Maturing fish tanks. Which is the best?

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redsockfluff - 01 Dec 2007 11:57 GMT

Hello everybody! I am a BSc student in the UK and for my dissertation
I am comparing 4 different methods of maturing fish tanks and
comparing the amount of bacteria grown on the filter sponges. Tank 1
is a fishless cycle with nothing added. Distilled water (control tank)
Tank 2 is a fishless cycle with 0.30g of food intended to rot and kick
of the nitrogen cycles. Distilled water
Tank 3 is a fishless cycle with Nutrafin Biological Suplement "Cycle".
Distilled water
Tank 4 is a fshless cycle with Bactinettes. Distilled water.

As the water I am using is distilled (due to the terrible limescale in
the tap water here and the fact that the microscope slides I put in
the filter got covered in limescale so I couldnt see the bacteria!) I
am not entirely sure my experiments will work because I am not adding
ammonia to any of the tanks

When using bactinettes and cycle do you have to add ammonia? Because
it doesn't say to on the instructions. Does the fact that i am not
adding ammonia make a difference? If i am just adding cycle and
bactinettes, the bacteria, do I need ammonia in there to sustain their
growth? And if I water test everyday; nitrates, nitrites, pH and
ammonia in every tank each day... will i see any change?

If anyone can make any suggestions or give me their opinion on any of
these points i would love to hear from them and would appreciate it
greatly!

Please excuse spelling and grammar etc, i'm dyslexic!
many thanks,

red

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Tynk - 01 Dec 2007 14:57 GMT

> Hello everybody! I am a BSc student in the UK and for my dissertation
> I am comparing 4 different methods of maturing fish tanks and
[quoted text clipped - 27 lines]
>
> red

Hi Red.

The fact that you are using Distilled water only concerns me.
It's too clean.
If your water is liquid rock (I know your pain), you can cut it with
either distilled or RO water.

This statement has me confused....Tank 1

> is a fishless cycle with nothing added. Distilled water (control tank)

It won't cycle just sitting there. It needs a source of ammonia, be it
from a fish, a rotting piece of shrimp / food, pure ammonia (no
perfumes or additives), or bacteria starters with the right type of
bacteria in them.
So Tank 1 is a dud as is. There is no "fishless cycling" going to
happen.

Tank 2 is a fishless cycle with 0.30g of food intended to rot and kick

> of the nitrogen cycles. Distilled water

I've never cycled this way, but know you can. I believe it's pretty
slow going though.

> Tank 3 is a fishless cycle with Nutrafin Biological Suplement "Cycle".
> Distilled water

The product Cycle has the wrong bacteria in it.
It has a later stage bacteria (I think this product uses nitrobactor
or the other) and not the first ...start up bacteria (nitrospira).
There are more than one bacteria type that create the "cycle". Each
one has it's place.
Cycle won't help with first stage cycling, so without a source of
ammonia to start it, I don't know what will happen with this stuff.
When using it to jump start the process with fish, it doesn't help at
all.
BioZyme and Stress Zyme are the same. They too have the later stage
bacterias.
BioSpira and from what I hear, the bactinettes do.
Biospira works, and some folks on The Freshwater Aquarium group have
used the bactinettes with sucess.
That group can help you a lot. There are many highly knowledgeable
aquarists over there and many like me....just a long time hobbyist.
http://groups.google.com/group/The-Freshwater-Aquarium?lnk=li&hl=en
As for needing to add ammonia with the Bactinettes, you need at this
point to feed the live bacteria, otherwise they will die.
The method of doing so up to you. How long they survive without any
source of food....I do not know and is a good question.
But do check out the Freshwater Aquarium group. You'll have to sign
up, as it's moderated to keep the crazies and spammers out.

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Bill Stock - 01 Dec 2007 16:48 GMT

> Hello everybody! I am a BSc student in the UK and for my dissertation
> I am comparing 4 different methods of maturing fish tanks and
[quoted text clipped - 12 lines]
> growth? And if I water test everyday; nitrates, nitrites, pH and
> ammonia in every tank each day... will i see any change?

As Tynk said tank 1 will be a dud.

How about one tank with fish? I gather you're trying to avoid having any
pets after the experiment?

I've read that only the refrigerated bacteria products are of much value,
but I have no idea if they're available in the UK. Bactinettes sound very
good, but I've never seen them here.

You might also try a tank with Amquel+ or Prime, which won't speed up your
cycle but will give your 'fish' a better quality of life during the cycle.
It would be interesting to see cycle time vs. water quality (fish health).
In other words, you don't care too much if one method takes a week longer to
cycle provided your fish are not harmed. I would expect to see this with the
Amquel+, Prime products.

You'll need to feed your bacteria regardless of the route you go.

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Reel McKoi - 04 Dec 2007 20:29 GMT

> How about one tank with fish? I gather you're trying to avoid having any
> pets after the experiment?

