My Tank- What The?!...very Frustrated

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ammoniator

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hi everyone- ive had my tank for 11 weeks now and didnt do fishless cycling. my setup is listed in my signature.

the fish are very healthy and growing...but, i am changing 25-50% of water every 1-2 days because of ammonia levels between 0.25 and just under 1 ppm.

I'm starting to tire from this as no matter what i do i cant see how i can get the tank to a state of stabilisation.

I took an extreme measure just yesterday and cleaned the entire tank out..every drop of water and cleaned the gravel..everything..except of course the internal filter and canister..so as to preserve any good bacteria that might be in there. (i say "might" as theres no evidence to suggest there is any- despite it being in there for 11 weeks)..

ive tried all the tips ive had from a very competent LFS..but it seems the one i need to persevere with is water changes.

ive reduced feeding down to bare minimum now also but get this, its been about 16 hours since the full water change and the ammonia is already close on 0.5ppm.

I bought an expensive eheim canister filter thinking that that might help but it seems to have made not a bit of difference. I dont want to be changing water every dau, every other day, or even weekly if i can help it. I was under the impression that fortnightly changes would be required- that i can deal with...but as it is i am contemplating selling off my gear as i simply dont have time to be doing all this work.

I hope someone from here can advise..or go through a list of things to diagnose?

or just keep my motivation up..as it's waning.

Thanks,
Tim

(PS the water supply is ammonia free, and the containers are food grade, only used for this task)...

I'm at a loss really..although i've never had a nitrite reading in the entire 11 weeks..so i figure bacteria isnt growing- right?...if not, i cant see why it isnt..im pretty sure im doing everything correctly..
 
well, please dont think about selling your stuff already.

have you tried any products to decrease your ammonia? i think your fish will be ok short term, but in the long run its doing permanent gill damage. there are also products you can buy that help nitrites produce. youve got the ammonia for them and i dont know why theyre not in your tank.

do you have nitrates? ...im sure the cleaning of the tank got rid of a lot of them.


i use aqua safe to dechlorinate my water...and its also got a lot of good stuff in it. not only does it help with coating the fish with protective slime, it also has bio extract. this just aids in the growth of that bacteria. i havent had any problems with my tank, and its a bit over stocked too! do you use anything like this to dechlorinate your water? you do dechlorinate your water right??

hope this helps..im sure people will want to know all of your stats and can help you better than i can. good luck!! you can do it :good:

p.s.

i just looked at your stocking...im curious to how these fish will be together. at first i thought, nooo thats bad, but now that i think about..im sure its possible?? lol they are all agressive but maybe theyre balanced and get along
 
p.s.

i just looked at your stocking...im curious to how these fish will be together. at first i thought, nooo thats bad, but now that i think about..im sure its possible?? lol they are all agressive but maybe theyre balanced and get along

Definatley not in a tank of that size, 65 gallons? Recommended size for one oscar is 75 gallons and two 125 Gallons with tank mates, and then hes got 2 JDs and 2 SDs and a convict. Its very overstocked imo and they are all heavy protein eaters so this is maybe why your amonia isnt going down. Id either keep one oscar or one JD and take the rest back.
 
overstocked?!

really?

darn i thought that might be it a few weeks back and asked the LFS and they said it was fine. The fish are only small..still, they will grow.

So how many can i have in there?...2 oscars, a JD and a Convict?

(they all get along famously)

Thanks guys,

Tim


PS why havent i gotten any nitrite readings yet?- overcrowding doesnt seem to be an answer to that bit....any ideas?
 
overstocked?!

really?

darn i thought that might be it a few weeks back and asked the LFS and they said it was fine. The fish are only small..still, they will grow.

So how many can i have in there?...2 oscars, a JD and a Convict?

(they all get along famously)

Thanks guys,

Tim


PS why havent i gotten any nitrite readings yet?- overcrowding doesnt seem to be an answer to that bit....any ideas?

