Newbie With Lots Of Questions

[andreachen]

Hello,

I've never had fish before so I have a few questions, I hope that's ok.

I have inherited a friend's (empty) 60-litre tank, including water heater, filter, lights, gravel, and some bits and pieces.

My kids were very excited in the fish shop and are asking for leopard danios, male guppies, neon tetras, siamese fighters, and bristle nose catfish.

Now, the shop assistant told me that that's fine to get them all and that I can keep 50 fish in the tank if they are all small fish. From reading the FAQs etc it seems that I should really only keep at most 10 fish or less in there, so I'm a little worried about his advice.

He also said that they will all go together, as long as I get only one siamese fighter, do you think that's true? I would have thought danios and guppies together are fine but the others might not be such a good idea from what I read. The assitant suggested to get 6 danios first because they are the hardiest, then 6 guppies a week or two afterwards, and the rest after that. He said danios, guppies, and tetras like being in groups.

He also said that to set up the tank I should fill it with dechlorinated water, switch on the filter and heater, and get it up to temperature, then the week after I could buy the danios, pour in a bottle of live bacteria and release the fish. I've read all about cycling a new tank but it was also mentioned in the wiki pages that live bacteria would work within a day. Do you think that's true? It does sound too easy to be true. I have bought a testing kit as well to make sure but of course there is nowhere for the fish to go if it doesn't work out, or would frequent water changes help?

I would also like to add some plants but haven't found much information, ie do the fish mind which plants there are?

And my last question is regarding the water, ie which is best to use, tap water, softened water (water softener that works with salt, not sure if that leaves too much salt in the water for fish), or filtered water (we have a tap attached to a reverse osmosis water filter), and would all of these still need the decholorinating liquid adding?

Sorry for asking so many questions, I'd be grateful for any hints you can give me.

Many thanks,
Andrea

 

[This Old Spouse]

For starters, welcome to the forum! You'll find lots of good stuff here.

I'd suggest you go right to the Beginners Resource Center, a pinned topic on the home page. It's going to be a little overwhelming, but if you can try to concentrate on the subjects that pertain to your tank, you can mostly avoid the information overload that inevitably happens.

Just a couple of things .... please keep in mind that the small fish you bring home may grow and grow and GROW, so please research any fish before you buy them. For instance, the Siamese fighter (Betta) would not do well with male guppies. They usually think the guppies are other male bettas and will fight them.

I don't know much about plants, just the ones I have which I've gotten rather willy-nilly. But they all seem to do well.

I dechlorinate any water I put in the tank. I'd first get a master test kit to test your water to see what you're dealing with first.

Good luck, and again, welcome!

 

[fluttermoth]

Hello,

I've never had fish before so I have a few questions, I hope that's ok.

I have inherited a friend's (empty) 60-litre tank, including water heater, filter, lights, gravel, and some bits and pieces.

My kids were very excited in the fish shop and are asking for leopard danios, male guppies, neon tetras, siamese fighters, and bristle nose catfish.

Your tank is too small for the danios; neons do better in tanks that have been running for 6 months or longer; guppies and the Siamese fighter are good choices, but you'll have to decide on one or the other; the siamese fighter will attack the guppies thinking they're other fighters (I know, they're not the brightest of fish mentally; mind you guppies aren't high in the intelligece stakes either!) I personally think your tank is too small for a bristlenose too.

Now, the shop assistant told me that that's fine to get them all and that I can keep 50 fish in the tank if they are all small fish. From reading the FAQs etc it seems that I should really only keep at most 10 fish or less in there, so I'm a little worried about his advice.

50 fish!!! The man's raving mad for sure! I would take all his 'advice' with a large pinch of salt from now one; either he doesn't know what he's on about or is just after your money! Your tank is 13 gallons or so, so you're looking at having about 12 or 13 one inch fishes as a final stocking.

