Papagoomba Posted September 27, 2021 Share Posted September 27, 2021 So 2 days ago i had thought my cycle was near completion because i woke up and my nitrites were gone but my ammonia was still at around .25 ppm which was weird because prior to that it had been going from about 3ppm to 0 ppm in 24 hours. Well i dosed again yesterday to raise my ammonia to between 2-4 ppm to see if it would all be nitrate today in hopes that my cycle was finally finished well here are my results after waiting 24 hours from dosing ammo. Does this mean my cycle has crashed? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Administrators Zenzo Posted September 27, 2021 Administrators Share Posted September 27, 2021 No, not necessarily "crashed" in my opinion. I think it's probably a situation where the level of bacteria that you had was equipped to handle a certain amount of ammonia. When you added ammonia, it's similar to a cycled tank having fish food spill in the tank or a dead snail or fish, where all of a sudden there's more ammonia than what the tank can handle. In your situation, you can probably just wait a few days for the bacteria to multiply and manage the new ammonia levels. You could also do a water change to lower the amount of ammonia and nitrate. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Papagoomba Posted September 28, 2021 Author Share Posted September 28, 2021 should i dose it back up to 4ppm ammonia or just wait till tomarrow and dose again then? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Odd Duck Posted September 28, 2021 Share Posted September 28, 2021 On 9/27/2021 at 7:46 PM, Papagoomba said: should i dose it back up to 4ppm ammonia or just wait till tomarrow and dose again then? Probably depends on how many plants you have, how fast you plan to add fish, how long has your tank has been running, etc. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Papagoomba Posted September 28, 2021 Author Share Posted September 28, 2021 A couple val, some dwarf hair grass that doesnt seem to be doing well, and a couple small handfulls of java moss. 55 gallon got it august 24th. And as far as adding fish goes i plan on slowish i guess. End goal is 6 cory cats 10 praecox rainbow 10 cardinal tetra, 3 or 4 hillstream loach and a few angels. Not sure how slow to add them. Obviously not adding all at once. This is my tank Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Odd Duck Posted September 28, 2021 Share Posted September 28, 2021 (edited) Everything sounds pretty OK for timing. Slowish for me for that size tank would be 5-6 fish per week. Just don’t rush it and you should be fine. Your fish lists sounds good but those angels might be a monkey wrench in your plan. They tend to be hard to sex so getting all one sex isn’t always possible if that’s your plan. They also get VERY territorial when they do pair off and decide to breed. You’ll need a back up plan for any pairs as they develop (assuming there will be at least one and possibly more that pair). If you get only 2 angels, even if they pair, you might be OK since they don’t seem to mind about cories or smaller fish that would serve as dither fish. Edited September 28, 2021 by Odd Duck 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Papagoomba Posted September 28, 2021 Author Share Posted September 28, 2021 I wanted to go with boesmani rainbow instead of the angels but my girl has her heart set on them and since I have gone kinda overboard on gettting tanks, I need to let her have them or I will never hear the end of it. I do have a 29 that i just set up a couple weeks ago that is also cycling that I plan on having guppies and plattys in. If the angels cause to much issue in the 55 could i move them to the 29 and be ok? Also im assuming i should just wait to dose ammo again till tomarrow since its still at 1-2ppm currently? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Odd Duck Posted September 28, 2021 Share Posted September 28, 2021 On 9/27/2021 at 8:22 PM, Papagoomba said: I wanted to go with boesmani rainbow instead of the angels but my girl has her heart set on them and since I have gone kinda overboard on gettting tanks, I need to let her have them or I will never hear the end of it. I do have a 29 that i just set up a couple weeks ago that is also cycling that I plan on having guppies and plattys in. If the angels cause to much issue in the 55 could i move them to the 29 and be ok? Also im assuming i should just wait to dose ammo again till tomarrow since its still at 1-2ppm currently? Yep, test tomorrow and see where you are. Dose if ammonia is down to zero. 29 gallons would be very small for adult angels other than a singleton or possibly a pair with not much else for bioload. You won’t get pairing until sexual maturity and that’s a pretty big (tall) fish. More body mass than you might realize since they look so delicate. I have a 46 bow front I’ll be setting up for angels, but the typical recommendation is 55 or bigger. Assuming I get pairing, I may be putting the “leftover” adults into the 75 with my Jack Dempseys. I’ll be braced with a couple nets and a big bucket ready. The 75’s working on getting more heavily planted now if the Jacks would just leave the Val’s alone! 