Gravel / Test kit

[mobilecow]

Sorry for a rather silly question - it's acutally a couple of questions regarding gravel (or lack thereoff)

1) Is it better to have a bare bottom or have some kind of gravel? (assuming the discus is 2 to 3 inches)

2) Why keep the bottom bare?

I went to the LFS today and was chewed out by one of the guys for not having gravel because (in his opinion) gravel provides some kind of habitat for bacteria and he recomended putting in an UGF.

_________>>>>><<<<<__________


Apart from water changes, how do you suggest keeping ammonia down?

I bought a test kit and am either in the 2 to 3 or 3 to 4 range (which is bad either way).

Thanks in advance

Shawn

[Graham]

he recomended putting in an UGF.

Time to find a new store, this guy is living in the dark ages...UG's are ancient history. The idea is to remove all organics from the system,,,,any kind of a system...not store them in gravel to screw up water quality.

A bare bottom tank makes it very easy to siphon out the organics/crap and are mainly used with fry and breeding. BUT lots of people have gravel in their tanks and just use a siphon vacuum and clean up the gravel once a week or so.

Yes, gravel provided additional surface area for nitrifying bacteria to grow om but it's not really needed. A good filter will have sufficient bio-media with in it to be able to handle all NH3 produced. That filter will also have decent mechanical media that can be removed easily and cleaned.

Form that reading...it sounds like you've got a ''cycle '' going on ...how long has this tank been up and running with fish in it? did you clean everything in the filter? for the moment do a 50% water change and cut right back on the amount of food fed they won't starve.

Can you check the nitrites?

Edit add back the bio-wheel

[mobilecow]

Hi Graham

Thanks for the insight on filters - I stuck the biowheel back on the tank along with a spare Eheim Liberty I lifted off my bro's tank. I've changed about a third of the water but didn't have any more aged water.

The Nitrite level shows between 0.25 and 0.5 (first time doing this test - so I can't tell yet).

The tank has been running roughly 8 weeks.

[Graham]

No Question that you're going thru a Nitrogen Cycle, but things are starting to kick in that why the N02 reading.......just keep the food way down, and change as much water as possible.

G

[Alight]

Do what Graham says, and also add some Prime to the water if your pH isn't below about 6.7 or so (this will lock up the the ammonia as ammonium). Also add some salt to the water, can't remember how much--maybe Graham will chime in with the amount.

BTW, I agree with Graham that it is almost never necessary to add salt to the water of freshwater fish. The only time I recommend it is if you have nitrites in the water. In this case, the salt helps to prevent the damage that nitrites will cause to your fish.

Also, I really recommend a bare bottom tank for growing out Discus. While it can be done with gravel, it really isn't worth the trouble, and you can prevent 99% of the problems with Discus and avoid having to post in the Disease section of this forum if you don't put gravel in your tank.

Your LFS is not unusual which is part of the reason that it is very, very hard to find any Discus, yet alone nice Discus at LFS' in North America.

[mobilecow]

How long will it take to get the ammonia / nitrite levels back to acceptable levels? I am prepping some water right now and will do smaller water changes (10 to 15%) tonight and then a larger one tomorrow. Thanks

[White Worm]

http://forum.simplydiscus.com/showthread.php?t=55673
Just for future reference. Check the graph for the nitrification process.

[Graham]

1 teaspoon per gallon of any kind of salt...should be lots on Toronto after yesterday.......... will be more than enough to protect the fish from the nitrites that are going to increase.

As to the lenght of time for the tank to complete the cycle...every tank is different...lower temps, KH and pH extend the time frame.........what you'll see is NH3 level drop to 0.0ppm almost over night while the N02 levels is increasing and after several days it'll drop to 0.0ppm almost over night. All the time the NO3 level will be increasing and this is where water chnages come in. Read this

http://koishack.com/wiki/index.php?title=Nitrogen_Cycle

[Alight]

How long the cycle will last is unknown. If you have another tank that has been set up for several months, or a friend that has a well setup tank that you know has no disease in it, you can speed up the cycling time by putting some of the filter media from these tanks in the filter of your tank, or by putting some gravel from one of these already setup tanks in a small porous bag (one of those nylon bags they sell) in your filter. This will help "seed" your filter.