He also said that they will all go together, as long as I get only one siamese fighter, do you think that's true? I would have thought danios and guppies together are fine but the others might not be such a good idea from what I read. The assitant suggested to get 6 danios first because they are the hardiest, then 6 guppies a week or two afterwards, and the rest after that. He said danios, guppies, and tetras like being in groups.

They won't all go together, as I've already mentioned; he is right about only being able to have one fighter and that the danios are the hardiest; however, danios are very strong swimmers and need a much larger tank that you'd think to be really happy. He is also right that danios and tetras need to be in groups; at least 6.

He also said that to set up the tank I should fill it with dechlorinated water, switch on the filter and heater, and get it up to temperature, then the week after I could buy the danios, pour in a bottle of live bacteria and release the fish. I've read all about cycling a new tank but it was also mentioned in the wiki pages that live bacteria would work within a day. Do you think that's true? It does sound too easy to be true. I have bought a testing kit as well to make sure but of course there is nowhere for the fish to go if it doesn't work out, or would frequent water changes help?

Not many people have any faith in the bottled bacteria starters. The general consensus is that if there were any live bacteria in there, they will be dead by the time you get them. Some used media from an established tank is the best source of the bacteria, if you can get some. We recommend a fishless cycle in here; you can do fish-in, but it's risky; you may lose fish and involves a lot of hard work; twice daily water changes for some weeks are a distinct possibility. You can read up on the different options in our beginners resource centre here; http/www.fishforums.net/index.php?/topic/277264-beginners-resource-center/

I would also like to add some plants but haven't found much information, ie do the fish mind which plants there are?

Live plants are great and there are lots that are easy to grow. The fish won't mind one little bit which ones you have

And my last question is regarding the water, ie which is best to use, tap water, softened water (water softener that works with salt, not sure if that leaves too much salt in the water for fish), or filtered water (we have a tap attached to a reverse osmosis water filter), and would all of these still need the decholorinating liquid adding?

You can't use the softened water; you're quite right in thinking that the salts it leaves in the water leave it unsuitable for fish. You can use RO water, but it needs 'buffering' or mixing with tap water to get the right minerals back into it; it's actually too pure for fish just as it is. You might be very glad of that RO unit later in your fishkeeping, but for now I'd recommend you stick to plain, dechlorinated tap water; that's perfectly fine for most fish

Sorry for asking so many questions, I'd be grateful for any hints you can give me.

Many thanks,
Andrea

You're very welcome; we love people who ask questions instead of coming on here telling us what they've already done and how to fix it!

 

[Lolly123]

Hi Andrea,

Without patronising you, just want to say well done for actually asking first instead of going out and getting yourself into a mess by listening to bad advice from LFS, especially if your kids are going to be involved in the tank. I guess it is very hard to try and explain to children that you have to be patient and sometimes why you cant buy a certain fish. However, if you enter in to this hobby the right way, it will make the experience for all of you much much better.

You've been given some great advice in this thread already but just wanted to say that you might want to consider a fish-less cycle. For that you will essentially be replacing the waste that fish produce with bottled ammonia from somewhere like boots (if you're in the uk) and you'll also have to pick up a good liquid test kit, for ammonia, nitrite, nitrate and PH, API have a masterkit which is what a lot of people on here use and rely on, it's worth the money. Stay away from the strips, they are a waste of money and are quite inaccurate.

Just as fluttermoth said, fish-in cycles can be done, but there is no doubt that you'll be exposing the fish to toxins, if not kept under control it can cause significant damage to your fish. Smaller tanks do pollute quicker and can get out of control and it is quite possible that you'll find yourself do multiple water changes daily. All in all, it can be achieved but is a little more stressful on both parties, not to mention fish-in cycles can take a little longer than fish-less.

