Pet Shops & Cycling

[seangrenyer]

Hi

I know nothing about setting up a fish tank.

BUT, I'm lucky in having half a dozen Aquarium shops within a 5 mile radius and have been to all of them to see what they had, ask questions, etc.

I also have a few friends with tanks who I've talked to as well.

Strange thing is that NONE of the shops said anything about cycling, testing ammonia/nitrite/nitrate, etc levels. They all said something on the lines of 1. fill up with water, 2. Add some chemicals, 3. Leave it a week or so, 4. Add some hardy fish, 5. Couple of weeks later add some others.

And that's it. Any my friends have received similar advice and their fish are fine.

So I login to this forum, which is great, and see loads and loads of warnings about making sure you cycle properly which could take weeks, etc, etc.

I'm confused!

Just wondered if anyone else had this experience!

Sean

 

[Macko1968]

I think we all have. Most LFS want to sell fish & make money, telling someone they need to cycle a tank for up to 6 weeks, messing with ammonia & testing kits is likely to send customers away having spent nothing.

 

[Geoff1991]

Hi and welcome to the forums.

Yeah, pet shops are there to make money and have no problem selling you loads of chemicals and fish that you dont need... Have a good read through the topics that are listed here

Click

Then come back if you have any questions.

 

[seangrenyer]

Thanks guys

And yet my friends tanks are all fine after doing what the shops told them?

And my point is the shops aren't trying to sell me testing kits, etc. Most of them say they're not necessary!!

Go figure!

Sean

 

[JenCliBee]

Thanks guys

And yet my friends tanks are all fine after doing what the shops told them? Go figure?

Sean

The tanks may well be fine, but the untold damage that would have been caused by ammonia and nitrite levels are sometimes hard to see.... plenty of people have done this route and alot have been fine but there is still suffering going on by the fish, they just cant tell you so to speak .

Always opt for fishLESS cycling becasue it would be in the long run better for the fish and fishIN cycle can get very tedious at times with daily water changes and sometimes even more than one daily water change.


jen

 

[Miss Wiggle]

theres more than one way to skin a cat!

I always advocate fishless cycling as I believe it is the safest way to go, however I also accept that it is possible to do a fish-in cycle with a relative degree of sucess (i.e. make it through the cycle without any fish dying). If you do just choose a couple of hardy fish and bring your stocking up slowly, combine this with fairly regular water change and you can keep all the fish alive until the tank is cycled.

However ammonia caues untold damage to the fish which can often not manifest immediately, often the fish will seem fine at first but will have a greatly reduced life expectancy or develop health probems later in life.

Another likely problem is people overstocking in a new tank, if they put in lots of fish (which some fish shops will happily let you do) then they will almost definately experience problems.

However for you cycling will nto be a problem, because you have a number of friends with healthy tanks, you can take some media from their filter and put it into yours, this will contain all the beneficial bacteria that you need and consequently your tank will be instantly cycled, then if you add a small number of fish you shouldn't have any problems at all then build up slowly from there

 

[seangrenyer]

Thanks,

Don't get me wrong, I will do a proper Fishless cycle. Just strange I've never heard of it before!

Sean

 

[waterdrop]

Understanding stress/distress/damage in species distant from our own can be quite difficult. You could probably get up a lively discussion among zoologists about this. We are ok at suspecting difficultites from other mammals (our dogs and cats for instance) when perhaps there are sounds we can interpret as being distressed.

Animals fish and insects begin to get farther away from our ability to interpret what we are seeing. When one finds a fish completely dead there has usually been little more than lowered activity and color. It stands to reason though that the distress prior to death was quite significant from the animal's point of view.

As far as knowing the types and extents of damage occurring, I believe this is pretty well documented in the scientific literature although I'd be hard pressed to produce the references. I think though that quite a number of us have wandered into these types of papers. Onset for nerve damage from nitrite(NO2) and gill damage for ammonia(NH3) varies considerably by species but begins at quite small, almost trace, levels for a lot of them.

Fishless cyclng, besides making sense from the above standpoint, also I've found is reported by a lot of experienced fishkeepers as just "feeling right" from the observation that fish behavior seems optimized in a fully cycled tank. Certainly this has been my own experience, that fish in a fishlessly cycled tank seem to behave from the start in a manner that I might have called a "peak" experience prior to this method.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[xxBarneyxx]

Unfortunately as mentioned above even if your fish store is aware of fishless cycling they arent going to suggest it for fear of scaring away potential customers. Much easier when they sell a tank to say "fill it up, leave it two weeks and then buy a few fish at a time".

Sadly this has been common practice in fish keeping for so many years when you do suggest doing it a different way people look at you as if you are crazy (had the same issue with my in laws, my other halfs sister wanted to put 4 goldfish in a 30L tank and her mum was also told to just leave the tank for 2 weeks and then add the fish).

 

[Fisses]

i too was told to leave my tank for 2 weeks, then add fish and jobs a goodun, how wrong they was for telling me that!!!