The Tribulations Of Cycling A New Tank - Need Advice

Hi JPC/Sue.

I used Dr. Tim's One and Only. I have been reading comments online that say it won't really start working until the ammonia is around 2. ()  There is definitely something going on in the little tank, just not the big one.

I checked the tracking on Safe Start Plus and it's due here any day - it came from the States and has been turned over to Royal Mail as of Tuesday down in England. So it should be here tomorrow or Saturday.

The little tank was badly overstocked and so I assumed there was more than enough stuff to feed the bacteria in two filters. The corys spawned and a goodly number of them survived. (!) I've never had that happen before, so I was caught by surprise. I had been planning to get a bigger tank, but was waiting to see how Brexit shook out - if we were going to have to leave or not - but had my hand forced by the addition of so many babies.

The API "Up" treatment says to add .5 teaspoon for every 25 gallons. I assume that's US gallons. Since a 60 litre tank is around a 15 US gallon tank, I gave it .25 of a teaspoon in some extra water. I will check the Ph again later tonight, and tomorrow if it hasn't changed I'll add another .25 with some fresh water. If memory serves, early on in the cycle that had been working I did add enough to raise the Ph, and it took a double-dose for it to even register.

So, the bacteria should be attaching the the filter, the gravel, and the stuff in there (the bogwood, etc.) and not be free-floating in the tank water, correct? So if I change some water out tomorrow (to hypothetically refresh any phosphorus that's been used up) it's not going to be removing the bacteria?

Edit: I just checked the water in the big tank again and had my daughter look at the colors for me (she's an artist and has a very good eye for colors). No change. Ph shows at 6, though it's very pale. Ammonia at 1. No nitrite, no nitrate.  The corys are doing extremely well in there and are growing. Now that the mother, Big Bertha, is in there, they are all schooling together. Very cool to see, really. 

Personally I so not like using sodium in a tank because it makes the water unlike anything found in nature.

Hi Sue,

I would need to check if sodium is found in natural waters. In the meantime, are you aware that domestic tap water can contain up to 200 mg/l of sodium? That's its PCV (Prescribed Concentration or Value). Last year, in my regional tap water supply (South East Water), the measured range for sodium was from 19.0 to 37.6 mg/l. Apparently, it comes from sodium hypochlorite (bleach), which is used as a safer alternative to chlorine gas as a disinfectant. Here is a bit of bedtime reading:

  https://www.lenntech.com/processes/disinfection/chemical/disinfectants-sodium-hypochlorite.htm

Furthermore, sodium is one of the elements used in Seachem Replenish for remineralizing RO/DI water. Other companies producing freshwater remineralizing electrolytes also include sodium.

JPC

My water quality report gives min 4.4, max 8.7, mean 6.55 mg sodium per litre.


I know that using salt on a routine basis is not good for soft water fish, though hard water fish do have a better tolerance. It is fine to use it for a limited period but not routinely.
But it all depends on just how much sodium is added to a tank. If the addition of bicarb is kept as low as possible - just enough to get KH high enough for cycling, and then for keeping the pH stable once there are fish - it is probably OK. My tap water has KH 3 and my pH is stable because I do regular water changes to replenish it. The danger would come if a fishkeeper added a lot of bicarb to increase very low KH to, say, well over 10.
This is my main reluctance in advising the use of bicarb - we can never know just how much someone reading a post will actually use in their tank.

Sodium chloride and sodium hydrogen carbonate are both salts in the chemical sense. A soluble salt will dissociate completely into its ions when dissolved in water. So both sodium chloride and sodium hydrogen carbonate will result in sodium ions in the water. It's the other half, the anion, which is different. Chloride does nothing to the hardness (GH or KH) and will not affect the pH. The hydrogen carbonate anion will affect KG and pH but not GH.
But both put sodium into the water, and this is the 'bad' half of the molecule.

I agree that everyone will try not to overdose chemicals. This is easy when there are instructions on a bottle of a medication, but I do wonder if someone reading "bicarb helps during cycling" will stop reading at that point and just throw in a handful.
I should add that I have used bicarb during a fishless cycle as I have low KH. When I did my first fishless cycle, I had no idea how low it was and the pH crashed. Adding bicarb saved that cycle.



