New to tank cycling - what should I expect?

Question

I'm cycling a five gallon tank without fish. I know it isn't the best way, but I am using a bacteria supplement instead of fish, and since I do not have access to an established tank. I bought a testing kit, and I am wondering what I should be looking for with read outs as far as nitrate, nitrite, ammonia and Ph levels go. I've heard they are are supposed to rise and then zero out? Is this correct?

I'm only planning on having a couple of small fish (maybe a couple danios or cherry barbs, and a cory cat). Can anyone give me some good information or sources on the numbers I need? Thanks!

FYI - its a freshwater tank

How often, and when, should I be doing water changes (if at all) during the cycling??

Answer 1

Actually, fishless cycling is the way to go - you don't permanently damage your fish that way.

Honestly, most bacterial supplements are nothing but a waste of money. More often than not, most of the bacteria is dead before it even hits the shelves. In fact, the only live-culture supplement available is BioSpira - and it really is kinda difficult to find, as it must be kept refrigerated at all times.

You need something to provide an ammonia source for your tank. You can drop some fish food in a couple of times a day, or simply use pure ammonia. Read more here on fishless cycling: http://www.flippersandfins.net/CyclingFishless.htm

Within your first week, you should start to see your ammonia levels rise (make sure they get no higher than 8ppm - any higher, and you risk pH crashes). By the end of the second week, your ammonia levels should start to die off and nitrites should start to rise. In about a week/week and a half, nitrites should start to drop off and nitrates should start to rise. Your cycle is complete when ammonia and nitrite are both at 0ppm, and when you start to see nitrates go up. The only way to remove nitrates is through water changes - you never want them to get any higher than 40ppm when you have fish in the tank, but really, you want them as low as you can go. Keep an eye on your pH throughout the whole cycle just to make sure it's stable - if you start to see swings, wait it out about a week to see if it stabilizes. In the end, your pH should be around neutral (7.0), however, it's more important to your fish that it remains steady rather than at a perfect 7.0.

EDIT: As long as you don't have any fish in there, you really shouldn't have to do regular water changes. After your ammonia and nitrites hit zero, and your nitrates start to rise, you can safely do a 90% water change and add your fish. After that, you should continue to do 20-40% changes every week to keep nitrates in check.

If you ammonia hits over 8ppm at any point, you'll have to do daily 10% water changes until it starts to lower. Extremely high ammonia levels like this can actually cause bacteria to die off - so, essentially, you'll end up waiting twice as long for your cycle to complete.

Answer 2

Cycling with or without fish is the same in theroy. The advantage of fishless cycling is you don't risk killing your fish. In practice cycling with fish takes longer as you have to replace water to remove ammonia and nitrites. (Thus the bacteria have less food, and the population growth slows.) Plus you can throw in more food and not worry about over feeding your fish.

Remember food = ammonia. It doesn't matter how many fish you have. Ammonia/nitrite/nitrate comes from the food. The only thing the fish do is break the food up faster.

Personally with fishless cycling I'd feed the tank as it there were fish there for a week. Then test for ammonia, nitrates, and nitrates. When you've cycled the tank you'll have no ammonia, no nitrites, and lots of nitrates. Change out water until you have 5-10 ppm or less of nitrates. From this point I'd monitor ammonia and nitrates when I was adding fish. Ammonia should be less than 1 ppm, and nitrates under 10-30 ppm. For nitrates 30+ is bad, 10+ is not good, but it's going to depend on the type of fish.

Answer 3

Fresh water or Salt water?

With fresh water, its common for the levels to rise then, zero out, I wouldn't put to many fish together. The amount of fish you should have in a 5 gallon tank is 2-3 depending on fish size and difficulty to keep.

With salt water, man you have a ways to go. With salt water tanks, your fish will be ALOT more delicate than on a fresh water tank.You would need live rock, some snails, bacteria filled sand, and a couple of marine plants( you don't HAVE to have a marine plant, but it helps oxidize the water) Make sure you only add distilled water, because adding salt to the tank will fudge it up, and extend your cycling time. When it does go to about the middle,( PH and sulfur usually read yellow) then its about time for you to add fish. When you go to add marine fish, you will need to let them sit in the water in the bag for about 35 minutes so that they are used to the water.

Good luck.

Answer 4

Freshwater is a good one for this tank!. get rocks, places to hid, and other decor. Don't put them in right away. put the bag on top of the water for about 15 min. then take them out, this gets them used to the water temp. Make sure the fish like each other, if not they will kill each other. get more females then males. if they are community fish then you need 3 or more. go to a pet shop they know more then anyone ( it is there job)