Newbie (as in, really!!)

Hi all,

So here goes. New to the hobby and love it. Will give a bit of background as to how I've started and what my experience has been.

My in-laws retired in early July this year and went on a 4-month caravaning trip. In prep for this, my "skoonma" gifted me her 60L tank with some basics.

The kit consisted of the following:
- 60 L tank with lid and basic fluorescent light.
- internal 2 stage filter. Basic sponge only.
- Air pump (broken diaphragm) - more on this later
- Air plate
- Fish net
- Water syphon
- Heater
- 3 pieces of decor:
-- 2 plastic plants
-- set of fake barrels (the pirate look I assume)

In early August, I decided it's time I set up this thing. Me and my kid head over to Petworld XXL (Cape Gate, Brackenfell) and bought:
- 11 Molly fish (buy 10, get 1 free) - R300 in total.
- fish food - R60 odd rand
- Thermometer - R30 I think
- Gravel - the dark type - I like that look

I set up the tank and added the water conditioner as per the instructions on the bottle. I ensured the water was about 25.5 and set the bag with my prized little mollies drift on top for acclimatization.
I then let the little guys free and everything went VERY well for the first while. The milkiness cleared up in the tank in about 1 day and the mollies seemed happy. I fed them a pinch twice a day and did a 10-20% water change once a week...ensuring I s

Something I should mention here - the air pump wasn't producing enough air at this point. I didn't understand the reason for the air pump and thought it was really just a "feature" as opposed to a necessity. The filter pipe was on the surface of the water though so there was at least "some" oxygination taking place - but not enough....

So after about 15-20 days... I had my first "molly babies". False sense of security set in and I was like "I got this...it's easy". And soon thereafter they just started dying... one, then another, then another... until I had only 3 of my prized 11 mollies left.

Some digging and reading pointed out to me at this was obviously the cause of the fish not getting enough oxygen. Damn...first rookie error.

So I cleaned the tank good and proper. Put the fish in a temporary container and literally "reset" the tank. Bought 3 more mollies to ensure I have a good spread of male/female. Also got a bristlnose pleco + 3 neon tetras and my first live plant. And, obviously, a new working air pump. This was around middle September'ish.

Start of October I also added two snails.

Everything seemed to be going very well since then and I've managed to keep 1 baby alive (seems like he'll make it) but I lost 2 more mollies last week. Both snails also died. I now have 3 in total, of which one is about a month old and the other two are adults (one has a popped eye). The tetras and the pleco seem fine.

I, again, cleaned out the ENTIRE tank. Reset to scratch.

So apart from regular cleaning and water changes, I seem to be doing something very basic wrong.

Hoping you guys could provide some sound advice.

Things I "think" I should do:
- Get a test kit and keep an eye on water parameters
- Invest in a better filter or filter media
- I need a more effective way of getting rid of the "poop".
Obviously, I'm budget sensitive.

I've added some photos of my setup.

Any comments (good or bad) are more than welcome. It's the only way I'll learn.

 

As @Reedfish and @A new day have pointed out, the Nitrogen Cycle is extremely important. As far as I can tell, you put fish into a brand new, uncycled tank and it's the resulting ammonia spike that killed them off. Another complication is that, after each loss, you broke down the tank and started over, essentially stopping the cycle and wiping out any nitrifying bacteria that may have begun to take up residence in the tank.

As @A new day said, this is a indeed a rookie mistake and I hope that it doesn't stop you from trying again. My main suggestion is that you let the tank cycle properly for around 14 days with your filter running before adding any fish. You could even kickstart the cycle with some Tetra SafeStart just to be safe (hence the name). Live plants also really help to get the cycle going and to break down nitrates in the water so you could also stock up on a few plants. Plants are my best best aquatic friends!

Keep us posted on the journey.

 

Thanks, everyone! So I just watched the video. The worst part is, I've seen it (or something similar) a million times and I cannot believe I didn't think of this when completely resetting the tank. Practise makes perfect I suppose.

Anyways. The current status is now as follows:
- 3 tetras
- 2 adult and 1 baby molly
- 1 bristlenose pleco.
Some live plants which should hopefully help with the nitrates.
I can't really cycle the tank without them now, as I have nowhere to go with them, so I hope I can do it without losing any more along the way.

@a-new-day
50% daily water change seems like a lot - I just want to make sure I read that right?

Thanks so far guys. Looking forward to the journey. I KNOW I'll get it right at some point...

 

I think that @A new day's advice of 50% water changes is sound. You currently don't have a colony of bacteria to break down the ammonia so you need to reduce it manually. The 50% change will reduce the ammonia without wiping out the nitrifying bacteria as they begin to set up shop in the gravel and in your sponge filter.

 

Morning all,

So I've been doing this (Water changes and Seachem stabilizer) religiously over the past week or so up to 3 days ago

I bought the Seachem Stabilizer and a 'Sera Quick Test Kit' (strips) at Brackenfell Pets as well. They had no ammonia test kits so I bought one of the Seachem Ammonia Alert things you stick to the side of the tank.
Not a big fan of the strips, and will invest in an API Master Test kit at some point, but for now these will have to do.

The ammonia is measured from 1 to 4 using the early warning thingy.
1 - safe zone (< 0.02ppm)
2 - Alert (0.05ppm)
3 - Alarm (0.2ppm)
4 - Toxic (0,5ppm)

The nitrate picked up "slightly" over the last two days. It's still within safe parameters according to the package insert of the test kit (recommends below 50ppm). Interestingly, I haven't done a water change since 3 days ago (I simply had no time, will do one again today)

This does mean that the bacteria are starting to do their magic, right? If the nitrates levels are slowly climbing, it means something is converting ammonia -> nitrite -> nitrate

Also, the molly with the popped eye seems to have healed almost completely.

Other than that the tank looks happy for now.

Questions:
- Do I keep doing 50% water changes? Or should I do a little less now?
- I'm still adding a cap full of stabilizer daily. Should I keep it up?

Thanks so far for all your help

 

Yeah the problem is my only way of measuring these is with the thing on the glass which doesn't have a measurement of 0. Hence my little table showing the possible measurements. (The first one shows zero because I didn't have the sticker in the tank yet)

Once I have the API test kit next month (spending R1000 on that at the moment a bit hard to justify) I can track it a bit more accurately.

 

Thanks I'll be in touch. Much appreciated!. I'm away for the weekend so will only be able to do it next week.