Cichlid Tank Cycling

[BettaFishMommy]

with no fish in the tank, you don't have to worry about your nitrate level. when your cycle is complete, you will be doing a large water change to clear out those nitrates before putting fish in.

what you want is a zero ammonia AND zero nitrite reading within 24 hours of dosing your ammonia. if the bacteria can process that ammonia within a day, the bacteria can handle bioload from the fish.

 

[jpappy789]

Agreed with BFM...just look for that nitrite to drop down to zero and then dose again to make sure the bacteria can process everything. Once that is confirmed a big water change to lower the nitrate is all you need to do before adding fish.

One thing that does worry me a bit though is that your temp is awfully high, even for tropical fish. Definitely plan on getting that lower before the fish too.

Nice job tracking the progress, btw!

 

[justin85]

Agreed with BFM...just look for that nitrite to drop down to zero and then dose again to make sure the bacteria can process everything. Once that is confirmed a big water change to lower the nitrate is all you need to do before adding fish.

One thing that does worry me a bit though is that your temp is awfully high, even for tropical fish. Definitely plan on getting that lower before the fish too.

Nice job tracking the progress, btw!

Thanks for your reply, yes I know the temperature is high I read that it helps the bacteria mutltiply faster I will be lowering it to arount 26c before I add fish.

For the water change once the cycle is complete, Should I change like 80 % of the water ? or more ?

 

[BettaFishMommy]

change enough water to bring your nitrates below 40 ppm. so for example, if your nitrate is at 80 prior to water change, a 50% change will bring it down to 40 (removing/replacing half the water will remove half the nitrates). if your nitrate is at 100, do an 80% change to bring it down to 20 before adding fish.

 

[justin85]

Ok got it, my nitrates according to my test earlier is now at 110ppm so will be doing a large water change or maybe 2

 

[BettaFishMommy]

don't worry about water changing until the day you are going to add fish. do the water change, then go fish shopping

if you don't want to have to turn off filters or heaters that day, you could do a couple of 40-50% water changes back to back, as long as you filter inputs and heaters stay submerged (you can push your heater's suction cups down the glass/move the heater lower as you remove water, to keep it completely submerged, if it's a vertically aligned heater). that'd bring your nitrates down to a good level before you add fish.

 

[justin85]

I'm running 2x 200w inline heaters with 2x eheim filters so would be easy. Thanks for the advice, I already know exactly what fish I want and iv got a guy at my lps trying to find out where he can order them from for me so hopefully he has luck and it all falls in to place once the cycle is done. *fingers crossed*

 

[justin85]

Will I be able to put a large number of fish in straight away ? From what I read cycling like this allows you to do this safely but I can't find anything about safe numbers at once.

 

[BettaFishMommy]

how many fish were you planning on for this tank?

 

[Jannika]

Justin,
Once your cycle and last water change is completed, you should add the mineral salts before the fish go in. For a 200L tank the initial dose would be approximately

10 teaspoons marine salt mix
10 teaspoons baking soda
10 tablespoons epsom salt

After that you need to add back whatever volume is taken out through water changes, and this is the most economical method. You can also premix the ingredients in a container for convenience. Good luck, and looking forward to seeing your beautiful p. saulosi!