New Fish tank' Cloudy water

[paul26982]

Bought the little one a fish tank' its been filtering the water for 3 days it says needs to for 4 before we can add fish. came in from work today and the water has went a bit cloudy. Top and bottom of it' i think its because the gravel hasnt been rinsed. do you think this will clear itself up within a day or two or is it a matter of starting again.

[Uncle John]

Did you use Tap safe with the original water?

Is the tank by the window? Maybe algae.

Is the filter working properly?

If all of the above ok then the water should clear.

Might be worth doing a 50% water change though.

[paul26982]

FullSizeRender by Paul Stephenson, on Flickr

[paul26982]

filter is working.

added tap safe to the water as stated.

not in front of the wind. its sort of to the side half way across the room.

[Uncle John]

Think all is fine, try a 50% water change.

[paul26982]

Many thanks, if I do a 50 water change will it have to filter another 4 days' start over again before adding fish

[Uncle John]

I'd give it a couple of days and as long as it's clear should be fine.

[paul26982]

Many thanks especially for the swift reply

[Jasandjules]

Before adding fish please check the water to ensure there is no ammonia and minimal nitrates

[GT03ROB]

Seriously read up about maintaining fish tanks. 4 days is not enough to have the tank set correctly to handle the ammonia from the poo the fish produce. If you try to introduce fish you will need to be doing 50% water changes every couple of days. Get a test kit. Get some ammonia. Seed the tank with ammonia, do the tests. Give the bacteria time to develop.

The last tank I set up (smallish at 165l) took about 6 weeks to get right before safe to put the fish in.

[extraT]

Bacterial bloom. That's good you need that, leave it and it will disappear.

[KamSandhu44]

Its a bacterial bloom.

No way is it safe to put fish in after 4 days.

It will need to cycle for at least a month.

Get yourself some ammonia, nitrite and nitrate test kit.

You will need to feed the bacteria ammonia to help them colonise.

Google 'fishless cycle' and read.

Please, please, please do not go adding fish, you will stress them and maybe kill them.

[paul26982]

Thanks everyone' I'm just learning, so the common sense thing to do is to leave it and wait until the water goes crystal clear then test the water to see if it is ok .

Rather do this the proper way and make sure everything is ok as we got this little tank to keep and not mess on with, just said in the booklet 4 days and pets at home said 4 days

[GT03ROB]

paul26982 said:

Thanks everyone' I'm just learning, so the common sense thing to do is to leave it and wait until the water goes crystal clear then test the water to see if it is ok .

Rather do this the proper way and make sure everything is ok as we got this little tank to keep and not mess on with, just said in the booklet 4 days and pets at home said 4 days

No not really. Read up on fishless cycling. Basically you need to establish a biological cycle that has bacteria breaking ammonia into nitrites then breaking the nitrites in to nitrates. You establish a colony of bacteria in the filters that do this. Ammonia (poo) will kill the fish.

To do this you put ammonia in the tank, bacteria establish to feed on it & break it down. Initally the colony is too small to support much, so you feed it some more ammonia & it grows. You can do this with fish in or fishless. With fish in the ammonia is produced from their poo & you have to dilute the ammonia manually by very regular water changes, which can be time consuing, disruptive & stressfull to the fish. It is far better to establish the colony of bacteria then introduce the fish. To do this you manually seed the tank with ammonia on a regular basis. It's less risky, but more time before the fish are introduced.

PS: PAH are not a good place to give advice on fish. Go to a specialised aquatics place, they will recommend fishless.

[KamSandhu44]

Pets At Home say that because they just want your money.

You will need to feed your bacteria ammonia, otherwise the cannot grow and colonise. They will just die off.

Get some household ammonia, I think Homebase sell it.

Then you will need to work out the correct dosage for your tank, Google can help their.

Its quite easy to do, just takes time and a lot of testing.

forum.practicalfishkeeping.co.uk << good source of information.

[Dr Mike Oxgreen]

You don't need to buy ammonia for fishless cycling. Everyone produces a natural source of ammonium salts, in a convenient aqueous solution - and it's free! And don't worry greatly about dosage - just a teaspoonful each day in a small tank, or a thimbleful in a larger tank is all you need. I've done it this way several times in the past with good success.

[Timmy40]

Dr Mike Oxgreen said:

You don't need to buy ammonia for fishless cycling. Everyone produces a natural source of ammonium salts, in a convenient aqueous solution - and it's free! And don't worry greatly about dosage - just a teaspoonful each day in a small tank, or a thimbleful in a larger tank is all you need. I've done it this way several times in the past with good success.

Are you telling him to p*ss in the fish tank?

[GT03ROB]

Timmy40 said:

Dr Mike Oxgreen said:

You don't need to buy ammonia for fishless cycling. Everyone produces a natural source of ammonium salts, in a convenient aqueous solution - and it's free! And don't worry greatly about dosage - just a teaspoonful each day in a small tank, or a thimbleful in a larger tank is all you need. I've done it this way several times in the past with good success.

Are you telling him to p*ss in the fish tank?

.... in a teaspoon actually looking at the size of tank...

[otolith]

If using human urine to seed the nitrogen cycle, do be aware that humans do not excrete nitrogen as ammonia, we produce urea. That's not a problem, it will still push through the cycle, but you may not see representative results on an ammonia test kit.

[750turbo]

Timmy40 said:

Dr Mike Oxgreen said:

You don't need to buy ammonia for fishless cycling. Everyone produces a natural source of ammonium salts, in a convenient aqueous solution - and it's free! And don't worry greatly about dosage - just a teaspoonful each day in a small tank, or a thimbleful in a larger tank is all you need. I've done it this way several times in the past with good success.

Are you telling him to p*ss in the fish tank?

Well, at least it is not the kettle...