Is My Water Ok?

Firstly; welcome to the forum.

Secondly and more; d'you intend to spend three months away each year because that sort of precludes keeping fish, unless there's someone else to do the necessary water changes and feeding?

You have no ammonia test showing and it doesn't sound like you've cycled your tank. Taking everything out and cleaning it has probably removed any of the denitrifying bacteria so you will need to cycle and test your tank, which means adding ammonia and monitoring it's progress as it's converted to Nitrite and then on to Nitrate.

This is a 'must read' if your tank isn't cycled: Fishless Cycling.

Once we know about the state of your cycle then we can help.

*phew* on the feeding!

The standard one that's used is the API Freshwater test kit. The Nitrate Bottle #2 needs a really good shake before use, and the first time you use it smack it on the table a number of times to break up the sediment that will have collected at the bottom of the bottle.

Fluval Cycle is not highly regarded I'm afraid as few people have found it does much to help a cycle.
However, if you managed not to kill the bacteria in the filter media while cleaning, there maybe some left in a dormant state. If there are, it should help with a fishless cycle. You haven't had a source of ammonia in the tank since March, but the filter bacteria don't starve immediately. After a week or two they become dormant, then die after a few months. But the longer they are dormant, the longer it tales them to 'wake up'.

What you need to do is get that test kit that Colin recommended, buy a bottle of ammonia, put a sponge in the aquaball instead of the carbon, and follow the instructions in the fishless cycling method.
Some branches of Homebase sell ammonia in the house cleaning section; my local DIY shop sells Jeyes Kleen Off Household Ammonia; Ebay and Amazon sell ammonia, but make sure it just has ammonia/ammonium hydroxide and water, no perfume, detergent etc.

You just need to be patient. You'll be able to replace your fish in a couple of months. if you do a fishless cecle you'll be able to get most of the fish you want straight away, just leave any sensitive species for another 3 to 4 months.

You have 0 ammonia, 0 nitrite and 10 nitrate according to what you have posted.
It is likely that 10 ppm nitrate is in your tap water - check your tap water for nitrate.

The reason both ammonia and nitrite are zero is because there is no source of ammonia in the tank. You may or may not have any ammonia eating and nitrite eating bacteria left from when there were fish, and possibly some ammonia eaters from the Fluval Cycle (which contains the wrong species of nitrite eaters, the main reason it doesn't seem to work). But you won't know if there are any bacteria until you add a source of ammonia form either a bottle or fish.

You have a choice.
Either you get get a few fish and be prepared to do daily water changes if either ammonia or nitrite ever show a reading above zero. This will mean doing a fish-in cycle
Or get a bottle of ammonia and add some of that. If you have zero ammonia and zero nitrite after 24 hours, it is safe to get fish. if you don't then you know you need to do a fishless cycle

Fishless is much easier.


You have a 180 litre tank. If you buy a bottle of 9.5% ammonia, you will need to add 5.7 ml of that to get a level of 3 ppm in the tank water. Kleen Off Household Ammonia is 9.5%, that's what I've got. If the bottle gives a different strength, post it here and I'll tell you the amount to add.
Adding a dose of ammonia will tell you after a day if your tank is ready for fish, and if it's not, you can make the decision whether to continue adding ammonia or do a fish-in cycle.

If you want to try a different bottled bacteria, get Tetra Safe Start. This one does have the right species of nitrite eaters. But it is not guaranteed to work. If it has not been stored correctly at any time between the factory and your tank the bacteria inside will be dead, and this has been known to happen. But again, it does need a source of ammonia in the tank. The bottle will say to use fish to make the ammonia but it is much safer for the fish to use a bottle of ammonia.

Once you've added the ammonia and tested after 24 hours, you'll find one of two things.

Both ammonia and nitrite might be zero. In this case, do a small water change (you will only have added 1 dose of ammonia so you won't need to do a big one) and go out and buy fish. If you can't go for a few days, add one third of the amount of ammonia every couple of days till you can go, but leave the water change until the day before shopping. Make sure there is no ammonia or nitrite before you get fish in this  case.

Or you may have a reading above zero for either ammonia or nitrite or both. In this case the tank is not cycled and you need to wait before getting fish until it is cycled.
Because there may be some bacteria you probably won't be right at the beginning of the cycle. Post the numbers and we'll see if we can work out which stage to start at in the method in the Cycling section.

And I see that GH has has doubled and KH has halved 
Unless you have something in the tank made of calcium (eg the substrate or shell or a piece of limestone rock) there is no way that GH can double. Even with those things in the tank, GH would not have increased by that much in just over a week.

Quote from: Sue on July 01, 2016, 02:50:35 PM

And I see that GH has has doubled and KH has halved 
Unless you have something in the tank made of calcium (eg the substrate or shell or a piece of limestone rock) there is no way that GH can double. Even with those things in the tank, GH would not have increased by that much in just over a week.

I agree completely with this, as someone who has limestone rock in my own tank. I do find the test strips unreliable for KH and GH (can often give a high reading when actually both my KH and GH are low), and they tend to give a lower-than-expected reading for PH, but all the other readings are usually very accurate.