be able to handle things easily.