============
I hope he doesn't put any fish in distilled water. =:-O

Signature

RM....
Zone 6. Middle TN USA
~~~~ }<((((*> ~~~ }<{{{{(ö>

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dr-solo@wi.rr.com - 01 Dec 2007 16:58 GMT

I am a scientist, so here goes...

the question is.. how are you going to test for "mature" fish tank? the number of
bacteria is not a test because you dont know what these bacteria do. you need a
functional test. I would suggest a concentration of ammonia and you need to pretest
for this.

1. control
2. food (Hikari Gold fish food) or any food that releases ammonia within 15 minutes
when put into water.
3. ammonia in same concentration as released by the ammonia above
4. cycle with ammonia same as released above, or, with food
5. different bacteria with ammonia or food as above. my preference would be for the
food. weigh it to get it exactly right. and dont overload the tank.

OTOH, you might drop in a small GF and find out how much ammonia that GF puts out per
weight of food per day.

you need to be sure to keep the temperature the same and you CANNOT just use
distilled water. you must add some RO right or other "salts" or the bacteria will
fail. the pH will swing wildly. BTW, DO TEST THE PH every day too.

Ingrid

>Hello everybody! I am a BSc student in the UK and for my dissertation
>I am comparing 4 different methods of maturing fish tanks and
[quoted text clipped - 27 lines]
>
>red

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redsockfluff - 02 Dec 2007 15:49 GMT

Thanks for the responses! Much appreciated

All the tanks are the same size and have a Fluval 1 filter in.
The distilled water was concerning me too. Do you think it's a good
idea to just use tap water and treat it with a water hardness
adjuster? Can't get RO water here... well not with any ease anyway!

Tank 1 - is my control tank
Tank 2 - I'm not worried about as the food is there to breakdown and
produce the ammonia.
Tank 3 - I've read on these threads that in a lot of peoples pinions
that due to the lack of nitrospira that Cycle won't work at this stage
of tank cycling which, if it fails as a maturation method doesn't
concern me because then it just shows that it doesn't work. But it
won't work either way if there is no ammonia present or this is what I
gather from what you're saying... so I think I will use the fish food
like in tank 2, same amount.
Tank 4 - Again from your response I gather I need a source of ammonia
so I think I'll go for the food option... again same amount.

Have never seen BioSpira, Amquel or Prime over here so I don't know if
it's available. I worked in a big fish shop last year selling fish and
aquaria products and I never came across those. I do have a limited
knowledge of fish keeping but before I started work I had no knowledge
at all so I am still learning. As for trying a tank with fish - I
doubt my college would allow it to be honest! I want to do 7 max, 5
min repetitions of the experiments. The final dissertation is due in
May 5th and due to things like inspections (Ofsted etc), Christmas
holidays and half terms the amount of time I have to do it I is
getting shorter and shorter. Feeling a little out of my depth and I'm
extremely gratefully for you guys helping me!

I am cycling 7 days (I know its 7 to 10 but because of the time
constraints I am only doing 7 days). I am water testing daily for
ammonia, nitrates, nitrites and pH except for weekends when I don't
have access to the labs.

To the scientist - Ingrid.
My methods of counting the bacteria probably a bit rubbish!
- I have put 2 slides in each filter and at the end of cycling for 7
days I take them out and gram stain them and counting the amount of
bacteria through random fields of vision.
- At the end of the 7 day cycle sponges are removed, put into a jar of
distilled water and put in a shaker for x amount of time. The water is
then sampled and bacteria cells then counted using a haemocytometer.

The lab technician and I have been looking at ways to culture the
bacteria from the sponges but keep hitting a brick wall. We know it's
possible to culture but we can't find out exactly what the media is or
what exactly it's made up of.

Please excuse my ignorance but what do you mean by a small GF. Did you
mean goldfish?

Thanks again for all your help everyone.

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Reel McKoi - 04 Dec 2007 20:32 GMT

> Thanks for the responses! Much appreciated
>
> All the tanks are the same size and have a Fluval 1 filter in.
> The distilled water was concerning me too. Do you think it's a good
> idea to just use tap water and treat it with a water hardness
> adjuster? Can't get RO water here... well not with any ease anyway!

=====================
My water is so alkaline and hard due to our serious drought this past summer
I've started to collect rain water to mix with tap water. Rain water is
free. My fish have really picked up.

Signature

RM....
Zone 6. Middle TN USA
~~~~ }<((((*> ~~~ }<{{{{(ö>

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redsockfluff - 06 Dec 2007 23:05 GMT

don't worry i am not stupid enough to put fish in distilled water.

i really want to avoid a fish cycle. want to concentrate on fishless
cycling

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Pet Forum / Aquaria / Goldfish / December 2007

Maturing fish tanks. Which is the best?