The Puffer Forum

It's a 55g tank with a Fluval 306. Right now there are 4 tiger barbs in there (1 full grown, 2 close to that, and 1 juvenile) - I'm taking those out but just wanted to give you an idea of what kind of bio-load the filter is currently handeling.

Once I take them out, how many F8's can I put in there right away? The more, the better in this scenario as the last batch of F8's the store got all passed away due to ick I know you're usually meant to start with 1 or 2 but due to what happened last time I'd rather get as many as possible right away to ensure they're healthy. I'm hoping the fact I have 4 barbs in there right now helps.

EDIT: these are juvenile puffers, by the way. Very small

Ammonia -0
Nitrite - 0
Nitrate - 5ppm

Go with the amount of space you need for an ADULT puffer & figure total water volume, which is probably closer to 45g. 4 puffers would be happy in there. You might also be able to add a few other BW species like chromides, Bumblebee or Knight gobies.

Oh, I know. I wouldn't put any more in than it could take as adults. 4 (or 5 if I do no other species) is my max and I wasn't going to go passed that regardless.

I just want to know whether I'd be able to put 4-5 in at once. Would my filter be able to handle going from the bio load of 4 barbs to 4-5 puffers?

If you add Safestart to the filter.

My tank is already cycled is that a good idea?

Can't hurt it. It will give added beneficial bacteria to the filter so you filter won't have to build more up. It will adjust to the added biology very quickly.

I'm just worried about the fact that a Tetra employee (in a Q&A with FishLore) says it raises the ammonia for the first week or so. After searching online, it's unclear whether this is ammonia in a form (i.e. ammonium) that is safe for fish (but still feeds bacteria) or not.

That's not what he said. I have used Safestart countless times, for cycling a new tank, adding extra bioload to an established tank & moving fish.

How is it not what he said? The question was:

"How soon should you test the water and why? (I've heard it said you'll get high ammonia readings if you test within 10 days of adding TSS. Isn't that harmful to the fish? If not, why?)"

And the answer:

"You can test the water any time, but really, you should probably wait at least 48 hours. We expect TSS to start slowly seeding the tank, and making a difference in about that time. You have to have some ammonia occur in the tank to provide the cycle needed, so it will usually create levels or reduce levels to around 1.0-1.5 ppm, and they should stay there for a week to 14 days, and then come down. Sorry, these levels would be for both ammonia and nitrite. These are considered stress, but not toxic, levels, and should not cause any long term damage to the fish.

But the bacteria product doesn't create ammonia, it "eats" it. Fhe fish are the ones producing the ammonia.

bigpuff wrote:How is it not what he said? The question was:

"How soon should you test the water and why? (I've heard it said you'll get high ammonia readings if you test within 10 days of adding TSS. Isn't that harmful to the fish? If not, why?)"

And the answer:

"You can test the water any time, but really, you should probably wait at least 48 hours. We expect TSS to start slowly seeding the tank, and making a difference in about that time. You have to have some ammonia occur in the tank to provide the cycle needed, so it will usually create levels or reduce levels to around 1.0-1.5 ppm, and they should stay there for a week to 14 days, and then come down. Sorry, these levels would be for both ammonia and nitrite. These are considered stress, but not toxic, levels, and should not cause any long term damage to the fish.

I am surprised by the response if this is indeed a response from a Tetra employee because there was a member on here who carried out an experiment with it and posted their results daily, I'm almost sure that they didn't register an ammonia reading at all!

The text appears to be poorly written as I believe that they were trying to say that the ammonia level in the tank will likely increase to 1.0-1.5ppm as the bacteria gets to work not that the Safestart will create levels of 1.0-1.5ppm. If they are a Tetra employee then they may be erring on the side of caution but on this advice I could never recommend that anyone use it and would advise everyone to carry out a full fishless cycle. The 'Tetra employee' appears to be trying to talk their company out of a lot of potential sales.

Probably just like a fish store employee giving crap advise!

Ok, I see. The use of "it" made it confusing but I get what he meant now. Wasn't written too clearly. Thanks guys. And pufferpunk, you said to dump it right into the filter? Anywhere specific or just take the lid off and pour it in? (It's a fluval 306).

Yes, be sure to shake well, 1st.