Noobie 10 gal tank!

[starangl987]

Hey everyone!

I love fish and anything that lives in water, always have, so I decided to start my own aquarium. As a noobie I decided to start small with a 10 gall tank, along with the fact that I didn't want to spend too much (relativly speaking) on a bigger tank, which probably wouldnt fit in my room, and would be to much of a hassel to move with, as I'm 19 and don't plan on living with my parents my whole life lol so I think for now, until I get the finances and space to get a bigger tank a 10 gall should be good. So I set it up, I put the tank across the corner of my room, like not against the wall but diagonally across the corner, I wiped down the tank with water, cleaned the gravel and decorations, put the gravel in the tank, then the rocks, then the plants (not real), then I filled the tank with tap water, then put the filter in and the heater and filled the tank a little more, then I put conditioner in it and turned on the filter to let it run, and then I turned on the heater and set it to 76. I have 3 Mollies (1 male, 2 females) in my 5 gall tank that I am going to put into the 10 gall, though I may separate the male as I dont want too many fry swimming around and me not knowing what to do with (I have 14 white ad black fry in a breeding net in the 5 gall. and are doing good, which I plan on giving to my sisters so they can give them away to their friends and maybe sell them to a LFS) So I'll have my two female mollies in the 10 gall. and maybe if I can tell the difference between the sexes of the molly fry, I may keep another female.

Here's the 10 gall tank set up:

 

[Doomhed]

make sure you cycle the tank before you put the fishes in there!

 

[Cammie]

Looks lovely *twirlysmi

Just make sure that you do what Doomhead says and do a fishless cycle, it's well worth it

x x x x xx

 

[misterking]

A lot of people don't like fake plants, but depending how you use them I think they can look really good, just like you have here. Lovely set-up, good luck with it!

 

[littletankbigworld]

Wow, do you have a lot of bubbles!
My suggestion is to add a laminated tank background to hide the filter and all the wires.

 

[Monoxide]

Yeah tank looks good so far. Special since you said your newer to the hobby. Id like to add to the suggestions to add a straight black background. Most time just buy one from the store with plants on front and black on the back, and just turn it around Another thing is do fishless cycle (many people dont and will most likely pay for it). Keeping it clean and healthy is the best to having a happy tank. Also fish and fish mates are good. That is a small tank and limited to what you can stick in it. And heck even when you move out and you like keeping fish you can get bigger tanks and move up in the world. Usually if your into it and people suggest what to do when you 1st start and low income. I suggest getting bigger tank to start with because once you buy all the stuff with your 10-20 gal and few years later you now got to buy a new 55-90 gal now your just adding more stuff to the list of money. Also Gl with the hobby. Many get a fish and small tank and sees the poor goldfish not moving or get tired of it. They lose the enjoyment of it and throw the items out.. Hopefully you wont and stay in it! Gl with the tank and yourself.

 

[starangl987]

Thanks guys for the advice!! And thank's for liking my set up!

I do plan on cycling the tank, I just have to go out and buy a test kit, I havent yet because I hate seeing so much money leave my pocket at once, so I like to spread my spending out to make it look like I'm spending less lol but that's just me and my horrible logic (trust me, I think that I was born with a logic-deficiancy) Now, test kits, I looked in petco because they are the closest pet store to me, and I dropped by this small pet store like 30 min away, and this other pet store, and walmart hahaha (yes walmart sells fish now, and if any of you have not dropped in there and seen their fish tanks...let's just say I would NEVER EVER EVER buy a fish from there, not even their betta's, which sit on a dirty little shelf above the sink. and their tanks are all dirty with algea, but I did buy my fish stand there for $40 lol) Well again back to test kits...for the third time, they have the individual test kits, one for ph, nitrate, amonia, and whatever the last one is that I forgot (or is there not a fourth one?) but they are like $10-$20 by themselves, then they have the "All-in-one" tests kits which go for $15-$17 by themselves, but only give you 25 tests strips, which if you test the water everyday when you are cycling, and if that takes lets say four weeks, thats 28 test strips you need, which is obviously over the number of test strips they give you in the box, then they have the master test kit which is $31 and looks like you could do a lot more tests with it, I didnt look at how many you could do, so the obvious choice would be the master test kit, right?