I would also say +1 for the use of tap water, alot of people use sea chem prime as their water conditioner, very concentrated and effective, so again worth the money in the long run. I've never had a problem with dechlorinated tap water, so personally I wouldn't bother with the hassle of RO water. Also, just to reiterate, if you do go into a shop and they try to sell you bottled bacteria and products like that, you just don't need them, if they did work, I dont think we'd encounter so many newcomer emergencies in regards to cycling as we currently get on here. It's just a little thing that put in place to get you to spend your hard earned cash.

Good luck with your tank and as we will all say, ask as many questions as you like and someone will answer them for you.

In terms of plants it depends on your lighting really, but you'll be pleased to know that if you're lighting is quite low, there are a number of low light plants such as java fern, java moss and anubias that will do well in lower light conditions. If you can find out at a later date what bulbs you have and what wattage they are the planted section may be able to help you if you do decide to get some plants.

I have 6 zebra danios in my 250L and they are constantly all over the place, so as said before I personally wouldn't put danios in a 60L as they are really energeti.

 

[Warehouse]

Welcome to the forum. At least the no.1 lesson has now been learned, take everything you hear at the LFS with a huge pinch of salt. Fifty fish? That's just fantastic.

I'm currently setting up my new tank and running through the fishless cycle whilst researching the fish we want to keep. It's driving the kids mad having this big empty tank, but I've been involving them with the water tests and we've taken them to several LFS's so they feel involved in the journey. I think long term this will put them in a good place when they are older and want a tank of their own someday.

 

[Paul70]

lmao at the LFS you spoke to. You can tell his profits depend on sales!!

Try and stick to the 1" of fish per US gallon rule initially then I think I read somewhere that when your tank is more mature (eg6-12 months) you can go up 1.5"-2" of fish per US gallon. Obviously do research on what will go together when your tank is cycled and definitely do a fishless cycle first. I am currently at day 19 of my cycle and my ammonia and nitrites are now going from 4ppm to 0 in 12 hours consistently. I added a bottle of safestart live bacteria to my water when I first started cycling so not sure if it is this that has helped my cycle along or whether or not I have just been lucky.

Just follow the advice on here and I will say that there a couple of really good guides on fishless cycling (in particular the one by gville guy) which have helped no end.

It may be that you can get away without losing any fish if you don't cycle but who knows what suffering the poor things will go through swimming around in a vat of their own excrement (which burns gills and reduces oxygen transport around their bodies).

Good luck with it m8 and welcome to TFF.
truly a great bunch of helpful people
paul

 

[mbriggs84]

hmmm... just reading some posts and noticed the comments on zebra danios. I was informed they are good hardy starter fish. But it

sounds like my 29 gallon tank may be too small, is this true?

Just when I finally picked a fish I definately wanted!!!

 

[andreachen]

Many thanks for all the great advice, I'm very glad I found this site!
And I'm relieved you didn't mind so many questions all at once...

I couldn't believe the 50 fish either (maybe I should get sardines ). The only explanation I can think of is that he got confused between litres and gallons.

@This Old Spouse: I've read through a lot of the articles already, you're right, it is a bit overwhelming after a while.
I'll definitely keep in mind asking about the grown size of the fish, previously I hadn't quite appreciated that the shop has mainly babies. My boys' first choice were some silver sharks, but luckily the assistant did point out that they would end up not even fitting in the tank, so they were straight out... I've also told the boys now that they'll have to choose between the Siamese figher and the guppies, I think they guppies win, they are so nice and colourful.

@fluttermoth: I see that danios are out as well, and I did wonder about the bristlenose since I meanwhile read that it grows bigger than I thought, I think I'd prefer smaller fish that match the tank size anyway. Would guppies be ok to put in as the first fish though? The shop assistant thought they weren't hardy enough (of course his advice so far wasn't exactly good, so who knows). Also, are there smaller alternatives for a type of catfish, ie something that will eat the algae, plus one of my sons really liked it so he would be happy if I told him we could get something similar.

