Oneonion's First Fishless Cycle

[OneOnion]

Just bumping. Oh yeah! And I changed my mind again. I decided to go with my original plan and have 6 female bettas in there. Can't waiiiitttt to get fish.

 

[waterdrop]

Your results in the log are making it look like you're getting close again OO, hope it keeps up! The sorority of bettas sounds nice! WD

 

[OneOnion]

That's awesome! Too bad I ran out of ammonia testing drops. Hopefully it won't affect it that much.

 

[OneOnion]

Ok well I got my ammonia testing things! But I've got a question. In the beginning of my cycle, I had one filter. People said that filter wasn't very good, so I bought another filter during Christmas time, an Aquaclear20. But, I found out that the previous filter's media didn't fit into the aquaclear so I had to have both filters running. how long do I have to leave both filters running before the Aquaclear gets enough beneficial bacteria to work on its own? Right now it's been going for a little over a month. Also, having both filters there means I can't have a hood, and I heard you need hoods when you're keeping bettas because the jump, so I'll have to think of something.

 

[scotty]

would it not be possible to leave both filters running,gives you a back up if something goes wrong with one of them

 

[waterdrop]

Well let's see. We've got several things going here. After about a month of running together, the new filter will have begun to have significant bacterial populations of its own. On the other hand, when you run multiple filters on a given amount of ammonia/tank, the bacteria will distribute evenly between all the filters. If you have two filters, the bacterial populations will move gradually toward a 50/50 split over the two filters. And on the other issue, the lid, I'm strongly in favor of always having a lid. Fish really do jump out - I've lost many, many fish that way over the years. Not only do they jump if there's no lid, they can also unfortunatly seem to find the smallest of openings and jump to their death! So minimizing those chances is a good thing to do.

Sorry no easy answers in this post but I'm sure we'll all come to some good conclusions if we keep discussing...

~~waterdrop~~

 

[OneOnion]

Thanks for replying.

would it not be possible to leave both filters running,gives you a back up if something goes wrong with one of them

See, but there are 2 problems with that. One, the lid doesn't fit with 2 filters on the back of the tank, and two, there's a lot of current from both of the filters and one of the filters has no adjustment for flow on it. And the strong current might want to make them jump, idk. So I either have to get a new lid or take out one of the filters.

Well let's see. We've got several things going here. After about a month of running together, the new filter will have begun to have significant bacterial populations of its own. On the other hand, when you run multiple filters on a given amount of ammonia/tank, the bacteria will distribute evenly between all the filters. If you have two filters, the bacterial populations will move gradually toward a 50/50 split over the two filters. And on the other issue, the lid, I'm strongly in favor of always having a lid. Fish really do jump out - I've lost many, many fish that way over the years. Not only do they jump if there's no lid, they can also unfortunatly seem to find the smallest of openings and jump to their death! So minimizing those chances is a good thing to do.

Sorry no easy answers in this post but I'm sure we'll all come to some good conclusions if we keep discussing...

~~waterdrop~~

Yeah, I was thinking about that happening, too. Is there a way I could put the media of the first filter into the second filter? Maybe cut it up, stuff it up, put it in one of those bags and replace it with a pack of media that's in there? Or do you really need the 3 different types of media in the filter?

Or maybe I could just take the media of the first filter out and swish it in the tank water and leave it in the tank? Would that do anything?

 

[waterdrop]

Could you edit the log in the first post to indicate the day when you started up the Aquaclear running on the same tank? I'd just like to stare at that for a bit...

 

[OneOnion]

Yup. It's 12/25/09.

EDIT: I added it.

