Lost 5 guppies in brand new tank - what to do next

[Essjay21 136]

I'm not really the author of the articles, I just pulled them together in one article . TwoTankAmin is the real expert, he wrote two of the articles.


Be careful of YouTube and many websites. Anyone can set themselves up as an expert without any actual knowledge.

 

[bgarthe23 40]

And there is always “seeded fish in” cycling.

 

[JCinPA]

Huh? I have to look that one up, it’s a new one.

 

[JCinPA]

Ah, got it. I don’t have a used foam filter or anything. I’m stuck on this current path.

I’m just praying for the little guy!

 

[JCinPA]

04/30/26 10:00 am EST

Well the little guy survived the night! I included him in my bedtime prayers. The water is cloudy, found the Kaveman Aquatics video on bacterial bloom and found out this is normal, and he calmed me down quite a bit. Between my ghost feeding and the fish, both expired and current resident, there is enough to trigger the heterotrophic bacteria, but I trust that will clear itself up on its own as the tank cycles. It was a little disturbing because I wasn't expecting it. Turned up the air pump and the S10 flow to max.

Today is day 4 of Prime/Stability, but I used only 16 drops, figuring I have about 8 gallons of water in there after substrate and submerged equipment parts. Hopefully that will protect my little guy. Used half a capful of Stability, as per instructions. Test kit arrives tomorrow and I can't wait to use it. I will not add any more than this one small guppy until the tank cycles completely. I don't want to use the Prime/Stability regimen to become impatient. I'm just hoping things will progress naturally and the one fish will be OK.

P.S. I did a double dose (another 16 drops) of Prime, I am a little nervous since I don't have the test kit for another day.

 

[bgarthe23 40]

Glad to hear things are improving for you. Btw…..you can do the 20 drops of Prime wo hurting your fish. Imo, it’s better to be absolutely sure there is enough of the Prime to protect the fish. 16 drops (reduction from 20 bc of substrate) is logical, but not necessary. Do the 20 since this is Prime. If you were dosing a med, then you would be spot on with your reduction approach.

I hope I’m not being an alarmist, but from what I am reading, you are hovering between two methods of cycling your tank……kinda gojng back and forth. Pick a method (fish in or KaveMan) and do it fully. For example, putting half a cap of Stability in a tank w one small guppy is not (imo) going to build higher levels of bb. The Kaveman approach depends on ammonia being generated by multiple fish as Stability bacteria takes on the ammonia and Prime keeps the ammonia/nitrite in a harmless state while allowing the bacteria to act. The stability acts on only on what is available and does not just grow in numbers automatically. Your talk of heterotrophic bacteria growing from the expired and living fish is reminiscent of “fish in” cycling and actually contrary to the KaveMan approach. I just don’t want you to “spin your wheels” with this. Pick a method/strategy/approach and focus on doing it fully without variations. Just my caring thoughts…….

 

[JCinPA]

@bgarthe Thanks for your thoughts! I don't want to add more fish now after my disaster, and the one fish is doing well, looks good today on day two. If I understand you correctly (LMK, I may not), you would have me continue with the Prime dosing, but drop the Stability? Today (Friday) is Day 5 of the Prime. I would keep going with the Kave Man process, but I'm just scared to add any more fish now, so I'm just going to let this cycle. Test kit arrives today.

I'm also looking to add a couple plants soon. But apparently, I did almost everything wrong here lol. A) the 10 gallon is too small, wish I had bought a 20 or even 29, but too late. B) I bought an Aqueon full hood with a meager light, apparently would have been better to just get a glass top and a light suitable for plants. Oh well. At this point I'm viewing this tank as my learner tank.

I believe Java Fern will likely grow with my Aqueon Deluxe Hood light, from what I gather. Do you think it's a good choice? I'll get a couple small rocks for it to attach too, I understand it is not really a "rooting" plant. Seems like it might be the best choice for an inexperienced guy?

 

[Essjay21 136]

Java fern was the first plant I managed not to kill. It is a slow grower so it doesn't need much light. As a slow grower it won't take up much ammonia made by the fish, but every little helps.


If you do ever upgrade to a bigger tank, you can always use this one as quarantine tank

 

[bgarthe23 40]

I’m just saying either continue with Kaveman fully (Prime and Stability) or go fish in. It appears you’re leaning towards fish in. Do what you are comfortable with.

Btw……I had a major fish loss recently and had to work through it as well.

 

[JCinPA]

05/01/26 1:00 pm EST

Test kit arrived. Not happy with the condition arrived in, but more about that later. The guppy looks pretty happy, he's all over the place now, and had an appetite around 1:00 p.m. Tank still cloudy but clearing a bit. I can't match the colors exactly, of course, but I can definitely put them between two choices, so these are given as ranges between two adjacent colors.

PH: 7.4 - 7.8
Ammonia: 0.25 - 0.50
Nitrites: 0 - 0.25
Nitrates: 0 - 5.0

The nitrate test is still quite yellow, but darker yellow that the test patch color, so it seems to be off the floor, but just barely. @bgarthe I am tempted to get more guppies, my oldest grandson is coming this weekend. But I'm gunshy, obviously. Given these levels, would you think it would be safe to add one more guppy (not 4!), and keep going with the Prime/Stability treatments? They are quite small and given the ammonia reading, I'm thinking the Prime should keep two of them quite safe. Just looking for a little confidence.

So, when I opened the kit a couple of bottles had leaked so I had to clean up the container and the bottles. These should be good for another 3 years according to the date stamp, so I doubt there is anything wrong with the chemicals, I'm just a little irked. Plus they came with plastic tubes with flip caps, I thought they would be glass with separate caps like I see on Youtube. Since it's Amazon, it's a breeze to return, but I don't know if I should bother. I could try to replace it at the local Petsmart, but getting glass vials vs plastic is a coin flip. They've probably switched to save costs. I don't think there is anything wrong with the kit, I'm just annoyed.

