Post
by SnArL » Mon Jul 15, 2013 10:35 am
Thanks for the suggestions, everyone. We decided to go with the Giant Danios.
We've spent the past 2 weeks trying to fishless cycle our tank, and learned some valuable lessons:
To start: the tank has numerous kinds of live plants (there are NO fake plants in this tank). Anakaris, Anubis, Moneywort, Corkscrew Val, Ruffled Val, American Val, Wisteria, Hedge, and Java Moss. The Wisteria came from our other tanks, and with it came some mystery snail babies. We added driftwood, tying the Java Moss to it with cotton thread and weighting it down with rocks. Filtration is with an API Filstar XP Large. Intake is on the right side and the powerhead is on the left. We added a bubble curtain that runs the length of the tank in the back.
I filled one of the filter trays with ceramic media...half is the API stars, and the other half is the Fluval BioMax.
We kicked off the fishless cycle by adding some shrimp pellets. But after a day, no change in levels (I'm impatient). So we added some ammonia that we got from WalMart. Bad idea. The Great Value clear ammonia has a surfactant in it. Thankfully it's NOT a detergent, but still, the tank frothed really bad. But the ammonia levels went up. We dosed the tank with StressZyme and waited for the Nitrites to spike.
It never happened. We skimmed the foam off, did a 50% water change, and added more StressZyme. Still nothing. So we got some of the janitorial grade ammonia from Ace. Dosed the tank...and the ammonia SKYROCKETED. To mitigate the high ammonia levels, I added a packet of the API AmmoZorb to the filter. We used Prime to chelate the ammonia, and added some QuickStart. After a few 25% water changes, the ammonia dropped back down to 1 ppm and the Nitrites jumped. We continued to add ammonia to keep the levels up, and eventually saw a Nitrate spike.
Unfortunately, the Nitrite level never dropped. We did several 50% water changes, chelated with Prime, even swapped the AmmoZorb for NitraZorb. We kept the ammonia up to 2ppm, and every 6 hours, it's gone. The nitrates bounced between 10 and 80 ppm (depending on water changes), but the Nitrites remained off the scale high.
After 2 weeks of having a really nice tank setup but no fish, we figured we'd put something in. After all, the snails seemed to be doing just fine. Chelated with Prime that morning, got 11 Giant Danios, changed out 50% of the water, added StressZyme, and then let the fish out of the bag.
They're fine, but the levels aren't changing. The water change dropped the Nitrate levels, but not the Nitrites. We did notice that they seemed to be a bit bored.
So we got a MarineLand Maxi-Jet 1200 powerhead, placed next to the filter powerhead. The fish are really happy with the current, but more amazingly, Nitrite levels have dropped to less than 1ppm overnight, and Nitrates are way down. Apparently we didn't have sufficient agitation to push the Nitrites and Nitrates into the filter. :/
Once we see 0 Nitrites, we'll get our YoYo loaches. Moral of the story, get a powerhead if you have a long tank.