 

[waterdrop]

I meant to stick it down there in Day 43 or whenever it is so when we're staring at the long line of data it will be in the right place.. but its not important now

OK, you may need to correct me if I've got your various ideas wrong, I sometimes look at so many cases a day I get them confused over time. It sounds like you've been fishless cycling the little HOB (tetra10 or biowheel or something (can't look back or this lousy web editor will lose all my text!)) and then added the AC20 right before leaving on holiday, so its been also cycling for the last month. Your intent is to retire the original one and just use the new AC20 I think. I would think the original filter would be the type where you buy inserts that have some foam bags trapping media on a plastic frame...so, I'd say it probably would be a big deal to take that frame out (you don't have to work underwater but don't let the media dry out (mainly don't get distracted and leave it sitting in the air) and cut it up in whatever manner you can. Meanwhile you may need to have bought a new sponge and/or other AC media (at least that's what I always do just to make sure I have a complete set of the media for whatever filter is about to receive donated media just in case later I want to take the donated media out and put some fraction of new media in. Anyway, then you want to somehow get the older media into the bottom of the AC20 media stack (usually down below the blocky white sponge) so that it will be in the water flow first and the older bacteria will be carried upward into the newer AC20 media (which may need to be cut smaller with scissors also.

All of this may set your cycle back pretty far (worst case) as it will be a big shock to the biofilms and bacteria, but really now is a better time than after you have fish as you can let it all settle back in and get it qualified, leaving you confident for the fish again. I know this sounds like a lot of trouble but I really think it would be worth it compared to just hoping that 1 month of the new filter being in there would do it by itself. If you're lucky it will actually go smoothly and you'll still be finishing up your cycle just like you are right now!

~~waterdrop~~
ps. good luck!

 

[OldMan47]

As WD has said, your best bet is to use the existing partly cycled filter as the source of cycling the new AC filter. By day 43 of the original filter, you should have a decent build of the right bacteria, maybe not a full cycle, in your older filter. If you can retain much of the bacterial film on that media while moving it over, I would not expect you to lose much of the cycle that you have been building. The high flow from multiple filters can be a problem for some fish when they are introduced, but many fish will find the flow stimulating. Unless you have chosen to use slow water fish like bettas, the flow will not really be a problem. Failing to cover the tank properly means that you will need to run with a low water level or accept the fact that you may lose fish at almost any time to them jumping out.

 

[OneOnion]

Okay, thank you. I will cut up the old media and put it into the new filter. Hopefully it won't set it back too much and (if I'm really REALLY lucky) hopefully it'll be done by my birthday (that's in less than a month.)'

Update: So, this stage is a stage of weird fluctuations on testing, so is it common for my ammonia test tube color to be a deep, dark blue, and for all of a sudden my pH to get to 7.8+? Thanks.

 

[OldMan47]

My first guess is that you have added too much ammonia and gotten the 8.0 reading as a result. Ammonia is added to our tanks using the bottled ammonium-hydroxide in a water solution. That chemical can raise the pH of pure water to over 9.2 if used in too high a concentration. By adding the high dose of ammonia you are indeed affecting the pH of the water and are risking developing the wrong kind of bacteria in your filter as well. At concentrations in that range, the wrong ammonia processors will get the upper hand over the ones that you want. Please back off on the amount of ammonia you add each time so that we don't need to start your cycle over again, it has gone on far too long already.

 

[OneOnion]

Oops. I'll double-check how much ammonia I'm adding next time. Thanks.

 

[OneOnion]

Wait...

I think I know why it kept reading 8+! I use the same syringe for adding ammonia and testing it. I think there was still extra ammonia in the syringe, changing the scores. The way I noticed this was I tested my other cycled tank for ammonia: it came up as 8+. I FREAKED out and did a 60% water change, but after I thought, "This is obviously not true. After all, everything was fine; shrimp and fish were alive, clear water." The test results for the cycling tank I did just a minute ago with the accused syringe also came up as 8+. I thought, "Hmm, there must be something wrong here," so I went and got another syringe that was completely dry, and tested the 10 gallon again. It came up with 0 PPM. I think the syringe was especially messing up the pH tests, because you can see how they get up to 7.6+ right after I add ammonia.

EDIT: Ugh, to be honest guys, I'm kinda lost right now. x_____x I remember testing 8 PPM for 3 times straight, but I guess I forgot to put it in. o___o Sorry. I'll try to be more responsible from now on.