😆 I’ve also considered breaking up any pairs and trying for a single sex tank. I also have a very good lfs that would take adult angels in a heartbeat and I’m comfortable selling to them. If I thought I could reliably sex juvie angels, I’d only get one sex. Reality is, I’ll have to buy a proven pair if I decide to breed, or grow them up myself. Since I’m a tightwad and I don’t plan on setting up more tanks, I won’t be buying a proven pair anytime soon! 😉 I’d prefer to get about 5 of the same sex. Just enough to spread any aggression, but few enough to be OK with staying in a heavily filtered, moderately planted, 46 gallon with just a few dither fish (8-10), a 6 pack of cories, and maybe a trio of bristlenoses plecos. Either that or I’ll go with a pair with more dithers. This may get decided by the fish. 😆 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Papagoomba Posted September 28, 2021 Author Share Posted September 28, 2021 I have those 2 tanks that are cycling then i got lucky and found a guy on FB that was selling his 6 10 gallons for $20 total so i picked those up to use as a qt tank and the rest as places for the inevitable platy and guppy fry i will have. looks like if the angels dont work out ill have to convince my other half to let me buy another 55 or larger for them since they are what she wants. Im currently the stay at home dad since our daughter has medical issues so i have to get her on board with any tanks i want to get. I wish i had the confidence to breed the angels. My lfs doesnt seem to sell them to often so wouldnt be able to off load them anywhere sadly. The val in the 55 seems to be the only thing i can get to grow. I bought the java moss from my lfs but to me it doesnt really look like Java moss but i could be wrong. The dwarf hair grass I have just doesnt seem to be doing well. My girl had got some comet gold fish to put in the 55 because our daughter wanted them and i took them to the lfs a couple days later after I explained the cycle process to her. They pretty much beat the crap out of it so i dont think its growing very well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Odd Duck Posted September 28, 2021 Share Posted September 28, 2021 I’ve never tried dwarf hair grass, so can’t advise at all on that one. It probably doesn’t matter if it’s actual Java moss. Most of the common mosses have very similar requirements and growth rates. Some less common mosses usually are slower growing and can be pickier, but you don’t usually find those at your lfs anyway. What a fantastic find for that price! If your angels did happen to breed, you could start raising fry in a 10 gallon. You’re all set! 😆 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Papagoomba Posted September 28, 2021 Author Share Posted September 28, 2021 thats why i ended up grabbing them. just couldnt pass them up. the guy used them for breeding and selling guppys so i grabbed most of his equipment. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Odd Duck Posted September 28, 2021 Share Posted September 28, 2021 👍🏻 As usual I’m ORD hours ago. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Torrey Posted September 28, 2021 Share Posted September 28, 2021 On 9/27/2021 at 7:56 PM, Papagoomba said: The dwarf hair grass I have just doesnt seem to be doing well. My girl had got some comet gold fish to put in the 55 because our daughter wanted them and i took them to the lfs a couple days later after I explained the cycle process to her. They pretty much beat the crap out of it so i dont think its growing very well. Goldfish of all types are herbivores: they eat anything green😅 Dwarf hairgrass is a plant designed to bruise our egos at the beginning, and then totally shock us by surviving breaking down a tank and showing up a month later when I recycled the substrate 🙄 If it was tissue culture at your lfs in a clear plastic with the gel at the bottom, it takes longer to get going. It will propagate by sending out runners. You can guide the runners to go where you want the hair grass by putting root tabs where you want the runners to go. As soon as a little tuft pops up over an exterior root tab, put another set of root tabs down and place an extra beyond your hair grass. As long as you have enough light, enough agitation of the water surface for gas exchange, you will soon have hairgrass requiring trimming. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Papagoomba Posted September 28, 2021 Author Share Posted September 28, 2021 I actually bought it from the co-op site. its just me not knowing how to grow it or just not doing well at it. i think im going to get rid of it. Carpeted just doesnt feel like the rite look for this tank now that ive built up the other stuff. