Help With BigAls Order

Jedi, those floating scrapers (Mag-Float) really do work. The Mag-Float people make two categories of scraper: one for glass, and one for acrylic. Each category has a few different sizes based on the thickness of your glass.

I just got mine from Petsolutions, and the little blister package said they were manufactured in the Netherlands. The magnets are pretty strong.

They do not scratch the glass unless you end up getting some grit (like, say, aquarium gravel) between the scraper half and the glass surface. For that reason, I tend to leave a 1" belt of algae untouched near my tanks' gravel bottoms, and use a Kent plastic scraping blade to finish that off, when needed.

In the beginning, months ago, I was really worried that I might suffocate my fish with my rudimentary CO2 setup. I just recharged it w/ fresh water, sugar and yeast (every couple weeks I do this), and it's putting out about 1 bubble per second with no ill effects over the past couple days. You could go with a 1-litre plastic pop bottle on a tank of your size (mine is only 38-gallon). A larger bottle means it can keep bubbling longer because it takes longer for the alcohol concentration in the fermenter to reach a critical point (where yeast stop fermenting) if the fermenter has more water volume in it.

I do check pH often, since adding CO2 usually drives it down a bit. I adjust carefully w/ a carbonate buffer.

I don't know much about Eheim canisters (other than they are excellent products, the Porsches and BMW's of the fishkeeping hardware world). I just had my CO2 outlet hose positioned next to the filter inlet of my HOT Magnum. That way, just as a bubble of CO2 emerges from the fermenter airline hose, it gets sucked into the filter intake tube.

You know those check valves that come with some air pumps? You can buy those separately. That's all I use. My setup is truly simple.

A bubble counter allows you to see how much CO2 is being put into the aquarium. If it's putting out a bunch of bubbles at a machine-gun pace, then you're getting a lot of CO2. If it is sedately showing a bubble each second, then you're getting not so much. That's all it does. I guess some have check valves integrated into them, though I've never seen one.

I don't have a bubble counter other than that airline house carefully positioned (using suction-cup airline tube holders) next to the filter inlet. I can visually count bubbles as the fermenter spits them out prior to them being sucked up by the inflow of water into my filter.
 
Thanks! Maybe I can hold off on the bubble counter for now.

The ph crashing is kind of scary.... How often do you test your ph?

My shipment is due to arrive tomorrow :D . I can't wait to get it started. I need to find some ammonia though... I went to Target yesterday and they didn't have any unscented. I'll try Walmart but won't be able to until the minimum of tomorrow. With the hockey game right after work I have a sneaking suspicion there is no way I will get teh cycle started tomorrow and will have to wait until Friday.
 
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Here is a photo of my new but very empty aquarium:
P1010638-vi.jpg
 
I love your tank. It's almost the one we picked out. The 60g I got was on sale for just a bit less. I do love the look of a bowfront tank. Keep us posted as you do more to it.
 
hurricanejedi said:
Thanks! Maybe I can hold off on the bubble counter for now.

The ph crashing is kind of scary.... How often do you test your ph?

My shipment is due to arrive tomorrow :D . I can't wait to get it started. I need to find some ammonia though... I went to Target yesterday and they didn't have any unscented. I'll try Walmart but won't be able to until the minimum of tomorrow. With the hockey game right after work I have a sneaking suspicion there is no way I will get teh cycle started tomorrow and will have to wait until Friday.
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H-Jedi, I test pH on my tank w/ CO2 fertilization about twice a week, which actually isn't super frequent now that I think of it. I flow relatively little CO2, judging from my research on the web, which is probably why my pH doesn't do big swings. Start off small, like I did (based on the advice of smarter people on this forum and others; this is my first stab at CO2).

I've heard of people using 1-gallon plastic jugs to build fermenters for their 55-gallon tanks, with 2 cups of sugar as the fermented agent, and they don't over-do it...so I'm reasoning that my 20-oz. pop bottle on a 38-gallon tank is pretty gentle on CO2 output. I'm going to switch to a 1-litre pop bottle soon, and I'm starting a 2-litre bottle on my 100-gallon tank next week...the giant swords are settling in quickly.

Bear in mind that my tanks were already cycled, established with livestock and plants, and the water chemistry was already stabilized before I attempted CO2 fertilization. From a fellow newbie's perspective, do one thing at a time and be patient. I haven't had fish mortality problems because I was content to let those tanks sit for weeks, then add a fish or two, wait for days or weeks, then slowly up the tank population. Plants came next, and once that was established, I went for CO2. I simply don't have the expertise (like a lot of more experienced people on this forum) to do it any faster, so I take the leisurely approach on changing the variables.