Im afraid that is the reply of many newbies when they are asked to give up some fish. "They all get along now", The fact with Cichlids especially the larger new world species is that they can get along for a while then one day suddenly turn and rip each other apart, Ask a member here called Nelly his fish were fine and in a suitable tank everything cared for and suddenly his Jaguar (Brutis) turned. The fact is you can only keep one oscar in there without any tank mates, and no other fish. The reason why the nitrite may not be processing is beacuse the bactiera cannot cope with the amount of waste the fish is producing and there isnt enough bactieria processing the amonia into nitrite which is why your experiencing amonia levels.
 
p.s.

i just looked at your stocking...im curious to how these fish will be together. at first i thought, nooo thats bad, but now that i think about..im sure its possible?? lol they are all agressive but maybe theyre balanced and get along

Definatley not in a tank of that size, 65 gallons? Recommended size for one oscar is 75 gallons and two 125 Gallons with tank mates, and then hes got 2 JDs and 2 SDs and a convict. Its very overstocked imo and they are all heavy protein eaters so this is maybe why your amonia isnt going down. Id either keep one oscar or one JD and take the rest back.

Thanks Ace. Man I am amazed at what you are saying- not that I dispute it at all...BUT, in my area there are several aquariums with big tanks filled with huge fish that are literally swimming on top of each other...taking up much more available space than my setup. These are tanks that are for display fish too- so arent being constantly stocked and restocked...how, using the overstock rule of 1 oscar per 85gallons, can they do that?

one piece of advice i was given was that for communty fish, 1cm/litre is the rule, and for aggressive fish, 1 inch per gallon....this was taken from these very forums in stickies.

is this not correct then?

(if i have 1 oscar at 25cm in a 65 gallon tank, thats 6 gallons per inch of fish...hate to say it, but its hardly worth all the cost in setting up a tank if i keep one lonely fish)..


maybe i look at this from another angle...what could i put in this tank?- i was after variety and at least enough fish to entertain my kids..

Cheers,
Tim
 
Well mate that is a sensitive subject, the rule is good for new people out in the hobby choosing small "Community" fish. that only reach 1-3" long. But when you start getting onto oscars which can get to 12-16", then it just dosent make sense, by that logic you could keep a oscar in a 16 Gallon, which we know isnt true. With big fish you have to count for agression, territory etc. I am talking from some sort of experience as I have had two oscars, and another member has tried two oscars in a smaller tank like yours (Shelagh) and it didnt work for her. Although she sensibly got rid of the other oscar quick and peace was soon returned to her tank. Im sure she will tell you the same after experiencing what happend.

Its 1 per 75 gallon and 2 in 125 Gallon. But 1 will be fine in a 65 Gallon.
i
The thing is with shop tanks is they are constantly being bought etc, and the display tank is a Huuuge tank with overfiltration to the max. Although these tanks may work on the surface to us, I suspect they have lots of problems behind closed doors.
 
yeah as above, these rules are aimed at small community type fish. get into the realm of big territorial/aggressive fish and it goes right out of the window.

you can't keep two oscars together unless they are an established breeding pair, if you do they'll fight to the death. They will be fine until they reach around 1 yr to 18 months old (i.e. hit sexual maturity) at which point they'll develop agression and will start to attack each other.

The JD's are also a lot more agressive than the Oscars, when they reach maturity they'll batter each other and everything else in that tank to be totally honest. They need to be kept either alone or with other equally agressive fish. The O's are more agressive to each other than to other fish see.

A group of SD's would make reasonable dithers for either of the cichlids though, but you'd need a larger group than you currently have (6+) and for that you'd need a lot more space.

Long and the short of it is the fish you have at the moment are a time bomb waiting to go off in your tank, the cycle isn't working for whatever reason. I would be temped to return the lot of them to the shop, do a fishless cycle then stock the tank appropriately.

Seeing as you like cichlids, want a decent amount of fish and seem to like slightly larger more agressive fish why don't you look into an African Cichlid set up? They're dead colourful, and because of the agression people actually intentionally overstock with them because the more fish you have the more spread out the agression is. While there are some bigger ones there's a lot which stay around 4/5" so you can have a lot more fish in the tank than if you went for 12" fish. Because of the personalities of the fish it'll be much more interesting to watch than a 'normal' community tank with tetra's etc (i get the impression thats what your after).
 
do you de-chlorinate your water? the chlorine in tap water could potentially kill any good bacteria
 
Seeing as you like cichlids, want a decent amount of fish and seem to like slightly larger more agressive fish why don't you look into an African Cichlid set up? They're dead colourful, and because of the agression people actually intentionally overstock with them because the more fish you have the more spread out the agression is. While there are some bigger ones there's a lot which stay around 4/5" so you can have a lot more fish in the tank than if you went for 12" fish. Because of the personalities of the fish it'll be much more interesting to watch than a 'normal' community tank with tetra's etc (i get the impression thats what your after).

