# 55 Gal will not cycle



## Seems Fishy (Nov 7, 2012)

Hey Guys its been about a week since i started cycling my tank. I really wanted to do a fishless cycle but the overly confident salesman at Petsmart convinced me to do a "Fish in" cycle. I have only been messing around with my 10 Gal for the past yr so i really trusted him. So here is my situation.

i am filtering the 55 Gal with a Aquaclear 110 When i initially filled the tank i used Prime to make the tank safe to introduce the fish into. After going to a Petland discount to get another opinion they told me to use Microbe-Lift. they said it was the best thing to get the tank started. I believe it worked good because i had nitrates and nitrites present the next day, and my ammonia is at a safe level.










The tank is stocked with 4 Black Skirt Tetras and 4 Rosy Tetras (now 3 Rosys)










Now i am confused, all of my levels have been the same for the past week, my water has not gotten cloudy at all, my ammonia has not started to rise, i have even been over feeding hoping to get the ammonia up a bit to kick start the cycling. I have only lost one fish so far, they all seem great though, very alive and energetic. Is it safe for me to start introducing other fish? should i wait until the ammonia, nitrates, and nitrites are at zero?

My current readings are
PH - 7.8
Amonnia - .25
Nirates - .25
Nirites - .10


















Also i noticed one of the black skirts fins is half missing! The water levels are not bad enough for the fishes to be affected by it... is it possible that they are nipping each other or is it the water conditions?









Any Help would be greatly appreciated!


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## Dave Waits (Oct 12, 2012)

You have the same problem I'm having with my 55 gallon, my Nitrites are too high. I'm introducing a larger Biological filter(Large Air-Driven Sponge filter to get more Biological filtering) My Ph is lower ,ammonia is zero, my Nitrates are good but my Nitrites are high.

I don't think, and I'll probably get mightily castigated here, that constant water changes are the answer. As long as you keep making large water changes the tank will keep cycling.


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## LTruex (Nov 8, 2012)

SeemsFishy, let me start by saying your keeping notes, you have a test kit that is being used and reading seem to mathch color charts. Now let me add do not add new fish till everything settles down to calm, and don't start making changes everyday for too much too fast kills (honestly it kills). On this web site is a topic in _*new to freshwater aquarium hobby *_, but it offers an article called "*fish pooh and you a primer*" by Scuff...read it and take notes to determine if you want to raise your ammonia levels. I cannot attest to what you have been told and do know we all want fish in our tank ASAP...but if they don't die off right away they don't live the full life expectancy for ammonia damages their gills and causes a slow lingering death. I don't mean to imply you have done so...just how important cycling is...and you were right to consider the fishless proceedure...fair to the fish and your confidence. I won't seek to advise on products for there are to many good ones to offer a single suggestion, but you must get the ammonia and by products of ammonia under control and keep them down. I hope others reading your story will offer suggestions for there are members that know the subject all to well. Oh that tetra looks like fin nipping by something... Larry


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## LTruex (Nov 8, 2012)

I forgot to ask are the plants real...if so lower airation, for to much air raises ph lowers CO2, and best used more at night than day. That again is just my opion and sure there may be others to disagree. Larry


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## dalfed (Apr 8, 2012)

In my opinion you have not started to cycle yet.Quit using chemicals (ph down) and change 25% water every second day until your ammonia starts to rise then you will need to do whatever water changes necessary to keep ammonia below 1ppm.
I have only tried the bacteria in a bottle once and it did absolutely nothing for me, but others have had luck with it. If you know someone who has an established tank, or you have extra filter material in your ten gallon transfer some of that to your 55's filter, just make sure the material stays damp.


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## Seems Fishy (Nov 7, 2012)

LTruex said:


> I forgot to ask are the plants real...if so lower airation, for to much air raises ph lowers CO2, and best used more at night than day. That again is just my opion and sure there may be others to disagree. Larry


Thanks for the advice Ltruex! I will def check out that article. My plants are fake, i will be honest since i am new at this i did not know airation increases ph. i just liked the looks of it. Maybe i should get rid of it since my ph is already pretty high.


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## Seems Fishy (Nov 7, 2012)

dalfed said:


> In my opinion you have not started to cycle yet.Quit using chemicals (ph down) and change 25% water every second day until your ammonia starts to rise then you will need to do whatever water changes necessary to keep ammonia below 1ppm.
> I have only tried the bacteria in a bottle once and it did absolutely nothing for me, but others have had luck with it. If you know someone who has an established tank, or you have extra filter material in your ten gallon transfer some of that to your 55's filter, just make sure the material stays damp.


I still have my old 10 gallon running, should i grab the filter mater and just shake some of it into the water? or into the filter? SHould i grab some of the gravel from the old tank?

also if i do this and i start to see ammonia rise, then should i still do the water changes?

thanks again for the help


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## lonedove55 (Jan 25, 2012)

Hello Seems Fishy and welcome! Please don't think I'm trying to be critical, but seems like something may be "fishy" (lol, no pun intended) with the tests you posted...First off, why is there more liquid in the ammonia tube than in the nitrate tube? When adding the ammonia regents, only 8 drops of each regent (16 total) are used; whereas, the nitrate regents take 10 of each, for a total of 20 drops? The meniscus, or "bottom" of the curve should be even with the white line. Too little or too much water will result in an inaccurate test result. Click on this link Q & A: Why does water curve, and what is a meniscus? | Department of Physics | University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign to determine how much water should be in the vial. 

