About a week ago I was given a 20 gallon tank with rescue fish from someone. The tank has 2 neon tetras, 2 zebra danios, 2 loaches, and 1 nerite snail. The only thing I know is that the fish have lived for at least 2 years in this tank and that the original owner has barely changed the water.
This is the current picture of the tank. I plan to replace the substrate for half fluval substrate and sand. I also plan on adding more plants. One of the problems is that I don’t know how long this would take to recycle when I do this. I was going to wait a few days and temporary move all of my fish to my already empty fully cycled 5 gallon tank (which also has a few plants). I’m worried about this because this many fish in a small tank would crash the cycle and isn‘t enough space. I plan to take out the water from the 20 gallon tank and put in back in once I add the remove the old substrate and put the new substrate and plants inside.
Another problem that I have is that my ph is too low and I need to remove the few ammonia that is in the 20 gallon. I’ve used a liquid water tester, but everything else is fine except for the ph and ammonia. The ph is at 6.0, but it must be at 7.0 for all species of fish to thrive. Are there any safe ways to increase the ph from 6.0 to 7.0? The ammonia is at 0.25. Are there any way to safely lower that? I‘m just surprised that these fish are still even alive after surviving for 2 years in there.
Once I fully set up my community tank, how often am I supposed to change my water? I have heard your supposed to do a water change once a week and take out like 20% of the water. However, I’ve also heard that sometimes people barely have to do water changes if they have a stable ecosystem. And with the shrimp they already clean up all of the waste.
After all of this is done, I do plan on adding more fish. I tired to follow the 1 inch per gallon rule for the other fish that I’m gonna get and it seems to work. I was thinking of eventually adding 2 golden zebra danios, 4 neon tetras, 1 sunset gourami, and some cherry shrimp. Obviously not now but once I know that the cycle is fully stable.
The main questions that I need help on are the bolded sentences. So I would appreciate as much advice as possible. I feel kinda stressed since it’s my first time having a community tank.😭I've tried to do as much research as I could.
Posted by Ok-Assistance6999
5 Comments
Reminder that the tank looking like this is temporary!
My poor snail also has shell erosion I think and Idk how to help him 🙁 since the ph is wayy to low. I’m just gonna move him to the 5 gallon (ph is in between 8.0 to 8.2)
So since the ph is way too high in the 5 gallon I think I’m unable to temporally move my fish there..
Are there also any tips for lowering the ph in there? I’ve tried everything like using distilled water for water changes but literally nothing helps
Hi! After reading your description, my suggestion is to keep everything as is.
First thing is that it is common for test kits to yield a false positive 0.25ppm ammonia reading when it is effectively zero. If ammonia does not read any higher than 0.25ppm for at least a few days, then yeah, most likely it is a false positive reading. No one really knows for certain why this is the case, just that it is perfectly fine.
And if that is the case, and your nitrite is also zero, then I’d recommend leaving things as is. Chances are this is around the pH the tank was at for the previous owner too, so the fish has been doing fine. Often, the pH range listed in guides are not the complete range of a species anyways. So yeah, don’t be too alarmed by the pH.
Re: water changes, everyone will tell you something different. Personally, I only really do water changes if nitrate gets high enough. For a planted tank, that may never be the case. My tanks regularly go for months between water changes.
Lastly, ignore the 1 inch per gallon rule, it is a pretty dumb rule.
First do not change the substrate
Second, whats the gh and kh? Old tanks might have depleted KH
For water change, do very small and with a drip system (assuming tap water)
Dont worry about pH and ammonia
You will want to change water slowly, so 20% every few days, do this five times and you have a 100% new water. The minerals (and ph) of the tap water will bring the ph up unless your tap water is very low ph (which i can tell it isnt if your other tank is high ph.) No water change tanks happen by pure luck or hard work. If you plan to add more fish you will need to do water changes anyway.
Snails love high ph so he will be happier in your other tank.
What is the ph of your tap water? I imagine high if your 5gallon has a ph of 8.