half way ..... i think

[princess]

lol sooo annoying evertime sweetang says take it out someone else says leave it in.
i'm in no rush for fish at all
i really think if i dont take the shrimp out as sweetang says its just gonna get higher and i wont have any controle over it .....i think my waters peaked now so if i take it out now and just leave it to go down itself ....see what happens?

whats the worst thing? that the cycle isnt complete and when i put the fish in (when ever its ready) my tank will go back into a cycle?

 

[sweeTang21]

I still say take it out lol. In the end the decision is up to you.

if we look at it from this stand point:

is leaving the shrimp in there is it going to hurt your tank, no
will it increase your nitrate like no tomarrow, yes
is this bad, not always
can this tank work, most definately
is anybody wrong in this thread, no

now if you decide to leave the shrimp in then your not going to be adding fish for a while. As ive said before though, this is fine because your not suppose to rush the tank in the first place.

all is well no matter what decision you decide to go with. Good luck and most of all, have fun, its a great hobby

 

[Predator 1]

I totaly agree. This hobby is a Joy, not a chore! And the key word is allways "PATIENCE"

 

[princess]

ok so i took it out and my readings are as follows...prawn has been out 3 days

ph:8.0
nitrite:5.0
nitrate:100
ammo:0.50


not sure why my ph has dropped?

 

[sweeTang21]

ph could have dropped for many reasons. Make sure you have good surface movement to allow good gas excahange. Levels should be coming down soon. When ammonia and nitrite level out to 0, then you can start the water changes to get the nitrate down. Shoot for 5ppm or lower if ya can.
Good luck

 

[JayK1320]

so I just came across this by chance. I am wondering what this "cycling" means? When you first setup a tank I know you need to give the water time to drop ammonia etc. Or is this for setting up a new filter that has never been used?

This may be a stupid question, but I am just curious.

 

[princess]

lol there are no stupid questions.

i was setting up a new tank/filter ..... but if your just setting up a new filter you take the media out of the old filter and put it in the new.....no need for cycling that.

cycling is a hardish thing to explain there are loads of sites explaining all of the semantics, much better than me trying to explain

 

[JayK1320]

Is it for saltwater only or do you need to cycle fresh as well?

BTW whats team princess haha nice videos...

 

[princess]

lol yeah freshwater needs to be cycled aswell............
your here so i take it you have fish? its something you really should know.

thankyou

 

[jcardona1]

yeah fresh and salt need to be cylced. here's my explanation of the cycling process:

- fish take dookies in the water
- dookies and uneaten food produces ammonia (harmful to fish)
- bacteria in filters consume ammonia, and produce nitrite as a byproduct
- another type of bacteria consume the nitrite, and produces nitrate as a byproduct
- nitrates are reduced by doing regular water changes

This is what happens in a cycled tank. in a new tank, there is no bacteria to consume ammonia and nitrites, these are harmful to fish. when cycling a tank, your introducing ammonia to set up the colonies of bacteria to consume ammonia/nitrite. princess used raw shrimp for her ammonia source. by decayin in the water, it produced ammonia to start feeding the bacteria.

some people use shrimp, others add pure ammonia, and other use cheap/hardy fish (see my sig) to produce the ammonia. did that make any sense?