Cycling - gone fishless, where am I at?!

[lilacamy931]

So i'll set up a new thread here if ok as lost my way on this cycling. I had fish tanks many a year ago, fell out of fish keeping and now have my beaut of a tank set up. I thought as previous experience I could get away with a fish in cycle, I was exceptionally wrong.

So far:
Tank set up on 14th November.
200 litre, Fluval 306, live plants, sand, heater 27C, Aquasky lighting. Bubbler added today.

I won't include the readings from when the fish were in there. However once they were moved out, I left the water as is as had ammonia in the readings and been monitoring daily. as follows:
Sunday 17th 1ppm
monday 18th 2ppm
tuesday 19th 1ppm
weds 20th 7pm 1ppm
thurs 21st 5pm .5ppm
fri 22nd .5ppm
sat 23rd .25pm
sun 24th .25pm
mon 25th between 0-.25ppm

Nitrites and Nitrates just don't seem to be happening. I've read nitrites can easily be missed if day to day readings but still no nitrates?

At the start I used Seachem and Safestart products however hindsight is a wonderful thing as that was when the fish were in there and water changes probably got rid of any BB.

A trusted fishshop recommended Evolution Aqua Pure Balls. Half went into the aquarium itself and the other half into the canister. They recommended not touching anything at all and to pop back in a week. Unfortunately I've been extremely ill over the weekend so not been able to. Today I have popped some flake into the water as the ammonia is so slow now.

I still have some of the pure balls left and also now brought the bomb product but not applied. Unsure where to go from here?

 

[FreshyFresh]

It does appear that ammonia is being consumed, but you typically keep dosing with ammonia until you read 2-4ppm and keep it there until it drops and you see the nitrite spike and then nitrates. The 2 times I did fishless cycling by adding liquid ammonia, it took a good 5-6 weeks and not without issues. LOL.

I was dosing ammonia up to 4-5ppm, which caused such a high amount of nitrites that my liquid test kit couldn't read it, so it just read 0. Once I did a couple large WCs and nitrites were readable, nitrates took off and I was good to go.

Can you get some seeded filtration media from a healthy tank that's been setup for a long time? Throw that in your canister and you can stock your tank. With testing to verify of course.

 

[Hendre]

This is why I use stability and gradual stocking. It works rather will in my experience

 

[FreshyFresh]

^ agree. There's nothing wrong with a well supervised "fish-in" cycle. If done right it's going to be a 'silent cycle', where you should read no ammonia, no nitrites, but eventually will see nitrate creep up.

* This does take lots of water sampling and water changes though.. You can't just plop fish in and top up the water.

 

[lilacamy931]

Thank you very much for the replies

In relation to some mature media, unfortunately local LFS won't part with theirs, friends is a very unhealthy tank so will not go there and the one person who responded ad hasn't come back).

My initial fish in cycle was a bombard - I got too excited and stocked heavily with tetras from the outset. I have two small puffers due in January (they are currently 1 inch each). If I start with just these two guys with heavy monitoring in a 200 litre tank that should not be a huge bioload on a ratio?

 

[lilacamy931]

I've just tested my tap water and it doesn't appear to read quite base zero for the ammonia....

 

[twentyleagues]

Thank you very much for the replies

In relation to some mature media, unfortunately local LFS won't part with theirs, friends is a very unhealthy tank so will not go there and the one person who responded ad hasn't come back).

My initial fish in cycle was a bombard - I got too excited and stocked heavily with tetras from the outset. I have two small puffers due in January (they are currently 1 inch each). If I start with just these two guys with heavy monitoring in a 200 litre tank that should not be a huge bioload on a ratio?

What kind of puffer? I'd say throw some tetras back in there and some bb product. It'll be fine in that time. I've never been into fishless cycling in fresh water. If done properly and monitored you should be fine. It's also possible that the plants you have are using your nitrates and ammonia. Plants do consume both.

 

[lilacamy931]

twentyleagues - I;m getting 2 x schoutedeni puffers

They will be due hopefully next week or week after permitting. Unsure whether they should go in first now.

Eventual/gradual stocking will look like this:

2 schoutedeni
2 zebra pleco
4 guppy
22 neon tetra
4 endlers

If I add some tetras now or guppies - my problem the first time was introducing way way too many at once for the tank to handle. Perhaps I should try 4 guppies or 6 neons if go that route?

 

[twentyleagues]

twentyleagues - I;m getting 2 x schoutedeni puffers

They will be due hopefully next week or week after permitting. Unsure whether they should go in first now.

Eventual/gradual stocking will look like this:

2 schoutedeni
2 zebra pleco
4 guppy
22 neon tetra
4 endlers

If I add some tetras now or guppies - my problem the first time was introducing way way too many at once for the tank to handle. Perhaps I should try 4 guppies or 6 neons if go that route?

Yeah do like 6-10 neons now and when the puffers get here they can increase the bioload give your tank some time to adjust and add some more neons or guppies or whatever in another batch of 6-10. After that you should be good. I want a schouetedeni too. Are you afraid of your puffers eating the other stock?

 

[lilacamy931]

twentyleagues - thanks for the help, I will start with 6 as caution and we will see what happens.

I gave a lot of consideration on that. Puffers are so unpredictable whatever happens, will happen (which is why largely going for cheap but "shiny" fish to add some movement to the tank). Everything I have read on schoutedenis has shown them to be much much more placid, it will depend largely on their individual personalities. I'm more worried how they will get on with each other as again largely seems they are fine together but you might get the odd rogue! After christmas I will get an update from the LFS to see how they have been eating and doing so fingers crossed!