Now cycling, when you cycle a fish less tank, all you do is test the water, find out what the levels are, then add amonia (which I dont know where to find), then wait another day and test again, find the number of amonia, then add more amonia, then wait and test and add and wait and test and add, until amonia reaches 5 ppm? And when that happens, you just let it run and switch over to reading the nitrate levels, everyday you test until nitrate reaches 0, then it should go up again? then it will peak (how do you know when it's peaked?) and when it peaks, you will see it? then you wait unitll Nitrate goes back down to 0? and then you can add the fish?

Now that's from my memory from what I have previously read, did I get something wrong or miss anything?

As for the tank background, I don't really like that wallpaper stuff, i dont know, it just sometimes looks tacky, but maybe that's just the fake background pictures. Are backgrounds cheap? they must be. I dont want to spend like $3 on something I try and dont like and then cant return it because I dont like it.

Can I get hermit crabs and put them in with mollies? because hermit crabs helps clean the tank too right, or snails, and they arnt big. and like maybe 6 neon tetras? they're small, but the mollies would eat them probably.

55-90 gallon tanks are amazing and beautiful, but I don't think I will be able to maintain that big of a tank. I think the biggest I will probably go is maybe 30 gal?

And cleaning my tank (sorry for the long questions, if you dont want to answer all of them, just answer one or whatever you want lol) I'm still not sure how to do that, it's probably really simple to figure out, and I might sound blonde right now haha, but I have a siphin (sp?) but I havent used it yet, so I take the tubes and fill them with water, close off each end with my thumbs, put one end into the aquarium and the other over a bucket and take my thumb off the end in the aquarium and run it across the bottom of the tank untill the water turns clear? and then to fill it back up I just add water that has been sitting and conditioned into the tank?

And last, is there anything else im missing? I have a filter, heater, glass floating thermometer, flouresent light , food, net, im going to buy a test kit and a background (possibly), and im going to buy amonia (do those come in small bottles? they dont come in those big like laundry detergent bottles do they? IDK what else I would need amonia for besides setting up the tank) How about an air pump? The filter works as an air pump right? So I dont have to buy a separate one?

I know that's a lot of questions to answer lol Sorry! And thanks guys again!!

 

[lauraf]

Hey Star - you are on the right track! I can't answer all your questions right now, but to start:
IMPORTANT: shell out and buy the liquid test kits. It will be painful, but well worth it in the long run. If you are tight on funds, the three main ones you need to have in order to cycle your tank properly are ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate. You were almost right! pH is good to have, but as most fish will adapt to whatever the pH of your local water system is, and it probably is the same as what your lfs (local fish store) has, save buying that test kit for later.
Lots of people on this site are like you, and won't buy fish from Walmart because of the conditions they are kept in. I live in Vancouver, Canada, and we don't have Walmarts that sell livestock, so I can't comment directly, but I probably would agree. Always look at the tanks themselves wherever you are thinking of buying, and how healthy the fish appear.
To do a fishless cycle, yes, the best way I think is using pure ammonia, and you're pretty close on what to do. But it's the nitrites, not nitrates, you want to look for - the nitrates come after. I didn't know about this option when I set up my tank in a fishless cycle, but it seems to be the easiest way to go. *Someone else here will give you a link to how to do the fishless cycle with ammonia* What you want to buy is 'pure ammonia' - a place like Walmart might very well have that for you Just make sure it has no additives. Not sure if it comes in small bottles - maybe someone in your family can use it for laundry or cleaning or something if you have to buy a big bottle.
Cleaning your tank, especially with a small tank your size, is easy to do with a siphon. Remember that you don't want to take all the water out of your tank at any given time. I just put a bucket on the floor and start the suction by, well, sucking briefly on the end of the siphon (before the water gets in my mouth ) and let the water flow out of the end of the tube into the bucket. (Your method will work too.) I siphon as much gunky poop off the gravel as possible, but depending on the needs of the tank, usually only take 25-30% of the water out. Then, yes, you replace with other water that has been brought up to room temp and conditioned with a product like Prime. Prime is a fabulous water conditioner.
So, that's as much as I can answer for you right now. Keep asking questions, and be patient about adding the fish. You can have a successful, happy, healthy tank from the beginning and avoid the mistakes lots of other beginners make that result in dead fish and disappointment. This is a great site that has helped me tons. Keep us posted!
Cheers,
Laura

 

[OrangeCones]

Can I get hermit crabs and put them in with mollies?

