Tanks gone from bad to WORSE!!!!!

[acetennis2002]

for about a week now ive been dealing with some cloudy water in my tank. but i came home from school and it was even worse than the last 2 days combined. i have a 29 gal. tank with a blue backgroung but the background looks gray it's so bad. ive been doing 15% water changes and putting in stress zyme but it's not clearing up at all only getting worse what should i do? im starting to cyle a tank i set it up last night shoul di put my fish in there or are they not in that much danger.

 

[cation]

What are your water readings? How many and what kind of fish (oops, never mind, there they are in your sig! )? Whats the temp?

 

[acetennis2002]

h/o i will get the readings

 

[acetennis2002]

ammonia= 0.00
nitrite=1.0
nitrate= 5.0

 

[Tolak]

How long has the tank been running, & what type of filtration do you have? The presence of nitrites means either a newer tank that hasn't fully cycled, or a mini-cycle in an established tank.

Newer or established tank, that seems to be a pretty heavy bio load for a 29 gallon. Plecs are messy, and that shark will get more aggressive as it gets older.

Tolak

 

[acetennis2002]

i have a wisper 40 and i cyled it for 3 weeks b4 putting in any fish

 

[Sky042]

i have a wisper 40 and i cyled it for 3 weeks b4 putting in any fish

How did you go about cycling?

How long have the fish been in the tank?

Did you do anything recently like changing filter media or washing out the filter?

 

[Sky042]

Also do you have a future home for your red tail shark picked out?

 

[mlee0332]

actually, your cloudiness is harmless. Your nitrites, though, are at a danger level. You need to try to bring it downto 0.5ppm.

The cloudiness is a bacteria bloom meaning your tank is almost finished. I had the same problem a few days ago. I had a 10g that was cloudy for about 5 days. It cleared up later. It'll be fine!

 

[acetennis2002]

thanks for all the help i hop eit does get better and yes i have a home picked out for my shark when he gets too big or agressive. but as far as cycling i put in all the decore and gravel then filled it with water and i put the filter and added the right amount of stress coat and let it run for 3 weeks. and yes i just changed the filter pad they said change it every 3-4 weeks and it had been 4 and it was really dirty. but one last question should i continue doing water changes to bring down my levels and clear up the cloudyness or just leave it, and it will heal up?

 

[mlee0332]

don;t do water changes for cloudiness. You NEED to bring down your trites though. Yes you do need water changes.

Hth

 

[Sky042]

thanks for all the help i hop eit does get better and yes i have a home picked out for my shark when he gets too big or agressive. but as far as cycling i put in all the decore and gravel then filled it with water and i put the filter and added the right amount of stress coat and let it run for 3 weeks. and yes i just changed the filter pad they said change it every 3-4 weeks and it had been 4 and it was really dirty. but one last question should i continue doing water changes to bring down my levels and clear up the cloudyness or just leave it, and it will heal up?

Yes you need to do water changes to bring down nitrites.

FYI you should really read this http/www.fishforums.net/index.php?showtopic=10099

What you've described is not actually cycling a tank. You've just run the tank empty for a while but that alone doesn't do anything to build your bacteria base.

There isn't a whole lot you can do about it right now other than perhaps cut your feeding back to every other day or so keep up with your water changes and cross your fingers.

For the next tank read the link I posted and you may want to read up on fishless cycling.