Second Stage Cycle Started Today Help

[Miss Wiggle]

it's just risky putting any angels with such small fish. that's not to say all angels will eat all small fish, but if you happen to get a bit of a territorial/agressive angel then they will pose a threat to small fish like that.

if you're angels are gonna turn out to be..... well, little angels, then you're just fine

it's just one of those *maybe* combinations that you'd need to keep an eye on, it can work, but it can also go wrong.

 

[waterdrop]

ok, we're going to try and keep everything angelic in the tank.

Lana, check out my thread over in the New World section where Tolak gave me a link to study "Angelfish History" - you can see pics of the full range of Angel colorations out there.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[lana]

630 pm reading 12 hours after adding 12 ml ammonia 4ppm

ammomia 0 to 0.25
nitrites 1
nitrates who knows still that gold color
ph 7.2
kh 3 drops

temp 30C

almost 12 for ammonia should be there in the next few days if not sooner

 

[lana]

ok, we're going to try and keep everything angelic in the tank.

Lana, check out my thread over in the New World section where Tolak gave me a link to study "Angelfish History" - you can see pics of the full range of Angel colorations out there.

~~waterdrop~~

cool thanks i will go look for it

it's just risky putting any angels with such small fish. that's not to say all angels will eat all small fish, but if you happen to get a bit of a territorial/agressive angel then they will pose a threat to small fish like that.

if you're angels are gonna turn out to be..... well, little angels, then you're just fine

it's just one of those *maybe* combinations that you'd need to keep an eye on, it can work, but it can also go wrong.

that is what i remember about them ya good good ones or hellens just like kids i guess

 

[waterdrop]

630 pm reading 12 hours after adding 12 ml ammonia 4ppm

ammomia 0 to 0.25
nitrites 1
nitrates who knows still that gold color
ph 7.2
kh 3 drops

temp 30C

almost 12 for ammonia should be there in the next few days if not sooner

Now there's one of the first posts by a beginner that had all the right tests done and told me exactly what I needed to know right there! And to top it off, you're cycle is looking good

~~waterdrop~~

 

[lana]

day 10 fishless day 48 all together

630 am readings 24 hours after 12ml ammonia added to 4ppm

ammonia ZERO
nitrites 1 to 2
nitrates still ? gold
ph 7.2
kh 3 drops

temp 30C

added 12 ml ammonia


water still crystal clear,

 

[waterdrop]

 

[lana]

7pm readings 13 hours afer adding ammonia to 4ppm

ammonia 1
nitrites 2 to 5
nitrates still gold
ph 7.4
kh 3 drops

temp 30C

all good

 

[lana]

day 11 fishless day 49 all together

630 am readings 24 hours after 12ml ammonia added to 4ppm

ammonia 0
nitrites 1
nitrates up in air still
ph 7.4
kh 3 drops

temp 30C

added 12ml ammonia

 

[waterdrop]

Interesting, you notice that even though nitrites are spiking in the 12 hour range after the ammonia add, by the time we get to around 24 hours, the fledgling N-Bac population has processed them down to 1ppm. I hope that means we are climbing the steeper part of the N-Bac exponential growth curve now and one of these days we will see zero nitrites in less than 24 hours and then of course in less than 12 hours!

We have to remember you've been through a number of changes: from fish-in to fishless and then from the original filter to that filter plus the new ones, but now we are hopefully seeing the road straightening out toward the finish.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[lana]

630 pm readings 12 hours afer adding ammonia to 4ppm


ammonia 0 to 0.25
nitrites 1
nirtrates still no clear picture
7.2
kh 3 drops
temp 30C

 

[lana]

Interesting, you notice that even though nitrites are spiking in the 12 hour range after the ammonia add, by the time we get to around 24 hours, the fledgling N-Bac population has processed them down to 1ppm. I hope that means we are climbing the steeper part of the N-Bac exponential growth curve now and one of these days we will see zero nitrites in less than 24 hours and then of course in less than 12 hours!

We have to remember you've been through a number of changes: from fish-in to fishless and then from the original filter to that filter plus the new ones, but now we are hopefully seeing the road straightening out toward the finish.

~~waterdrop~~

one can hope so , i even went and got a new nitrate test kit and it is doing the same no idea what is up there,

hope this ends soon i want fishies to watch not just bubbles

 

[waterdrop]

O dear, not sure what you are looking for out of nitrates. They are going to be all messed up mostly during cycling. About the only thing useful from nitrates during cycling is just the reassurance sometimes that, yes, there are some N-Bacs in there that seem to be eating nitrite and producing some nitrate (you can ever be sure -how much- nitrate because some unknown amount is going out with water changes.) Once cycling is over and you have fish, if you do very nice, very regular gravel cleans you may find then that the nitrate readings settle down, make sense and are fairly regular.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[lana]

day 12 fishless day 50 all together

630 am readings 24 hours after 12ml ammonia added to 3ppm

ammonia 0
nitrites 1
nitrates ?
ph 7.4
kh 3 drops
temp 30C

added 11 ml ammonia

730 reading
ammonia 3 to 4

 

[waterdrop]

OK, I've just spent some time rolling through these 14(!) pages of stuff and I have two things, an observation and a thought:

1) My observation is that although you are only on day 12 of your fishless cycle, we've always had the hope that it would be closer to the end of cycling because it was a follow-on to a fish-in cycle that should have been maturing the media in the older of the 3 filters. Reviewing your statistics posts, I believe there is reason the believe that is indeed happening. After you switched over to fishless (and added the two new filters) you still had a period of quite a few tests where nitrites were clearly spiking and ammonia was clearly dropping, all second phase characteristics. Looking since then it seems quite clear to me that you seem beyond the nitrite spike and both ammonia and nitrite are being dropped, with nitrite taking longer to drop than ammonia. It just seems really clear that you are for sure in that last bit where dropping nitrites to zero within 12 hours just seems to drag out for days and days, maybe weeks. Its a very good sign that you seem to be beyond the nitrite spike, I'm really hopeful about this. Its been very complicated with the fish-in and with the new filters and all but I still think its on track.

2) My thought: For a period of time in your posts you were getting fairly high nitrate(NO3) readings and then nitrates seemed to get a little strange on you and have seemed perhaps like the test result had a strange color. When I re-read your posts I realized that this seemed to correlate with the introduction of the two new filters. Somehow to me this sort of makes sense in that I keep having this funny feeling about nitrates(NO3) seeming somehow to "hang around" in gravel and inside filters. I mean it shouldn't make sense since its a substance dissolved in water that is being pumped all around, so maybe other members will take exception to this idea (?) but I noticed that it was after the two new filters had had a couple of days to kind of get their biofilms started.. I'm just speculating but maybe the creation of new biofilms in the new filters might have actually used up some free-floating nitrate and that's why you began seeing lower values for that. Also, perhaps you are just being "picky" about the color of your test result not seeming to match any of the color bars on your chart card. I've noticed that myself and felt you just have to guess a bit where an unmatching color might fit in. I think it may be hard to get inks on the cards that perfectly match or that always last over time retaining the same color and I've noticed it particularly sometimes with the api nitrate colors.

~~waterdrop~~