I also don't think I'll rely on the bottle bacteria plan now, I definitely wouldn't want to harm the fish. Maybe I'll try bottled ammonia and bottled bacteria together (without fish) and then test it to see if it worked. I have my friend's old filter, I didn't know that that would be a good starting point, but I guess the bacteria area already dead now, her fish got moved out 5 days ago, shame...

@Lolly123: I'm indeed in the UK, I didn't realise Boots sold this kind of thing, so that's a good tip, thanks. I had already bought some testing strips, sounds like I should return them and buy something better, I didn't know that there were differences.

You're right, my children are a little impatient about it, but on the other hand they also don't want to risk any of the fish being bitten, or even dying, in fact their first question for each of them was how long they would live, so they can be fairly easily convinced about what to get and when (two 8-year-old boys btw).

I checked the lighting, it's built into the lid and seems to be a 15 Watt neon tube. Moss and fern sounds nice, so hopefully that will grow with these lighting conditions.

Thanks to both of you for the information on the water as well, so I'll stick to tap water, and the shop sold me something called 'aqua safe', I hope that's ok to use?

@Warehouse: I agree, I won't necessarily believe this shop anymore, there is another one in town, so I'll try that one as well to see what they have and recommend.

@Paul70: Seems that putting ammonia and bacteria together might have the best chance of success, thanks.

I have a new question as well now, I have meanwhile read that the tank should be sitting on some polystyrene or so, is that necessary? The best I have at the moment is a piece of wood and some left-over vinyl flooring, will that be good enough you think?

Thanks again to everybody!
Andrea

 

[waterdrop]

The only time you put tanks on poly is when the actual flat glass bottom is going to be against a hard stand surface. This is pretty rare. Most tanks have what is technically called a "floating base." A floating base simply means there is a rim of some sort that is what actually touches the stand or furniture. The glass bottom is raised a short distance up from the stand by the rim.

Even with a bottom rim, the surface does need to be flat and level and if the base is made of particle board (as some in the pet stores are) it can be a good idea to put some heavy mil garbage bag type plastic between the tank and the wood such that a tiny bit sticks out. This can keep the occasional drip of water from getting in to the particle board and causing it to swell into a bump which can then crack the bottom glass because the rim is no longer level.

Parents not wanting to explain "why the new pet just died" is often one of the main things that helps spur them on to push through the fishless cycle. With younger kids it can help to have them work on large colorful posters that copy the pictures of "The Nitrogen Cycle" and perhaps make cartoons of the bacteria themselves, repeatedly explaining that you are growing these in the filter. It's a challange though. Most of us parents have been through it and since many fishless cycles last about 70 days, it can seem forever.

There is no question though that it is the route to take. It is just about the single most important skill in the hobby and there is no better introduction to it than doing a daily log here and sharing the experience with the members. While the cycle is slowly crawling foward, you can work on other maintenance skills like the weekly gravel-clean-water-change and the details of a filter maintenance. The main thing though is working on the stocking plan, which can be quite a bit trickier than most beginners expect.

You're already headed in the right direction: API Freshwater Master Test Kit, Boots household ammonia, a couple of marked syringes, simple thermometer, rdd1952's reference article, GVGs summary of recent tweaks.

~~waterdrop~~
ps. Welcome to TFF!

 

[This Old Spouse]

 

[andreachen]

Hello again,

@waterdrop: Thanks for the information regarding the tank, in that case it should be fine since the tank has a rim around all edges. And the vinyl should catch any drops. My boys are not too impatient at the moment since they're now planning how to decorate the tank with plants and ornaments, they want the sunken aircraft carrier they saw in the shop (I don't think they'll get it... ).

Meanwhile we've been to another fish shop and they recommended leopard or zebra danios for the beginning as well, they also said that I need to leave the water for 2 weeks before putting fish in, which doesn't sound right again, but at least they said I could bring some water in after 2 weeks and they can test it to see if it's suitable for putting fish in.