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Administrators Zenzo Posted September 28, 2021 Administrators Share Posted September 28, 2021 On 9/27/2021 at 9:46 PM, Papagoomba said: I actually bought it from the co-op site. its just me not knowing how to grow it or just not doing well at it. i think im going to get rid of it. Carpeted just doesnt feel like the rite look for this tank now that ive built up the other stuff. I see that you just got the tank about a month ago (8/24). That's a pretty short amount of time to expect plants to flourish in a new tank. In my experience it can easily take 2-4 months before plants start to grow and look great. Adding root fertilizers and dosing with fertilizer can help quite a bit, but you still need patience. As an example, I set up two new planted aquariums on August 28th, so almost the exact same time as you. Various plants were added that I ordered from Aquarium Co-Op. Even though I am using Easy Root Tabs and Easy Green, and have a plant substrate, some of them are just now starting to look decent after some melting, and the growth is slow. They are healthy but tiny, and I know that it will be several more weeks until I see any real progress. The only difference between my setups and yours is that I added cycled filters and bacteria, so my tanks didn't go through the ammonia/nitrite spikes. Other than that...I am just waiting like you. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Papagoomba Posted September 28, 2021 Author Share Posted September 28, 2021 Being new to the hobby the one thing ive noticed that is most important is patience. 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Odd Duck Posted September 28, 2021 Share Posted September 28, 2021 (edited) On 9/28/2021 at 11:11 AM, Zenzo said: As an example, I set up two new planted aquariums on August 28th, so almost the exact same time as you @Papagoomba I didn’t even think to add that I also set up a tank at almost the same time (on Aug 29). It’s the 29 gallon reset in my signature. I bought some plants, used some plants that were already in there (it was a sad plant holding tank), moved plants from other tanks, and tied moss onto wood a little over 2 weeks later. It’s still in its “infancy” as far as I’m concerned. It’s at least a month or more away from being ready for the fish I’ll be moving into the tank since I need it to be very grown in. I still have more plants I’ll be moving into the tank, just haven’t gotten around to it yet because, silly me, I didn’t leave enough space on the substrate for the Anubias and Java ferns I have glued to rocks and wood. I’ll have to rearrange some plants to add the others. I’ve been very aquarium lazy since work has been wearing me down a bit. Like @Zenzo, I also started with an already seasoned filter, although I’ve actually replaced that filter with a new one that will restart itself more reliably after water changes and power outages. I ran the filters side by side for a couple weeks before pulling the old filter out (a rather tired, twice-replaced impeller, HOB for a newer, pump inside the tank style, HOB). Both filters are filled with foam blocks and have ACO foam prefilters. I readily admit that I’ve barely tested this tank at all since I was using a very seasoned filter from the start when it would be going through any big surges in the parameters following set up and any significant leakage from the Osmocote granules in the substrate. Plus I knew I would be feeding and growing the snail colonies in this tank for at least a couple months before fish went in it. Does that help you feel any better that you’re doing things right? More correctly than I’m doing, but I’ve got to the stage where I don’t worry about a lot of testing when I know I won’t be putting fish in for weeks. If I was planning to add fish as soon as possible, I would be testing daily with strips and watch for the nitrite surge from the substrate to clear, then I would start blind feeding and watch for another nitrite surge and see how fast it cleared, then repeat until I was confident the tank/filter could handle it. As a new fish keeper, everyone is in a hurry to get to the add fish stage. Everyone! It’s their first tank and it’s almost unbearable to just wait and look at a tank with just plants and water. I’ve got decades of experience and I still rushed fish into my 100 gallon because I had to wait sooooooooo long after I got it before I could set it up (9 months from when we bought it!) but it was still 6 weeks before I put fish in it and it was only 6 cories into a 100 gallon. Patience is your best friend and the need for it is your worst enemy in fishkeeping. If you can, you’ll enjoy the hobby and have more longevity in the hobby, if you can convince yourself to enjoy the whole process of watching, observing the small details, and learning how plants look as they go through the stages of settling in, establishing roots, starting to produce their first