Understocked and large tanks are always easiest to manage as far as water chemistry goes.

v/r, N-A
 
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A friend of mine who does freshwater and saltwater says I should only add a few fish at a time even after the cycle is finished. I thought the bacteria would die back from lack of ammonia. Some of the fish I want are really sensitive or hard to transition but fine after. Should I just put in a school of tetras and give it some time, then add some other fish and give it time? Or should I do the full-bioload? I'm getting such different advice :( .
 
A waterbed drain fill kit for $5.00 and a drinking water hose works the same way a python does..and this is where the basic Python idea came from. Also, your tank actually holds just under 44 gallons with a 1" lip. Don't forget how much space your gravel and such is going to displace water. With those measuremennts, with every 1" of gravel, it's taking out apx 2 1/2 gallons of water space.
 
hurricanejedi said:
A friend of mine who does freshwater and saltwater says I should only add a few fish at a time even after the cycle is finished. I thought the bacteria would die back from lack of ammonia. Some of the fish I want are really sensitive or hard to transition but fine after. Should I just put in a school of tetras and give it some time, then add some other fish and give it time? Or should I do the full-bioload? I'm getting such different advice :( .
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A few fish at a time can't hurt, in my humble and limited experience. Even if the bacteria die back, you won't kill the entire colony. They will adjust their numbers to meet the amount of food presented to them, just like any other animal population does. Once this happens (and it will after waiting a couple weeks), you can add more fish.

I've heard of doing the fishless cycle followed by loading up with a substantial population of fish. Some people with much more experience than me have done this pretty successfully. I haven't done this yet. The patient "method" worked for me, and I'm comfortable with that, for sure.

Your idea of putting in some hardy fish (just a few), giving it time, then adding more...nothing wrong with that! That's how I accidentally got my big tank properly cycled. We had two new broods of guppy fry, 100 in all, that we put in our 100-gallon tank. Wife wanted to go on a vacation, so we did, leaving the tank alone with a Hagen AquaClear 500 hang-on-tank filter (w/ a piece of pantyhose tied around the inlet so that the fry wouldn't get sucked up) and a NutraFin autofeeder. Two weeks later I expected the worst upon our return home, but the fish were bigger and healthy, and the tank was cycled and ready for plants. I'm selling the guppies now to my LFS in exchange for types that I want.

I guess those 100 tiny guppy fry initially put almost no load on that big aquarium. As they grew larger, so did their ability to output waste for the bacteria in the filter's bio-foam insert. After coming home from vacation, I added my 4 UGF plates (all linked by plumbing to one Magnum 350 canister) and some gravel, but let the Hagen AquaClear keep doing its thing for a couple weeks until the gravel could pick up a bacteria culture of its own.

As you can tell, I truly did this in the most messed-up order possible :huh: , but all my fish lived. :)

I guess the point is, there is no exact single solution. We're enjoying a hobby with many different ways to approach each problem, and you try the approaches that suit you and your aquarium. I'll try a fishless cycle next time to see if I can do it, but putting in a few fish (or a bunch of really tiny baby ones, in my case), waiting, then adding more has worked for this newbie. It's kind of like a Rubik's cube...we know the desired end state, and there's a lot of good ways to get there.

v/r, N-A
 
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GREAT LOOKING TANK!

If you haven't gotten your ammonia yet, then go by your local "Dollar Tree" or equivalent & you should find "pure ammonia!" that's what I did...

Also, if you can get some Filter Gunk from an established tank, or better yet, the filter media, that will help expedite your cycle a bit.

See my thread in General FW on 55 gal cycle progress


NOTE:
If you het the cycle to clear out 4PPM of ammonia in 24 hours, it'll definately handle a full bioload of fish!
 
Yah I'm lucky that our department head has a fish tank that he will get me some filter gunk from his HOB and some gravel (he has a UGF too). He has a biowheel so I'm not sure I can get media... I really don't know how filters work yet.

I think I will pick up some ammonia on teh way home. I don't know where we have a dollar store though so I might just try Walmart. That is if I feel better....I went to THE most expensive restaurant in Raleigh on business and got food poisoning :( last night. I was late to work this morning and up half the night absolutely sick.

My order is supposed to come today but I have a Hurricanes hockey game to go to so don't even know if I'll have time (or energy) to get the tank running. But I absolutely can't wait so I might just stay up until its running :P .

My friend says that I need more experience before taking on a full load of fish. I think theres something to that but I'm still so split on a full-bioload or just adding a few. I just feel like if I don't add them all then I just defeated the month or so that it will take to do a full cycle.
 
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