I'm in the North Yorks/County Durham border area which is not highly populated. Our water comes from Kielder reservoir in the wilds of Northumberland which is why my tap nitrate is so low at a mean of 2.2165 ppm, something I am very grateful for.

Small tank is definitely cycling, have appreciable nitrAtes showing. For some odd reason, the heater got it up to 80F overnight. The alarm on the tank alerted me (aka woke me up in the middle of the darned night!) and I was able to turn the previously perfectly functional heater down. It is now back to 77F. As it's cycling for sure, I did a 33% water change to drop the nitrites down. Used water that I had treated with  Prime two days ago and had left sitting out, so the Prime shouldn't interfere with any of the bacteria.  Will check again later this evening and possibly do another one, as I still have aged water left over. The fish are doing well.

The big tank - the Ph is back down to 6 (or less) this morning. I added another 1/4 teaspoon of "Up" to bring it back up a bit to the 6.4 range. The fish appear to be doing well.


Edit:  Big Tank this morning, several hours AFTER adding .25 teaspoon API "Up".

Temp 77F
Ph  6, perhaps just a bit higher but not to the next color
Ammonia 2
Nitrites - none detectable
NitrAtes - It seems there is a trace there, as it's not pale yellow but not as deep a color as the lowest non-yellow on the API chart.

Added another .25 of Ph "Up" to the tank.
Added the weekly plant food. Some of the plants are not looking too good.
The corys are still appearing happy and healthy.
I have finally sourced a supply of crushed coral (in a small amount) and it should be here in a few days. I will be adding it to the tank to help buffer the water.

How well planted is the tank? If there are lots of plants they should remove the ammonia instead of the bacteria. Always provided they are plants that like soft acidic water, of course.

On another forum is a chap who has virtually no GH or KH in his water and the pH often drops as low as 4.5 (he bought a test kit that goes that low). He does nothing to increase GH, or KH or pH and keeps only soft water fish. He has a fishroom rather than a couple of tanks and all his fish thrive.

With your pH, that ammonia is safe. You have no nitrite so that's OK. As long as you have no nitrite, you don't need to worry. Once the plants start to grow well, they should take care of the ammonia. Bacteria will grow slowly over time.
Of the bacteria you've added, some will grow at low pH and those are the ones you need. They will survive and multiply albeit slowly.

Still no nitrites. No nitrates. Same pH issues. Ammonia, after a 25% water change, is hanging at about 1ppm, possibly a bit less.

The small tank is cycling - ammonia going down, Nitrites are up (water changed, then Prime). Possibly some Nitrates - hard to tell. Could be a trick of lighting.

We seem to have an algae beginning to coat the bogwood in the big tank. And there were spots of brown algae (now removed) on the side of the filter and back glass. I think that corys don't actually eat algae. Perhaps we might need a large snail for that purpose. Except I don't want a snail if it's going to eat the live plants? Then again, in nature, the log would probably have algae on it, so....

Have moved the remaining corys to the big tank. They seem happy. They are extremely endearing little fish. The down side is that we used to have three, and each had a name. So now we have 9, and although I can easily still identify the original three, I'm thinking that eventually the other six are going to be indistinguishable from each other!

The neons remaining in the small tank seem somewhat traumatized. It was not easy to get the corys out of the tank, and a lot of the tank decor had to be removed to do it.  It's back in, but things have been moved around a bit. Their water is being watched closely.

Yes, it wipes right off.

Sigh. They're breeding again. If the current offspring were older I'd just assume that if I cut back on their sinking wafers they'd eat the eggs. But the eggs are quite a bit larger than their little mouths. And if I cut back on the wafers, the bigger corys will eat the wafers and the young won't get them. I assume the adults will eat a lot of the eggs anyway, but some will likely survive. She's strategically placing them all over the tank.

I guess the two adult males have to go back to the small tank until the current juveniles are a bit larger (and can eat eggs), or I'm going to be up to my eyeballs in albino corys! 

Unless there is a small soft-water fish, other than a cory, that doesn't need to be with its own kind, and likes to eat algae AND cory eggs? FEMALE betta?

They do well in acid water?

Yeah, that's what I saw. And this water is doing well to get up to 6.  Might have to go with a female betta to handle the eggs, unless I can find something else.  The algae isn't that bad, really.