Hermit crabs are NOT aquatic. They need land and access to some water.

And cleaning my tank (sorry for the long questions, if you dont want to answer all of them, just answer one or whatever you want lol) I'm still not sure how to do that, it's probably really simple to figure out, and I might sound blonde right now haha, but I have a siphin (sp?) but I havent used it yet, so I take the tubes and fill them with water, close off each end with my thumbs, put one end into the aquarium and the other over a bucket and take my thumb off the end in the aquarium and run it across the bottom of the tank untill the water turns clear? and then to fill it back up I just add water that has been sitting and conditioned into the tank?

I think you are describing a gravel vacuum. They are helpful for most to keep an aquarium healthy by taking excess food and waste out of the gravel.

and im going to buy amonia (do those come in small bottles? they dont come in those big like laundry detergent bottles do they? IDK what else I would need amonia for besides setting up the tank)

Ammonia is usually very cheap. I saw it yesterday at the drug store I went to for $2 for a quart. Just make sure it is only ammonia. No fragrance or surfactants in it, just pure ammonia.

How about an air pump? The filter works as an air pump right? So I dont have to buy a separate one?

A filter is all you should need. An air pump doesn't do much to filter your water. More oxygen is added to the tank by surface aggitation, not the bubbles an air pump makes.

 

[Monoxide]

-From your words about fishless cycle pretty much you got it on the head. Your going to keep adding amona each day and testing it constant to raise it up and then let it go back down. Pretty much its building up the tank and the water in it for the fish. If you just add fish all the food/poop and etc can cause the take to get sick and dirty and etc.. It just really helps doing fishless cycle. http://www.cichlid-forum.com/articles/fishless_cycling.php Heres a link you can read and Setting up a new tank and Fishless Cycling - Article at The Age of Aquariums - Tropical Fish
-Background I don't know about price back in the day I could get them from 4-7 bucks walmart local pet store.. And I only liked the background ones when I had a community tank with many fake plants in it. When I had something for more of deco wise cichlid tank I put a black background on it. It made the tank look so much nicer and brought the tank out IMO and many others. Also you can buy a regular background with plants on it at walmart and turn it around all the backs are black. Tap it on Also you said if you didn't like it you wouldn't be able to take it back.. Walmart accepts those back.
- Also those test trips Id suggest API ordering test strips.. Some times the walmart or local stores test strips can be hard to read and color is to close of this or that.. or even the color is to high sometimes and its not even on the chart. Also you can just test around with your test kits and see if they are working okay anyways. Another note to add test kits IMO can go bad if kept to long.
- Cleaning a 10 gal or anything higher I used 5 gal buckets and a small bucket for many months then I finally invested into a siphon at walmart.. Get the longer hose one.. And it worked great for while.. Till it broke under preasure and also it likes to suck up your fish/frogs so be careful. It get cloudy few times in the tanks Ive seen and bam poor fishys. But to add to it when changing water and you got your normal water from your sink in your buckets or whatever and you put the chemicals in it to make the water okay to put into the tank.. People will say different things on how they do it.. Some say they got buckets of water with chemicals in it sitting for hours or just few minutes .. but hell I had no problem adding chemicals into the actual tank itself.. then adding water with siphon then stirring it up.. Never had a problem.. but that is something you will do/learn yourself..

 

[bassbonediva]

I've found, and I think most on here will agree with me about this, that the bigger tanks are actually *easier* to maintain than the smaller tanks. I'm forever doing cleanings and such on my small tanks (a 5gal, a 6gal and two 10gals) and having to worry about my parameters, especially in the 5gal and 6gal (they get bi-weekly instead of just weekly water changes). In my 29gal and my 55gal, I just do my weekly water change and that's pretty much it. I don't even have algae problems in my 55gal (which I had horrible algae problems in my 46gal when I had it set up, but I think that was mainly because I didn't cycle the tank and was playing catch up the entire time I had it set up) and I overfeed on purpose (I have otos, kuhlis and a cory to take care of excess food and algae).