When first testing my tank water I too had trouble making sure the amount of water in the tube was correct as I have never taken any chemistry in school. By using a plastic medicine dropper found at any drug store (they may even give you one for free), makes measuring the amount of tank water to use extremely easy and accurate. I've also found inconsistencies in the test tubes themselves as to where the line was painted on the tube.....some tubes it was higher/lower than others.

I totally agree with the other 2 posters..drop the use of ph, etc...it will only cause more problems. And *YES* by all means use the filter media, gravel, etc (not water) from your 10 gallon established tank...it will definitely help cycle your 55 much faster as the beneficial bacteria are already present. I used some of the filter media (canister) and gravel from my 26 gallon tank to "kick start" my 38...it literally cycled instantaneously....I only had a slight trace of ammonia 1 day even with 3 messy fantail goldfish.

Sorry for the long post, and like I said..I'm not here to criticize your testing techniques...Good Luck on your cycle!!


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## BBradbury (Apr 22, 2011)

Hello Seems...

Cycling a tank with a few hardy fish is the traditional method and relatively easy. If you're carefully monitoring the water conditions, your fish will be fine. I used feeder Guppies. You can also use Platys, Danios, Barbs or any hardy fish.

You set up the tank and simply add several, 8 to 10 fish for a larger tank. The waste the fish produce starts the cycle. You have your water test kit handy and every day you test for ammonia and nitirites. If a test shows a trace of either, you remove and replace a minimum of 25 percent of the tank water. 

When several tests read "0" for the above toxins, you add a few more fish and resume testing. You just follow these steps until the tank is fully stocked.

You don't need to be concerned about the pH, hardness or any of that. The fish will adapt to your tap water.

B


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## jshiloh13 (Dec 12, 2010)

I've used that bacteria in a bottle before and never had any luck. It seemed to just throw my test results off and make them confusing, because you have nitrates and nitrites before you should, and you can't really tell where at in the cycle (bothered me anyways, maybe not anyone else lol)



> also if i do this and i start to see ammonia rise, then should i still do the water changes?


Yes you should be doing water changes till your tank is fully cycled. A water change will not start your cycle over. Just make sure you dechlorinate the water, and do not wash any on your filter media out in tap water. This will kill the bacteria you have built up. Instead just rinse them out in the water you take out of the aquarium when you do a water change.


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## susankat (Nov 15, 2008)

Seems Fishy said:


> Thanks for the advice Ltruex! I will def check out that article. My plants are fake, i will be honest since i am new at this i did not know airation increases ph. i just liked the looks of it. Maybe i should get rid of it since my ph is already pretty high.



Ok a miss conception here. Air doesnt increase your ph. What is happening. When you draw water from the tap its high in O2. Once it sits or has airstone added to it, it will level out to actual ph.

Take a glass of water from the tap. Test the ph, let sit 24 hours then test again. Once it outgasses your ph should test either higher or lower depending on the Gh and Kh of your water.

Additives for cycling tanks like startright and such is an iffy debate. Some people says it works, and most will say it don't. But one thing I have seen in common with most is that you have to keep using it and the tank never really cycles that way.

Lots of live fast growing easy plants will help your fish through the cycle. But in reality to cycle with fish its going to take a couple of months no matter how you look at it, because that beneficial bacteria needs to grow in the filter, on the glass, and any ornament you have in the tank.

As for the tetra there can be many vairables to cause the loss of part of fin. It could have been nipped, ammonia or nitrites can cause the damage. But usually with clean dechlorinated water it should heal pretty easy.

This makes a good read on cycling a tank. http://www.aquariumforum.com/f66/fishless-cycle-15036.html Might take a few times reading but its well worth it.


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## jrman83 (Jul 9, 2010)

Doesn't anyone read before they try to cycle a tank anymore?

A fish-in cycle will take 4-8 weeks to cycle, so saying it won't cycle after one week is just rediculous. Stop adding chemicals as posted, especially ph products. They will kill your fish if not used properly and "most" people do not know how to use them - more than just following the directions.

If you have fish now do NOT add anymore until the cycle is over with, despite above advice. Adding more fish increases toxins and work by you. Best to ride it out with what you have.

Stop wasting your time testing for nitrates at this stage.


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## LTruex (Nov 8, 2012)

Ok a miss conception here. Air doesnt increase your ph. What is happening. When you draw water from the tap its high in O2. Once it sits or has airstone added to it, it will level out to actual ph.

