New to fish keeping - Looking for a little advice!!

[Mr Phil]

Hello everyone,

I hope we are all well. As the title says I'm new to fish keeping and so far have found the information across this forum brilliant (wish I had found it earlier)!!!

So, I would like to explain were I am so far as I have a few questions for all you good folk on here.

I purchased a Fluval Roma 90 with cabinet in early March, the setup at the moment is:

90 litre tank (85 litres measured water volume).
Fluval U2 filter (additional biomax added and carbon filters replaced with basic course + medium media).
Fluval E series 100w heater. (Set to 25c)
Fluval LED lighting (8 hours per day)
Fluval Stratum substrate.
Dragon rock and bogwood for decor.

Plants:

Amazon sword
Vallisneria
Anubias nana
Java fern
Cryptocoryne bulosa
Java moss ( I later removed this as it exploded in the tank!)
Flourish and Excel are dosed as recommended on the bottles.

Approximately 4 weeks after setting up the aquarium (due to this pesky virus) I added 3 Zebra Danios for a fish-in-cycle as recommended! The fish are fed every other day, they look healthy and are very active. The aquarium has been running a total of 9 weeks now and during that time I have done 10% water changes (all treated) every week.

During this period my water tests (2 x week using API Master Water Test Kit) are as follows:
PH = 6.8 - 7
Ammonia = 0 - 0.25 (tap water tested 0.25)
Nitrite = 0
Nitrate = 20 - 40 (tap water tested 40)

Local water supplier figures:
Hardness = 19.75 GD
PH = 7.2
Nitrate = 39.76
Nitrite = 0.004

I'm not going to try and adjust the water hardness and will just get fish that are suited to it.

I started a 7 day dosing routine with Seachem Stability on 22/05/20 as I have read some good reports about on here. Other than some brown algae I have had no other problems.

So, after the information overload (which I apologise for) I would like to ask:

After 5 weeks with fish in should the ammonia have registered higher yet?

Is adding Stability with no ammonia present beneficial?

Thanks for all your help and advice.

I will try to add an image.

[Andys temperate tank]

The tank looks nice.

You want your ammonia and nitrite to be reading zero. The 3 danios you have in there are to provide ammonia. (From there poo) this feeds the beneficial bacteria in your filter. Have a look at the cycling guide at the top of the forum home page.

[Stephen]

Hello & welcome to the forum.

Your aquarium looks very nice.
I think you are doing things in the correct manor by adding Seachem Stability.
You have very little bioload to produce an ammonia reading, so don't be too concerned.

The Fluval Roma 90 is a 2 foot (60cm) aquarium, a nice starting point.
The danios are very active as you have found, a 60cm aquarium is therefore not really long enough to provide adequate swimming space for this active little fish.
The advise to add danios to aid the cycling process was poor advise (probably Pets at Home or other outlet).

You have hard water as mentioned.
This is great for hard water fish species such as Platy, guppy etc..

That's enough from me.
All the best


Stay safe & healthy everyone

[Gingerlove05]

Hello and welcome
You might get a green tinge from your tap water, its likely to be the test kit, my first api kit showed a slight green tinge on the ammonia test.
As mentioned as you only have a small number of fish the bioload would be quite low and adding stability and following its instructions you might not get any ammonia or nitrite readings as the bacteria would be present in the stability to deal with any toxins.
You just need to stock gradually from here and you can always add stability again when you add more fish to help boost the filter bacteria

[Mr Phil]

Thanks for the replies

[Martinspuddle]

Greetings & welcome to

Nice little set-up.

[Flex365]

Welcome Home

[plankton]

Welcome to the forum.
As you add more fish, use the Stability to boost the small muncher colony you probably have in the filter, and don't add more than the equivalent of 6 small fish at a time.
I agree about the danios, but shops are basically there for the money. It's best not to rely on their info, unless you know they do care.

[Ric]

Welcome to the forum and the hobby.

Love the set-up of your tank, looks well thought through.

Apart from the advice mentioned above, you may wish to turn down the temp a little. Zebra danios do better in the 18-24C range, which would also suit the other fish mentioned, such as guppies and platties. If you gradually reduce the temp to around 22/23C, that would be sufficient.

[Mr Phil]

Thank you all for the info, it really is appreciated.

I ordered the plants online as all shops were shut at the time. I recieved more than I thought but it seems to have worked out well so, a bit if luck thrown in with the planning.

I will be sure to ask on here first from now on. Regarding increasing the bioload, would 3 platy's (1 Male and 2 female) be ok to add?