New Fish Tank - What is the best way of running it in?

Question

Have just bought a second hand fish tank - I will be cleaning it with vinegar and then letting the filter run through it for a couple of weeks. Should I then add plants and let them settle in before I start adding fish or do the plants need the fish to thrive

Answer 1

Many people ask for a goldfish bowl as an easy option for their childs
first pet. This could not be further from the truth! Buy a bowl fill it
with tap water put in a goldfish and feed it several times a day as it
says on most packs of fish food and the fish will not last very long.

If the fish lasts more than 24 hours the bowl will quickly become a
cloudy smelly dish of stagnant water. Keeping fish is really keeping
water for the fish to live in! It should be filtered to keep it clean
and any tap water used should have the chlorine removed before the fish
comes in contact with it. Fish are quite delicate animals and should be
treated as if they were the most precious thing ever and not as a cheap
pet.

First thing you should decide is where you are going to situate your
new aquarium, this could be any tank or bowl you want. Find a place
that is not in direct sunlight, away from all sources of heat and is
big enough to house the size of aquarium that you want. Please do not
put it in the kitchen as vapours from cooking may adversley affect it.


When setting up a tank for the first time choose the biggest you
can afford and the biggest you can fit in the place you have chosen,
often I hear customers saying they wish they had got a larger tank.
Make sure that the surface it is going on to is solid enough to take
the weight. Water weighs 10lbs per gallon, a 36" x 15" x12" tank holds
20 gallons so this tank weighs over 200lbs with water and glass.
Perhaps a purpose built stand might be an advantage. Place it near to
an electrical supply, long trailing cables are not the safest of
things. Remember you will have to do water changes so think about how
you are going to get the water to and away from the tank. Plan
thing before you go out and buy!

When you get you aquarium home clean it well with clean water and no detergents.

Place it in the position you have chosen and make sure this is where
you want it before you do anything else. Happy? Then take you gravel or
substrate and wash it well with clean water, making sure that there is
no dirt left in it before putting it in the tank.

If you are using an undergavel filter place this in the tank first then
put the gravel on top of it, making sure all the uplift holes are not
covered with gravel.Then place all the electrical equipment in to the
tank,ie. heaters & filters. Next put in the decoration you have
chosen, plants, rocks or bogwoods etc. Put in a dechrorinator,
then place a dish or plate in the bottom of the tank. This is so that
when you are filling the tank with water from a hose or bucket nothing
gets moved by the flow of water. Aim the hose into the dish and
everything will remain in place. When the tank is full make sure all
the plugs are dry before plugging them into the electricity supply.
When this is all done switch on the electricity and check that all is
running corectly. If this is a tropical tank leave it to heat up and
check the temperature the next day.

PLEASE DO NOT RUSH TO PUT ANY FISH IN YET!

Leave the tank with every thing running for at least a week
putting a very small amount of food in the water every day.This is to
start a natural proces of maturation. First you need to create ammonia
in the tank then this is comsumed by natural bacteria and nitrates are
produced, this is what your plants feed off. When the ammonia is first
produced the water looks like a little milk has been added to it
making it very cloudy but not dirty. This will gradually dissapear and
the tank will become gin clear.Then find a frendly aquatics shop that
will do basic tests on your water for you, many like us will not charge
for this service. First test is the ph or acidity level, this
should be as near to 7 or neutral as possible for fresh water community
fish or gold fish. The second test is for ammonia, this need to be as
near to zero as possible. The third test is for nitrate, again this
needs to be as near to zero as possible. If you water passes all these
tests then you will be able to take a few fish home with you. Don't
rush to stock your tank to capacity a too many fish at the start will
over load the nitrifying bacteria with too much ammonia and you will
loose all your fish. Wait and see how these first few do for a week or
two before adding a few more. Allways ask advice on what sort of fish
are compatable or which fish need to be kept with only one specimen ie
fighters. The same process can be applied to any size of aquarium and
maintenance is usually the same. I recommend cleaning the glass weekly.
the filters fotnightly and a 25% water change monthly. This is for an
average tank with low stocking levels, if your stocking levels are
higher then this will have to be done more frequently. Feeding should
be with small amounts once a day in the morning so that the fish have
all day to comsume it and it is not left in the tank to cause problems.
Over feeding is a common problem and will lead to high ammonia and
nitrates which are deadly to all fish.

Answer 2

Tim,
If you've got the patience and want to do this correctly here are the steps. First clean and rinse everything and let it dry overnight. Fill you tank with water and use water conditioner for the clorine. Start you filter and heater and let things just run and cycle. It takes up to a month for new water to mature but this can be speeded up to 10 days if you use a biological additive such as Cycle. You can add your gravel right away too. Add a couple of plants after 3-4 days and you can use some plant food too if you like. This is a good time to set up your lighting, on a timer is best, 12 on 12 off is good for the plants and most fish. If you've used a biological additive in about a week you'll safely be able to add some fish at day 10. The water is still stabilizing so don't add too many fish 3-4 at most. If your water goes cloudy don't worry, this is called New Tank Syndrome and will go away when the biological activity in the tank catches up. Extra doses of Cycle will speed this up to a few days. Now the fish and plants are in place and you tank's biological activity is on it's way you only need to do weekly water changes, 10-20% and vacumn once or twice a month. A big mistake first timers make is to rush things and put too many fish in, follow these guidelines and you'll have a beautiful tank in 6 weeks, good luck, Peter

Answer 3

rinse the tank after washing it with vinegar... and let air dry. the vinegar will be gone. no worries.

i'm not a big fan of the gold fish cycling thing people always do... what happens to the gold fish when everything is done?

just buy 1 or 2 or 3 fish you would want to keep.. and use them to cycle the tank. you can add plants in right away... plant carry good bacterias in their leave and roots... so, plants can take the place of the fish in the cycling process. you can add aquarium plant fertilizer in the water to get the plants going. give it plenty of light.

Answer 4

A planted tank takes a bit more work than a tank with artifical plants and fish. If you don't get things like the water chemistry and lighting right you'll end up with huge problems. There's a couple of good sites below that explain the process of cycling and setting up.

http://www.fishprofiles.net/faq/begin.asp

http://freshaquarium.about.com/od/aquariumstartup/Aquarium_Startup.htm

and this one has lots of information on plants.

http://freshaquarium.about.com/od/aquariumstartup/Aquarium_Startup.htm

and a good one on setting up a new tank with plants

http://www.csd.net/~cgadd/aqua/art_plant_newtank.htm

Answer 5

What i do is get some feeder fish (gold fish, comets) and let them establish the bacterial colony and let them be the "canary" of the tank. But be wary if you are using it for other specices as they can transfer disnease. If you aren't sure, just buy some cheap fish that closely resembles the type of fish you are getting. No sense wasting alot of money on fish to have them die in couple weeks

Answer 6

I JUST DONT THINK YOU SHOULD GET THE PLANTS UNTIL THE VINAGER HAS RUN THRU THE TANK FOR A FEW DAYS MAYBE A WEEK BUT I WOULD GET THEM IN THE TANK LIKE ABOUT A WEEK BEFORE YOU GET YOUR FISH JUST IN CASE THERE IS ANYTHING THAT WOULD BOTHER YOUR FISH