But, good for you for realizing that it is hard to move bigger tanks, so waiting to get one until you have your own place is probably a good idea.

 

[starangl987]

Thanks again guys for the advice!

I bought clean ammonia from shop rite for $1.79 it's ingredients contain only ammonium hydroxide and I bought testing stuff, so I think I am ready to go!

 

[starangl987]

ok so its been a week and nothings happening. though that may be because I accidentally added too much ammonia (2 cap fulls lol I'm horrible at measuring ) But hey, I guess then it'll take twice as long to cycle :\ oh well. My ammonia reading that I got today was <8ppm lol and nitrite is <.25ppm, so I'm guessing thats good right? lol

 

[starangl987]

next test: Ammonia 4ppm or so (It's hard to match the greens ) and nitrite <.50ppm getting there!

 

[OrangeCones]

You are on your way! Great to see another fishkeeper doing the humane method of getting a tank safe for new fish!

 

[lauraf]

Go Star! You are doing a great job! Let us know what your readings are in another week or so - you might be ready for a few fish then . . . .

 

[Newman]

Doing great. My personal suggestion though:

When you see ammonia begin to got below 1-2 ppm regardless of nitrites, you will want to start adding just a few drops of ammonia daily. this is important in order to keep bacteria populations from reaching low levels as you finish up the cycle. And keep testing. your goal is to get 0 ammonia and 0 nitrites WHILE adding a few drops of ammonia to the tank daily. once that is accomplished, you can check the nitrates and do a big water change. keep adding daily ammonia again because you do not want to starve the bacteria. after 1-2 days of you first nitrate-reducing water change test the water again for all 3 things. there should be 0 ammonia and nitrite and some nitrates. if the nitrates that you get are above 20ppm do another large water change and repeat the last process. keep repeating until after 1-2 days of your last water change you get nitrates that are around 10ppm or less. It may take 2 water changes, it might take more. be patient and thorough. once you achieve 0 ammonia, 0 nitrite and 10ppm of nitrate or so then go get you first hardy fish. get just around 2-4 of them to be safe...
Also in a 10 gal tank try not to get fish that grow more than 1.5 inches...

 

[starangl987]

thanks guys!
And Newman thanks for the advice! I will sure do that! Funny, my mom keeps bugging me about my tank just sitting there. She says that she has never heard of anyone doing anything to the tank before they put fish in and keeps saying to just put my fish in it. And I keep telling her no and that its not ready, and she keeps saying that ive let it sit for weeks and its ready.

I already have 3 mollys in a 5 gallon (i know i know) that I am going to move into the 10 gallon when it's ready. And I checked with Aqadvisor and I am 78% stocked with 195% filtration (I put my filter down as aqueon whisper 10 as my filter came with the set up and is Aqueon Power filter 10, I figure as it's also aqueon 10 it should be relativly the same) for the three mollys, I'm thinking about getting like 3 snails for my tank but idk what type of snails my LFS has (petco is the closest to me) so I added 3 assassin snails to my list on aqadvisor and my stock went up to 83%, but then I thought adding some colorfull schooling fish would look nice so I deleted the snails and put in 5 neon tetras and my stock went to 98%

What do you guys think would be best? Just the 3 molly's or can I add the tetras or snails, or both?

 

[Newman]

I would do snails, or just the mollies, although mollies do not belong in a small tank like that, so I would rethink your stocking if possible. an average molly has the potential to grow into a 4" fish. in a 10 gallon the fish will be stunted and will have a shorter life span as a result.

If it were me I would dedicate the tank to only the tetras seeing as you are a beginner. once you have more experience with what works for that tank and what doesnt in terms of maintenance while having fish in it, then I would probably suggest adding a school of 5-6 pygmy cories to the tank if you went with 5-6 small tetra/rasbora species. maybe even an oto or two, but only after you know what it takes to keep the water in a heavily stocked tank at clean levels. One way to help such an endeavor is to use floating live plants...

 

[starangl987]

oooh ok...hmmmmm..think. Well I already have mollys as I said so I think ill put them in the ten gall then just keep them. And when it becomes their unfortunate time, I'll go tetra.