Nice advice and suggestions there Miss Wiggle, and if your looking into Africans, come into the african side of the forum or shout me a PM as they are the fish I keep. All the agression of the New worlds, twice as colorful and can keep more of them. Your 65 Gallon would be perfect :D
 
aye I don't know a huge amount about Africans (will have a Malawi tank one day....... but haven't really as yet) but I get the impression that they'd fit the bill nicely for what he's after.

As Ace say's, why not hop over to the african forum, if nothing else you'll find a load of tank pics and can see if that's the sort of thing you're after. :nod:
 
How's your tap water? You should be able to find out the base stats by visiting the home page of your water company or calling them. Here the water leaves from the plant with 0.2 ppm ammonia and 0.5 ppm chloramine. Chloramine turns into ammonia when the chlorine in it is released. Additionally, some dechlorinators don't do anything about the ammonia in chloramine, meaning it's just released into the water when you apply the dechlorinator. On the other hand, if you don't dechlorinate, the chloramine will hurt your fish and interfere with the nitrogen bacteria, again increasing ammonia in your tank.

When it comes out of the tap at my house it only has 0.2 ppm chloramine and a tiny bit of ammonia left, but it depends on where you live compared to where the water is coming from, and the time of day. A large water change in my case would pretty much mean that I'd be deliberately creating an ammonia spike in the tank.

So in the worst case scenario you might be constantly pumping ammonia and chloramine into your tank every time you make a water change. My suggestion: do smaller water changes (more often if necessary). Dechlorinate your tap water before putting it in the tank.
 
yeah as above, these rules are aimed at small community type fish. get into the realm of big territorial/aggressive fish and it goes right out of the window.

you can't keep two oscars together unless they are an established breeding pair, if you do they'll fight to the death. They will be fine until they reach around 1 yr to 18 months old (i.e. hit sexual maturity) at which point they'll develop agression and will start to attack each other.

The JD's are also a lot more agressive than the Oscars, when they reach maturity they'll batter each other and everything else in that tank to be totally honest. They need to be kept either alone or with other equally agressive fish. The O's are more agressive to each other than to other fish see.

A group of SD's would make reasonable dithers for either of the cichlids though, but you'd need a larger group than you currently have (6+) and for that you'd need a lot more space.

Long and the short of it is the fish you have at the moment are a time bomb waiting to go off in your tank, the cycle isn't working for whatever reason. I would be temped to return the lot of them to the shop, do a fishless cycle then stock the tank appropriately.

Seeing as you like cichlids, want a decent amount of fish and seem to like slightly larger more agressive fish why don't you look into an African Cichlid set up? They're dead colourful, and because of the agression people actually intentionally overstock with them because the more fish you have the more spread out the agression is. While there are some bigger ones there's a lot which stay around 4/5" so you can have a lot more fish in the tank than if you went for 12" fish. Because of the personalities of the fish it'll be much more interesting to watch than a 'normal' community tank with tetra's etc (i get the impression thats what your after).


great stuff...i took 2 JD, the 2 x SDs and the blue acara back to the store, so have only the 2 oscars, 1 JD and 1 Convict left in the tank. I think ill stay with them for as long as i can and then donate them back to the shop and go down this track...sound ok?



How's your tap water? You should be able to find out the base stats by visiting the home page of your water company or calling them. Here the water leaves from the plant with 0.2 ppm ammonia and 0.5 ppm chloramine. Chloramine turns into ammonia when the chlorine in it is released. Additionally, some dechlorinators don't do anything about the ammonia in chloramine, meaning it's just released into the water when you apply the dechlorinator. On the other hand, if you don't dechlorinate, the chloramine will hurt your fish and interfere with the nitrogen bacteria, again increasing ammonia in your tank.

When it comes out of the tap at my house it only has 0.2 ppm chloramine and a tiny bit of ammonia left, but it depends on where you live compared to where the water is coming from, and the time of day. A large water change in my case would pretty much mean that I'd be deliberately creating an ammonia spike in the tank.

So in the worst case scenario you might be constantly pumping ammonia and chloramine into your tank every time you make a water change. My suggestion: do smaller water changes (more often if necessary). Dechlorinate your tap water before putting it in the tank.

interesting reply.. I tested the tap water and it shows zero ammonia. However ive never tested it AFTER dechlorinating. ...is that what you are saying? (i.e dechlorinating releases ammonia?)

i can do some experiments...(please confirm prior)

Tim
 

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