 

[Essjay21 136]

Something else I forgot to mention

Test your tap water for nitrate. Most water providers permit some in tap water, but each country has different permitted levels. I think the US maximum permitted is around 45 mg/l (or ppm) on the nitrate-NO3 scale which is what our test kits use (the official max is 10 mg/l using the different nitrate-N scale). Nitrate is often higher in agricultural areas where run off from crop fertiliser or animal droppings gets into the water.
Once you have the tap water level you'll know if the nitrate is being made in the tank or has come in with the tap water.

 

[JCinPA]

@Essjay I'm not seeing how that would be necessary as nitrates won't leave the aquarium (without plants, like mine) except through water changes. I filled with our local tap water, so there is not much nitrate in it. I think the API kit will let me know when some are produced. It's still too early.

Also, I just ordered some glass test tubes from Amazon. I am not likely to gripe about the leakage, it's probably still fine. Just annoyed, is all.

 

[Essjay21 136]

It's the difference between tank and tap nitrate that matters. If tank nitrate is higher than tap nitrate, you know some is being made in the tank, so you must have grown some bacteria. But if the two are the same no nitrate has been made yet.

It's good that your nitrate levels are nice and low, some places have tap levels very near the max allowed.

 

[TwoTankAmin17]

Stability does not contain the live bacteria which do the cycling chores. It is a bottle of spores. The nitrifying bacteria reproduce by dividing and do not form spores. If you want the right bacteria to help a cycle you have two choices: Dr. Tims One and Only for FW tanks or Tetera Safe Start or Safe Start+.

The reason for the above is because there is a patent on the nitrite bacteria. The patent covers the method for testing for the bacteria and then for using them. The are strains of Nitropspira bacteria. What the other sellers of live bacteria are forced to use are the Nitrobacter. The Nitrospira ones thrive on the lower levels of ammonia generated in aquariums while the Nitrobacter thrive in the high levels which occur in waste water.

I have cycled a lot of tanks. I usually do not actually cycle the tanks but instead use a bio-farm to cycle the filters going into the tanks. I normally need to cycle multiple tanks and I find it faster and easier to go the bio-farm route.

I am willing to help anybody who has problems doing a fishless. I have walked a number of members here though a fishless cycle but I will never help anyone begin a fish-in cycle. The best i do in that respect are the two articles here on rescuing a fish-in cycle gone wild. My reason for being this was a re simple. No fish are killed or harmed if a fishless cycle goes off track. However, when a fish-in cucle goes of track fish are harmed and often killed.

The last place I would ever send anybody to get help with cycling is YouTube. I had never even heard of Kaveman before. Bear in mind that any idiot can have a website and/or post vids on Youtube.

One of the major benefits of doing a proper fishless cycle is once it is completed it allows one to pretty much fully stock a tank right away.

Our test kits are the only way we can know what the status of ammonia, nitrite and nitrate are in out tank(s). So, as you have likely figured out you made a few mistakes in what you did. One was not having a test kit before you started, But, I am not a fan of Stability. I am also not a fan of using dechlors which detoxify ammonia as a way to protect fish. These actually slow a cycle because they convert the harmful ammonia (NH3) int the way less harmful ammonium form (NH4). However, this can also do harm when elevated and present for a prolonged amount of time. The reason is that the ammonia bacteria want NH3. They can use the NH4 but do so less efficiently.

Also, most of the total ammonia in a tank is in the form of NH4. How much is in the toxic NH3 form depends on two factors- pG and temperature. The higher these are the more of the total ammonia will be in the toxic form.

Where you are now is pretty much in a fish-in cycle. If you would like my help them you need to start over without any fish in the tank. You need to return the one you have or get somebody to take care of it for you temporarily. if you want to continue on tyour current path then you will have to get advice.help from somebody else.

However, I will give you one piece of advice I offer to anybody embarking on a new cycle. because there are too many voices trying to tell people how to cycle, many folks end up mixing the differenc advices. What one should do is tto pick a single voicdee and listen only to that one. Things will either work out well and you know whom to trust in the future or else things will fail and you will learn what not to do and to whom you should not listen.

25+ years ago when I set up my furst tank and knew very little I did a fish-in cycle. Since then I have cycled about 165 tanks, But all were done without fish and most using the bio-farm filter cycling approach. There may be two threads here on my doing the bio-farm approach. It took me a while to get it down pat. That means I cycled the equivalent of 8 or 9 tanks in about 2 weeks. I normally fully stocked the tanks as soon as the filters were ready to go into new tanks.

I cycled so many because every summer I would set up tanks for the summer outside on our screened in terrace. I also used to sell in the vendor room of weekend fish events and I always brought tanks and cycled filters for such events.

 

[JCinPA]

Thanks for that detail. I'm beginning to understand this better, though it is still confusing. I think had I let my tank run for 2-3 days before introducing the fish this might have worked.

At this point I am not going to remove the fish. Petsmart won't take him and put him back in their tank now. I'm also not going to introduce any more fish. It will take a while, but the thing has started, I'm just going to leave this single guppy in there and continue to test. People didn't know all this stuff 50 years ago and started a tank with one small fish and they usually survived. I'll let it run its course.

If I do lose him, though, I'll start a fishless cycle using ammonium chloride and one of the two products you mentioned, not Stability. For now, steady as she goes, and hope he does well. He looks very good today. I will shorten the lighting time though.