Cycling basics, help!

Ok, so I've read a few different articles about cycling my axies tank, so I feel like I'm pretty ready...but my axie is permanently at my boyfriends house, as he has room for the tank and i do not, but we are moving our axie to a larger tank soon and i need to explain to him the cycling process as easy as possible..

Basically, can anyone clearly and as basic as possible explain cycling to me so I can further understand and so I can pass this along to him, because we both seem to not have it 100% down. We've got that with fish-in-cycling we should feed as little as possible without obviously starving our little friend, check the water parameters daily and do 10-20% water changes daily until the parameters read a certain way, but I feel like there is still a bunch that we don't understand.

Also, due to lack of room for our two tanks (the smaller and the new tank he will be moved to) we have no choice but to do "fish-in" cycling, I've read that its harder but we really don't have any other choice, his current small tank is barely into the cycling process as well as we just restarted his tank entirely a week ago because we used a small gravely substrate and switched to sand...

With fish-in cycling, you simply add the fish/animal to the tank and take daily readings for ammonia/nitrite/nitrate. (You need a liquid test kit for this - strips are not accurate) If the ammonia or nitrite is above 0 (which it certainly will be with the animal in the tank) do a 50% - 80% water change until the levels are 0 or almost zero.

First you'll see a lot of ammonia going up, then the ammonia will go down by itself as the tank starts to cycle, then the nitrites will go up a lot, then finally when the tank is cycled you will ALWAYS have readings of 0 ammonia, 0 nitrite, and nitrates between 10ppm and 40ppm.

You need to be REALLY diligent with the water changes though, because Axolotls are really sensitive to water quality and putting them through a fish-in cycle can kill them.

yikes, 50-80% water changes seem like a LOT...i was told and read that 15-20% was about right for daily water changes

I've unfortunately done a few fish in cycles with my goldfish since I move a lot, and trust me, it's necessary. The toxins build up and spike very fast once it starts to cycle and can easily kill your animal. What you should do is test the water daily, and if the ammonia or nitrite are high at all you do a big water change. Like I said axolotls are really sensitive to water quality - putting them through a cycle is not ideal.

there are a lot of different opinions about how much water change. Lots of people say that if you change too much water you could potentially be killing the beneficial bacteria that has just newly grown, and then set you back. Although if you do too little, you run the risk of killing your fish.

I moved to a larger tank just in december and I did 25-50% (since it was in the middle) (also 25% - 50% really depended on how much gunk was on the ground.. ). For some odd reason I never really had much of an issue with ammonia, (.25ppm.. same as my tap water)but I had a humongous nitrite spike i couldn't decrease even with an 80% water change. Whatever you do, I suggest to see through it all the way through whether it's 15% or 50%. I believe that consistency is key.

If you can, grab some filter media from someone you know that has a cycled tank and shove it in with your filter media. That will help jump start your cycling process

Finally, don't panic if your levels are absolutely insane. The levels are SUPPOSED to spike. When in doubt, post up again

sphynx said:

there are a lot of different opinions about how much water change. Lots of people say that if you change too much water you could potentially be killing the beneficial bacteria that has just newly grown, and then set you back. Although if you do too little, you run the risk of killing your fish.

I moved to a larger tank just in december and I did 25-50% (since it was in the middle) (also 25% - 50% really depended on how much gunk was on the ground.. ). For some odd reason I never really had much of an issue with ammonia, (.25ppm.. same as my tap water)but I had a humongous nitrite spike i couldn't decrease even with an 80% water change. Whatever you do, I suggest to see through it all the way through whether it's 15% or 50%. I believe that consistency is key.

If you can, grab some filter media from someone you know that has a cycled tank and shove it in with your filter media. That will help jump start your cycling process

Finally, don't panic if your levels are absolutely insane. The levels are SUPPOSED to spike. When in doubt, post up again

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I have the same problem cycling my tanks, HUGE nitrite spikes I can only get down with huge water changes, and still I can't get it all the way down. Frustrating, but worth it on that day you take the readings and suddenly it's at zero.

I think the best way to think about cycling is that when ammonia spikes up it causes ammonia eating bacteria to colonize. Once ammonia goes down nitrite goes up creating the perfect environment for nitrite eating bacteria. Ammonia is still being produced but is immediately turned to nitrite which is then turned into nitrate. if you see spikes of either ammonia or nitrite, remember you need some of it left to help the bacteria grow in numbers. Axolotls are pretty sensitive to both so I would do water checks and if it reads 4ppm do a 85% water change to get that number down to 0.75ppm or under. This is less stressful on the axies but still effective at getting the bacteria to form.