Am i cleaning my tank correctly?

[Bderick67]

Hi guys,

I have a 55 gallon tank with a whisper powerfilter 60.
Currently I have a silver aro( 8 inches) and a datnoid ( 4 inches) in it.
I dont have any substrate, cause i like my bottom clear
Every 5 days i change my water cause for some reason my ammonia gets real high.
I always change about 75-80% water.
I change the carbon inside the bio bags and change bio bags once a month.

Reason you have high ammonia is that you have nowhere for the Beneficial bacteria(BB) to grow except the biobag and carbon which you dispose of once a month. The ammonia is killing your fish, not to mention the nitrites.

In order for the survival of your fish you need to do daily water changes, do a large enough amount to keep ammonia under .25ppm. This wil not slow the growth of your BB, having more ammonia will not make the BB reproduce any quicker.

You basically have an uncycled tank and it will take about 4 or 5 weeks to get it cycled. You can possibly speed up a little by adding the used biobags with carbon into your AC110.

Set up the AC110 as shown in the instructions add the used biobags on top of the sponge and under the biomax. Do not use the carbon insert.

You can also buy a product call "Bio spira" made by marine land, It contains BB and will instantly cycle your tank. I would spread the "Bio spira" onto the biomax and reduce the flow on your filter for a few days.

Good luck, you've got alot of work to follow.

 

[vincentliu89]

thanks for all the help guys, its very informative!

 

[vincentliu89]

Ok so my new filter has been running for one day now, i put in some stress enyzme, prime, and salt.

Today i used my API test kit i got .25 ammonia, 0 nitrite, 0 nitrate
80-82 degrees, 55 gallon tank, 1 arowana(8")1 datnoid(4")

Is the parameters fine since its going through a new cycle?

 

[tankboy_taylor]

you could try and get some filter media from a cycled tank to help speed up your cycle

 

[vincentliu89]

its been two days since the new setup, how come my paremeters are 2.0 ammonia , 0 nitrites, nitrates? Is it in the process of cycling yet? or something is wrong? please someone help me!

 

[hybridtheoryd16]

Please do a general internet search for aquarium nitrogen cycle. And read. This cycle takes weeks to complete. Your ammonia will raise and raise until you remove it with a water change. Until the beneficial bacteria have a chance to colonize your aquairium. In my opinion you need to go to your local aquarium shop(LFS) and tell them you are trying to cycle an aquarium and you have fish in it allready. And ask them if you can purchase a little of there used gravel and filter clippings so that you can put that in your tank and in your filter to seed the bacteria. Most LFS's will do this free of charge. And you can just put the gravel in one of your bio socks in the whisper since you do not want substrate. You also need a test kit for nitrites and nitrates and reading that search will tell you all about it. Then if you have any more questions just ask. ---------Also that amount of ammonia will kill your fish very quickly.