Lisa
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- Oct 12, 2007
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- Location
- Perth, Australia
- Country
- Australia
Hello all. Well I finally acquired my four foot tank about three weeks ago and after a day of frantically staining the stand we also bought and sorting out the second hand canister filter whose components were all mixed up, got it started. My axie was still in his little tank for a few days, then my mum up and bought me a golden albino she found in her local pet shop, so the new tank has ended up being cycled with my original axie in it. Obviously not ideal, but as he's healthy, parasite free and in good condition and it's a big tank I justified it. The new one (nameless as yet) has now been in the small tank on his own for 2.5 weeks and will go in with Fred in another two weeks all being well.
The new one is slightly larger than Fred, has a couple of chunks out of his (I think) tail, and is eating well, gills look good, no sign of fungus etc.
I have an eheim external canister filter and a light I'm using only for about 5-6 hours a day, never at night and actually Fred has never seemed to mind the light. I like live plants so I'm trying it, and if proves a problem, I'll have to resign myself to plastic ones.
My tank seems to have cycled very quickly. I expected it to take much longer, but after an ammonia rise, within a week I had a very small amt of nitrite and no ammonia, and for about four days now, no ammonia or nitrite. I don't have a kit to measure nitrate unfortunately, but I'm assuming there must be some now. So it seems to be cycled after about two and a half weeks. Would this be because there's only one axie in it? And temperature is 19-20 degrees. Temperature is much more stable in this tank than the small one, as expected.
I figured I'd continue to test water parameters twice a week for a few weeks, and change 20% weekly, but then when the new axie goes in, there'll be a mini-cycle right? I'll attach some photos when I work out how.
The new one is slightly larger than Fred, has a couple of chunks out of his (I think) tail, and is eating well, gills look good, no sign of fungus etc.
I have an eheim external canister filter and a light I'm using only for about 5-6 hours a day, never at night and actually Fred has never seemed to mind the light. I like live plants so I'm trying it, and if proves a problem, I'll have to resign myself to plastic ones.
My tank seems to have cycled very quickly. I expected it to take much longer, but after an ammonia rise, within a week I had a very small amt of nitrite and no ammonia, and for about four days now, no ammonia or nitrite. I don't have a kit to measure nitrate unfortunately, but I'm assuming there must be some now. So it seems to be cycled after about two and a half weeks. Would this be because there's only one axie in it? And temperature is 19-20 degrees. Temperature is much more stable in this tank than the small one, as expected.
I figured I'd continue to test water parameters twice a week for a few weeks, and change 20% weekly, but then when the new axie goes in, there'll be a mini-cycle right? I'll attach some photos when I work out how.
