My tank has been running 5-6 weeks. I think I'm close to being fully cycled, as my nitrites dropped (0.5) without pwc after a few days of me ignoring it over the holiday w/e. Today I cleaned plants and vacuumed the 1/2 of the tank gravel that I hadn't previously touched, and did a 50% pwc. My nitrite climbed to 3. Should I be cleaning gravel and plants before I am fully cycled?
clean gravel when cycling?
- Thread starter mozart
- Start date
i wouldn't bother. whats the point. you aren't cleaning up after anything.
just wait till the levels are all good. then you'll be golden and ready to stock.
just wait till the levels are all good. then you'll be golden and ready to stock.
Sorry, should have said I have 6 zebra danios and 2 red wagtail platies in my 20 gallon tank. I have since learned that the info that came with the tank kit and my animal planet book is less than complete. Cycling with fish (if you care about them) is not as easy as they made it out to be!
i would just worry about the cycle and do water changes with gravel vacs.
http://www.plantgeek.net/article_viewer.php?id=9
http://www.plantgeek.net/article_viewer.php?id=9
Cleaning gravel is always good. How deep is your gravel? I found that if I do a gravel vac and only take the top 1/4 inch and clean that well, that is not enough. After a month of doing 3 shallow gravelvacs a week I then switched to doing deep gravel vacs whereby I push the gravelvac all the way down to the bottom of the tank, whereby about 1.5 inches of gravel are in the tube. When the gravel gets released, a tremendous amount of dirt floats up the gravelvac. I do this now once a week and my water numbers are perfect.