robust, healthy, new leaves after any melting from transplantation, and finally putting on that growth spurt that convinces you they are fully established and happy in their new home. It takes time, but it’s worth it in the end when you can sit back and look at your personal little microcosm of nature with the beautiful plants and fish. Edit to add: When I say I rushed the cories into the tank, it was 6 weeks, heavily planted, well aged filters, and parameters tested perfect. I mean I rushed them because the plants weren’t as established as I would have preferred and the cories kept uprooting the Pogostemon helferi that I tried to establish in the tank. Edited September 28, 2021 by Odd Duck Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Papagoomba Posted September 28, 2021 Author Share Posted September 28, 2021 (edited) I may have run into another problem unfortunately. So my 29 gallon that will have guppies and platys in it seems to have cycles as ive dosed to 4ppm ammonia the past 3 days and each day has dropped to 0 ppm on ammo and nitrite. now my issue is i did a roughly 75% water change to drop nitrates down as they were around 80 ppm in prep for added a few fish.After the water change i tested nitrates again and they seem to be around 40-80 ppm. i checked my tap and it seems that my tap water has 10-20 ppm nitrate coming out of it. So what should i do in this situation? Edited September 28, 2021 by Papagoomba Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Odd Duck Posted September 28, 2021 Share Posted September 28, 2021 On 9/28/2021 at 4:21 PM, Papagoomba said: I may have run into another problem unfortunately. So my 29 gallon that will have guppies and platys in it seems to have cycles as ive dosed to 4ppm ammonia the past 3 days and each day has dropped to 0 ppm on ammo and nitrite. now my issue is i did a roughly 75% water change to drop nitrates down as they were around 80 ppm in prep for added a few fish.After the water change i tested nitrates again and they seem to be around 40-80 ppm. i checked my tap and it seems that my tap water has 10-20 ppm nitrate coming out of it. So what should i do in this situation? Now that your tank is fully cycled, you can do a 100% water change (or as close as you can reasonably get) to get those nitrates down in a hurry since there’s no fish in the tank. Since your plants are already acclimated to your water and your tank/biofiltration is handling the ammonia well, just water change your way to the nitrate levels you want. Keep close tabs and add fish very slowly. Your plants (if you have enough - I’m not sure you do, yet) - will help control nitrates over the long haul. Until you have enough plants, you will have to do water changes to control the nitrates. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Papagoomba Posted September 28, 2021 Author Share Posted September 28, 2021 even with having the 10-20 ppm nitrate coming from the tap? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Odd Duck Posted September 28, 2021 Share Posted September 28, 2021 On 9/28/2021 at 4:56 PM, Papagoomba said: even with having the 10-20 ppm nitrate coming from the tap? Yep. Enough plants will eat that right up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Papagoomba Posted September 28, 2021 Author Share Posted September 28, 2021 Ok awesome thank you 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blaha Posted September 28, 2021 Share Posted September 28, 2021 So is 4ppm ammonia a good thing? I've always thought anything over 1 is bad for fish. I'm very new to planted tanks though. I've always had fake plants and decor up until about 2 months ago. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Odd Duck Posted September 28, 2021 Share Posted September 28, 2021 On 9/28/2021 at 5:10 PM, Blaha said: So is 4ppm ammonia a good thing? I've always thought anything over 1 is bad for fish. I'm very new to planted tanks though. I've always had fake plants and decor up until about 2 months ago. There’s no fish in this tank, yet. 4 ppm would absolutely be VERY BAD for fish. But for “training” the filter and testing to see if it’s ready for fish, it’s good that the filter is converting 4 ppm into nitrates within 24 hours repeatedly. It shows the levels of beneficial bacteria (BB’s) in the biofiltration have developed enough and the filter is ready for fish. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Papagoomba Posted October 15, 2021 Author Share Posted October 15, 2021 update in case anyone was wondering. Both tanks have finally cycled and now have fish in both. 29 has 7 adult platty with 4 fry, 1 cory cat (i lost the other 4 i bought) and 1 hillstream loach. The 55 has 3 nickel size angels with 1 hillstream loach. 29 had an amonia spike today so did a water 50% water change and added prime. Will reduce amount of feeding and see what happends 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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