Take a glass of water from the tap. Test the ph, let sit 24 hours then test again. Once it outgasses your ph should test either higher or lower depending on the Gh and Kh of your water.
Let me rephrase my miss wording of the terms "air will lower ph" given a common use in controling ph in planted tanks with injected CO2 find anywhere on the net...ph is lowered with CO2, and raised by increasing air from stones to reduce the CO2 amount desloved in water. Now ph is scale of balance with kh, O2 and CO2, and this scale my change or be altered by gh only as the limits since gh has no effect on change in ph...but represents how much it buffers...let me try to offer this idea...you can saturate a salt, by boiling water and continuously adding and desolving till you cannot add anymore...that becomes the limit buffer example...if the ph in water is at the limit of the buffer (or gh in my minds eye) you can only reduce but not raise ph without addition of more buffer (a chemical compound addition). You can lower with use of CO2 and can fine tune with a balance of air stone and CO2 to a point were roughly the ph will settle at an example say 7.0 (common distiled water average) the KH will be 0.5 and the CO2 will be 1.5 ppm. Hope I haven't taken this too far left or right. Larry


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## jrman83 (Jul 9, 2010)

> Ok a miss conception here. Air doesnt increase your ph. What is happening. When you draw water from the tap its high in O2. Once it sits or has airstone added to it, it will level out to actual ph.


I think you have the misconception or just not know what you speak of....O2 does nothing to ph. CO2 does affect ph. The idea being discussed is that an air bubbler causes surface disturbance causing CO2 to escape the water. It won't happen to the point that it zeroes out, but it does decrease the level. Unless the tank is injected with CO2, you won't see hardly any difference when you do this. If the tank is injected, the ph level will climb back to close to it's original level before injection.

GH/KH has little to do with actual ph values either. KH helps to hold or buffer a given ph steady, but that is it (not GH). GH values have nothing to do with ph. Stop believing in the CO2/kh/ph relationship chart which I see you subscribe to, it's useless.


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## LTruex (Nov 8, 2012)

Were all intitled to our opionion and belief, but I still accept your opionion and advise...thank you Larry


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## jrman83 (Jul 9, 2010)

Barring the comment I made about the chart, all I spoke of is fact. Not opinion.


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## LTruex (Nov 8, 2012)

that chart cannot be excludded as it does offer support to my point and why I presented it as I did...I don't mind and even encourage a difference of opinion for I do not always present things clearly as I would wish, but it too has bases found with fact not of words but trial and error methods. In injected aquarium use of surface bubble does gas off CO2 and that raises PH. if the chart is reffered to it will match KH, PH, CO2 If you bubble air to that it will gas off CO2 which will raise the O2 and PH.... if that is wrong then as you say I don't know from what I speak.


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## jrman83 (Jul 9, 2010)

> If you bubble air to that it will gas off CO2 which will raise the O2


Gassing off CO2 does not raise O2 levels. Use of a bubbler can however. Some things you talk about only apply to an injected aquarium. Unless you plan to confuse the original poster, why mention it? Of which, the chart especially doesn't apply to an injected tank.


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## LTruex (Nov 8, 2012)

jrman83, your right and I don't wish to add anymore confusion than has already been provided. Perhaps we can now get back to helping his concerns. Larry


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## Seems Fishy (Nov 7, 2012)

LTruex said:


> jrman83, your right and I don't wish to add anymore confusion than has already been provided. Perhaps we can now get back to helping his concerns. Larry


Unfortunately this has gone a little far and I am def confused now lol 

So basically what you are all telling me to do is stop adding any chemicals and just add bio matter from my other tank and just wait.... I only assumed in the 1st week I would see some progress but I was wrong. Right? Anything else?

Either way thanks for all the input!!


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## jrman83 (Jul 9, 2010)

Seems Fishy said:


> So basically what you are all telling me to do is stop adding any chemicals and just add bio matter from my other tank and just wait.... I only assumed in the 1st week I would see some progress but I was wrong. Right? Anything else?


Correct. In the 1st week you should start seeing traces of ammonia. That is about it. Nitrites can start to show in the 10-day point or so. If either values gets about 1ppm do a water change. Stop worrying about nitrate testing. They mean very little at this stage in your cycle.


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## LTruex (Nov 8, 2012)

seemsfishy, it is not a great idea to alter ph using chemicals and infact chasing the ph as has been mentioned...a never ending game. Fish can actually learn to tolerate your ph provided it's not so shocking as to kill them infact just keep it consistant all the time is better than bouncing around...the real harm with tap water is city treatment, and to combat that we must stock pile water to airate, rid chemical treatments, and adjust temperature. You do need to be concerned with making sure the tank is cycled which takes a month or longer (it takes as long as it takes) but you don't want to raise ammonia...that is deadly and fatal for the fish. the least of all evils is Nitrate and that is something you want a low as possible. Hope this helps


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## HFGGHG (Aug 28, 2011)

BBradbury said:


> Hello Seems...
> 
> Cycling a tank with a few hardy fish is the traditional method and relatively easy. If you're carefully monitoring the water conditions, your fish will be fine. I used feeder Guppies. You can also use Platys, Danios, Barbs or any hardy fish.
> 
> ...


The above from BBradbury is exactly how I cycled both my 20 and 29 gallon tanks with, I might add, the same 6 Zebra Danios. That was in
July and October of 2011 and 4 of the zebra danios are still swimming
around in the 20 gallon today.
I also recommend live plants. I had good luck with anubias and
hornwort.


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