Need help with new 50 gallon tank

[Essjay]

A lot of household water softeners have salt in them. They swap the hardness minerals for sodium. This is not good for fish, especially soft water fish. Where this type of softener is used, water from the bypass tap should be used for fish.
This means either having fish that can live in the bypass tap water or you can mix the hard bypass water with a form of pure water. Reverse osmosis (RO) is a process which strips out all the minerals in water so this can be used to mix with hard tap water to make it softer. Several of our members do this so they'll be able to help you if you decide to go down this route.

 

[Essjay]

We just bought a used 50 gallon tank and it's been cycling for about 4 weeks.

Can I check with you how you have cycled the tank? Depending on what you've done it may or may not actually be cycled.......

 

[mcordelia]

@smackitsakic When I kept fish in my previous life I also lived in an area where I would have had to drive 3h to get to a "real" fish store. I noticed that every now and then, the local petsmart would magically score some cool fish, so it would be worth talking to them about how they stock and when/what they expect in their shipments. Additionally, like many people have suggested here, before it gets too cold weather-wise ordering online is a great way to get fish, and I think a lot of online stores are starting to give "alive arrival" guarantees nowadays too. Also, craigslist/fb marketplace might be another way to source fish and plants! I've been searching fb marketplace for a tank lately, and was surprised to see a lot of live stuff for sale locally on there too (I'm currently in a larger municipality though, so not sure if that'd be the same in a more rural area).

 

[smackitsakic]

Can I check with you how you have cycled the tank? Depending on what you've done it may or may not actually be cycled.......

I used the filter and various elements (cave, rocks, etc) from my old, established tank.

 

[Essjay]

The filter from the old tank is fine.
We get a few new members who think just running the tank is cycling so I always check just in case