Or you can buy some Biospira and cycle your tank in a few days by adding it as directed. DO NOT-DO NOT-DO NOT think that any of the other products that are supposed to cycle your tank will work instead. They will not. I am not a Biospira sales person, and have nothing whatsoever to do with this company, but I am a Biologist, and know what I am talking about.

In fact, I suggest you use the "seeding" method instead of the Biospira. It will cost you less, and will be just as effective if you change your water often enough to keep the ammonia and nitrite levels below toxic levels.

[mobilecow]

Thanks for all the advice :)

Is it ok to hit the tank with like 40 spoons of salt? You mean aquarium salt or just plain salt?


Alight >> I swipped the (backup) filter from another tank that's been running well and shows 0 on the ammonia and nitrite tests - would that be ok, or should i go pull some gravel too?

The tank is now running with 3 hang-on filters and 1 bio-sponge. Should I put in an air stone?

Thanks for all the advice - as you can guess I am still very knew and quite clueless at this.

[Graham]

You can use any salt that you want or have on hand. If it's a 40 gallon tank then add 40 teaspoons over the next 24 hours. This will give you roughly a 0.1% salinity,

If you have a lot of rocks or a heavy gravel layer then cut back a bit to make up for the displaced water.

When you do water changes then compensate for the changed out water.

================================================== ====

Al

''........DO NOT-DO NOT-DO NOT think that any of the other products that are supposed to cycle your tank will work instead..''

Aaah you mean that there's no live aerobic nitrifying bacteria in those bottles:rolleyes: that sit of a shelf for months or years :D :D LMAO

[mobilecow]

Gonna go track down some aquarium salt later tonight and stick it in :)

How do I prevent this from happening? or is this something that just happens...?

[Graham]

The Nitrogen Cycle is what makes our aquariums work...you don't need aquarium salt............. any salt will work

[Alight]

Yep, what Graham said.

You did the right thing by swapping in a cycled filter. Depending on the bioload in the other tank, this may take care of your ammonia and nitrite problem very quickly. (The more fish in the tank you took the filter from, the quicker it will work). However, your new filter will still take quite a bit of time to be cycled (at least 3 weeks). So don't take out the swapped in filter for at least that long. You can partially speed this up by swapping some of the filter media from the old filter into the new filters on your new tank.

You can prevent the cycling problem by using the swapped in filter from a cycled tank from the beginning, and beefing it up using fishless cycling.

Do a search on fishless cycling here if you want the details on that. You should know about this technique for future tanks, as well as for potentially beefing up filters when you plan to add a large increase in bioload to an existing tank.

You do not need to add an airstone. Oxygen is not a problem.

[mobilecow]

Hi Sorry for a couple more questions -

1) Is it a good idea to put that ammonia remover / diamond blend stones in my filter? (I have one of those filter bags that I can shove in the back of the filter)

2) Is cooking salt ok to go in the water?

I am about to do a 15% water change and the feedings have stopped. Is it too impatient to see a drop in ammonia by tomorrow afternoon?

Thanks a million to everyone guiding me along on this - I've gotten rather attached to my Discus and would like to see him / her make it through.

[Graham]

Quick answers...

The zeolite will bind up the ammonium so as long as the pH is low they work just fine


Any kind of salt is fine as long as it doesn't have YPS anticaking agents in it and most don't

[Alight]

Yep.


I'd up the water changes if at all possible, but not if it means using unaged, unheated water.

[mobilecow]

Hi everyone
Just came back to say thanks for all the advice. I checked ammonia and nitrites this morning and both are registering in the lowest colour (ammonia shows virutally clear and nitrites are light blue). Thanks once again.
Shawn