I'm still unsure what to put in the tank first though once it's ready, since you think it's too small for danios. Would platies be ok for instance? My kids liked them in the second shop (the first one didn't have any), especially since some looked like goldfish which were they favourite but I already knew they would grow too big. And would these go with guppies if we got some later? And also, since the catfish seems unsuitable he now wants Japonica shrimps, would they be ok to get you think? They sounded like a good idea since they eat algae and leftover food.

Also, since I don't really want to breed fish, is it possible to get all male fish you think? Or would that be a bit mean?

Thanks again for responding, I really appreciate that!
Andrea

 

[waterdrop]

Meanwhile we've been to another fish shop and they recommended leopard or zebra danios for the beginning as well, they also said that I need to leave the water for 2 weeks before putting fish in, which doesn't sound right again, but at least they said I could bring some water in after 2 weeks and they can test it to see if it's suitable for putting fish in.

I'm trying to express how this paragraph makes me feel. It is so natural when you're a newcomer to walk into pet/fish shops and get in to discussions. It seems like the logical place to get advice. But we've repeatedly found this to be "hazardous" to say the least. What a given shop person (whether worker or even owner) will tell you is quite similar to the random person off the street or a single commentator here who might be "off the street" with respect to the hobby. You have to take it with a lot of skepticism. But in the shops the danger is even greater because it quite often works out to be an even more subtle thing moving you in exactly the wrong direction.

By stumbling on a really serious hobbyist site like this one, you've bypassed the great majority of the mess that shops can get you in to but you have to take the chance to fully embrace it and realize that you have to be very quiet and careful in shops and think much more of them being an "object/stock source place" where you go after lots of careful research here and coaxing of good information out of the real hobbyists. It's doubly hard in some ways because it takes patience to wait for good anwers here, whereas the shop will have ready answers on demand.. but the problem is that those ready answers are all about them making money and it's just not the same thing as what you as the fish environment owner ultimately want.

The shop is already steering you down a path where perhaps two months of the exhausting and frustrating work of changing water perhaps daily will leave you angry that the full impact of the decision was not well explained. Granted, fishless cycing carries its own kind of frustration, but it carries two huge benefits that have really made it an advance over the historically older technique of fish-in cycling. First there are just many less water changes and that represents a -lot- less overall work. Water changes are exchanged for tiny squirts of clear liquid. Secondly, for beginners, fishless cycling just takes the whole responsibility for keeping the fish alive and undamaged off the back of the beginner! Many beginners have quite good intentions of keeping the fish safe during a fish-in cycle and of relying on the good feeling that they are after all "hardy" fish. But the reality (which we see sampled here in our dozens of cases each month) is that the poisons bounce around quickly and take the beginner by surprise, leading easily to situations where the fish are actually receiving permanent gill and nerve damage (above certain levels they are all receiving this damage, there being no such thing as hardy in the sense of whether the damage takes place.)

By having no focus on a beginner learning of good test kits and no focus on fishless cycling, the shop is instead making the subtle lean to having the customer come in for in-store testing (where they can be told things are fine, regardless of what they really are) and perhaps even water from the store. What the business model really knows is that frequent returns are important to both sales and to getting repeat business. Sales are focused both on high profit aspects (more expensive fish and chemicals) and on increasing the repeated visits (having bought your equipment there so that you will return there, filters needing replacement media, etc.)

Oh dear andreachen, I just realized into one of my long morning coffee writings and you as a beginner don't really want to hear all this I'm sure! I guess sometimes the hobbyist coffee writings are good and sometimes they're bad. Hope I won't have taken away from the fact that there is plenty of wonderful stuff to be had from a first family community tank - our family has really benefitted. It's just that what I found here on TFF was that the long fishless cycle with lots of interaction with the members about stocking plans and learning maintenance techniques all turned out to be so very much better than what I saw in previous times in the hobby, so I've ended up wishing that for all beginners.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[This Old Spouse]