I have a new fish tank...and many questions, feeling rusty

Cycling the tank takes a while, when I got my 55 gallon, it took only a few weeks but that was also due to the fact that I transferred some items from an already cycled tank over. I'm not an expert by any means, and if somebody here offers better advice I would definetly take it. And I just kept testing the water over and over again until all of my parameters were normal.

I have platies, which I only added a few after cycling was done, they are all over the place! After that I added a few at a time over a period of a year, that is also including the bristlenose and angelfish.

You got a great bargain on your tank and accessories.
Good luck!

The rule of thumb is 1" of fishes per gallon of water. So a betta, which grows to about 3" should have 3 gallons. Obviously bettas don't require that much space, but that's the general rule. Some fish require more, other's will require less. Oh, and five one inch fish, take less load than one five inch fish, go figure. That's the problem with rules of thumb, they're really loosey goosey.

As for cycling, I cycled my ten gallon for a couple weeks before adding fish in it. Somerwhere around day 10 the tank got cloudy, this was the bacterial bloom, I bought my first fish a few days after. I probably should have waited another week or so, as I had about a 20% mortality rate with the fish I bougth for another month or so. I imagine you should be able to get plants going fairly quickly as it's the high ammonia and Nitrite levels that kill the fish, but plants thrive on ammonia. Somewhere around here there's a thread with FAQ's about cycling. About the different stages, well, from what I understand, ammonia levels build up in a new tank, as the ammonia builds up, there are bacteria that eat ammonia that build up too. Well, the by product from these bacteria are Nitrites. Nitrites are as lethal to fish as ammonia is, so the waters still not safe for the fish. Well, there are bacteria that eat the nitrites and produce nitrates. The nitrates are bad for the fish, but it takes a lot before they do anything. Seems like I'm missing a step, but basically in cycling your waiting for enough of the ammonia eating bacteria to grow to support enough of the nitrite eating bacteria to support your tank. Lol, understand, there's not all that much that you do, so it's essentialy one step from your perspective?

Top swimming and bottom swimming fish, umm....can't help you there, only thing I can suggest is to research fish, that's one of the more common pieces of information you find with brief descriptions of fish.

As for the plants, can't help you, look around, I'm sure you can find tips somewhere on the forum.

The Buddha, I don't think your gonna find anything like that. In a quick search all I was able to find was a decoration, with buddha faces offered through petco.com. You could probably stick a little stone buddha or something, I'm not sure, as long as it's clean, I don't think there'll be any probablems.

Great find on the tank by the way, tell you what, I'll double the price you paid for the tank AND give you my ten gallon, for your 55, what d'ya say?

Hope I helped more than I confused, lol. That's what I get for talking about stuff I barely understand when I'm tired.

that rule is bullsh*t

ouiouigirl said:

How long should I cycle the tank before introducing the plants, then how long before I introduce the fish. i read a few posting on this forum and some folks are talking about cycling amonia, then nitrites etc. I don't remember these different cyclings, I thought it all came together.

Click to expand...

The tank is cycled until it is finished cycling

Pick up a liquid test kit. Aquarium Pharmaceuticals Freshwater Master kit is a great one to have. You need to be able to test your ammonia, nitrites, nitrates and pH.

Then read up on different methods of cycling:

http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=64301

I strongly suggest doing a fishless cycle as it poses no harm to fish and you can add a full bioload all at once when you are done.

FWIW cichlids *are* tropical fish. Tropical means warm water as opposed to cold or cool water fishes (goldfish, weather loaches).

I would hold off on plants et al until you are finished cycling the tank. I would not recommend a silent cycle for someone who hasn't really "knowingly" cycled a tank before. Read the article for an explanation of silent cycling.

Roan

xarknov said:

The rule of thumb is 1" of fishes per gallon of water. So a betta, which grows to about 3" should have 3 gallons. Obviously bettas don't require that much space, but that's the general rule. Some fish require more, other's will require less. Oh, and five one inch fish, take less load than one five inch fish, go figure. That's the problem with rules of thumb, they're really loosey goosey.

Click to expand...

The inch of fish per gallon is not a good rule and should never be used. Even as a guideline. There are too many other factors that need to be considered which that "rule" does not even begin to take into account.

IMO bettas DO require at least that much space.

Roan

ouiouigirl said:

re: Cichlids, I know they're tropical, I just had to switch to brackish water so as far as I'm concerned that was a different setup than my first tropical tank. I May sound like a novice here and there, but to some degree I still know what I am talking about. I'm looking forward to posting pictures of the tank. Thanks again

Click to expand...

Brackish? You were keeping chromides -- Etroplus? That's the only cichlid that I'm aware of that is brackish.

I'd agree that many cichlid tanks are far different in setup as opposed to regular tropicals. The African ones spring to mind.

Roan

Cycling a tank from scratch (no seeding material from an established tank) takes about 6 weeks.

If you can, get some filter gunk and a handful of gravel from an established, cycled tank & you can speed up the process. You can also purchase a product called 'Bio-Spira'. It apparantly does wonders for cycling the tank fast.

Once your tank is fully cycled (0 ammonia, 0 nitrites, less than 20 ppm nitrates) and your tank can process your daily ammonia dose (about 2 ppm added ammonia I think, see the link Roan Art gave you for cycling a tank) and can reduce it to zero in 24 hours, you can add your fish. If you've built up a big bacteria colony in your filter with ammonia during your cycling process, you can add a moderate fishload.

How many fish to add? Sorry, but I do find the inch-per-fish rule helpful. I keep small fish & round down when I'm calculating, so that the fish have a little more room than the rule suggests. Of course, you will still need to consider how active your fish breed is.

PS. If you want a planted tank, it is a little different from an un-planted one. Depending on your choice of plants, you may require special substrate, and you would do well to consider this aspect now, before you've decorated the tank. If you go planted, I would advise you to add soil or gravel substrate and decorations first, then cycle the tank, then add the plants (make sure they're doing well) and lastly add the fish. It's quite difficult to add soil and plants after your fish are living in the tank.

It's great how enthusiastic you are about starting your new tank (I remember feeling that way too), but you'll need to take this process step by step. Maybe you could use the time it takes to cycle your tank (believe me, it seems to take FOREVER!) to research different types of fish, to find some that would work well in your tank environment.

Good luck