Hi I am new to here and new to fish! I have just purchased a second had 3ft tank with a stand and all the accessories.

In very, very simple terms how do I go about setting it up? My understanding (from
Searching) is I set up the tank with the plants and let it filter for a week adding a touch f fish food to it daily. Then after a week
I add a small amount of fish (I was thinking around 4-5 tetras) wait 2 weeks and add more. Is this correct?

Cleaning the tank- my understanding is I clean the filter weekly or fortnightly in a bucket of tank water and clean the glass when needed. I will get a gravel vacuum (is this good?!) and
Clean the gravel how often? Ad top up the water after I vacuum
It? Is this right?

Please be simple for me hahha thanks in advance!!

Hi there and welcome.

This article will tell you all you need to know about cycling your new tank:


Fishless Cycling

Unless you can borrow some mature filter media from a friend, it will be at least a couple of months before you should even think about adding any fish to the tank. Patience is a virtue!

Hope that helps
Peter.

P.S. Where abouts in Australia are you? My sister lives near Perth.

Months?!!! Oh man I don't think my daughter will last that long lol

I'm
In Queensland :)

Not quite months - 4 to 6 weeks is usual

Ok cool I can do that!! Is there anything special I need to do apart from feeding the 'plants'

LOL, don't worry!

The 'nitrogen cycle' is a fixed biological process and cannot be rushed. Mother nature does her thing in her own time.

Most fish-less cycles complete in about 4 weeks, sometimes just a tad longer. Cycling with fish in already takes forever as you have to keep toxic water quality diluted (think buckets each day!) and to be honest, most fish die during this or at the very best then go on to have long term health issues

A bottle of 9% ammonia, a baby syringe and a good quality liquid based testing kit is all that is needed.

In the interim, take the time to research the fish you'd like, then change your mind altogether lol. You can plant and decorate the tank, perhaps cut out pictures of fish you are thinking about with your daughter and stick them on. Worked for others here with children

The only way to cut down on this time is to add pre-seeded filters from another stocked fish tank into your new filter to kick strat the bacteria a tank needs. This can shave off a week or two in my experience.

Follow the instructions for the fishless cycle and you'll be fine. Liquid ammonia is the easiest method, as you know exactly how much you need to add to top up as the cycle progresses. Do not add fish until your nitrites and ammonia both read zero 12-24 hours after adding a dose of liquid ammonia. Mine took about 5 weeks. Two months is unusual, but not unheard of. If your water is very soft you may find your cycle crashes. This is usually caused by a drop in the quantity of carbonate in your water (KH), (the bacteria that "eat" your nitrite and ammonia use carbonates as part of this metabolic pathway) and a good proxy is high nitrates in the middle of the cycle rather than at the end.

While you're waiting for the cycle to run its course you'll have plenty of time to research the fish you want to keep, get your plants going, etc.

Cleaning the filter media should always be done in old tank water. How regular this should be will depend on how much gunge your tank accumulates- I've not bothered cleaning the external on my 60L in several months, but I tend to do the external on the 240L once a month or so.

The glass should be cleaned as and when necessary. I do the outside whenever I do a water change (I always end up spilling a little, and I don't want to look at watermarks- my water is very hard so I get lots of limescale). I give the front and side glass a go over with a algae magnet or razorblade on a stick as and when necessary (ideally just before a water change so any large bits of algae dislodged can be sucked up).

Gravel vaccuming is usually done whenever you do a waterchange. This is a good article explaining how to do it. Dig around in the gravel while removing your water, and you'll remove any grot that's collected in the spaces between your substrate grains. This doesn't work with sand, (you'll suck it all out and dump it in the bucket) but you tend to find dirt accumulates on the top so its easy to remove by swirling your siphon tube around.

After you've removed about 20% of your water replace it with fresh water that's been dechlorinated and brought up to temperature. If the water out of your tap and in your tank have notably different pHs then you should age the water for 24 hours or so before doing the water change.

I know what you mean about children finding it difficult to wait!
Perhaps use the weeks to teach her about the Nitrogen cycle and let her help with the tests(counting drops and comparing colours to the charts).I would have taken in more at school about chemistry if id had hands on experience like cycling a tank as Ive found it fascinating. My two year old now spouts about testing the tank and always 'helps'. She was in a way even more excited about getting fish because she had to wait. We did lots of window shopping too and internet research on types of fish to make the wait easier.

Ok I'm not going to lie its more me who is impatient then her LOL I have been looking at fish for about 2mths now and finally found a decent tank for cheap price! Getting it tomorrow so will set it all up. I am going away for a week, I can get my mum in to few the plants if I need too?? Do I just feed them a touch of
Fish food? Each day?

Yes, you need to "feed" the bacteria you need to grow to process your potential fishs' waste with liquid ammonia. The article explains in detail, but basically you'll add a measured amount of liquid ammonia then test the levels of ammonia and nitrite every day.

The ammonia will start to fall when bacteria arrive to "eat" it and every time it drops you'll need to top it back up. Those bacteria will start to produce nitrIte, which will climb daily for a longish time. Eventually, the nitrite level will start to fall when a second colony of bacteria appear to "eat" that, and they will produce nitrAte, which you'll see rising if you test for that at this point.

Once you reach a stage where the ammonia dose has been processed in 12 hours so that the tests show 0 for ammonia AND 0 for nitrIte you're ready for fish. You'll do a big water change to reduce nitrAtes just before buying them.

Hope that helps, but any questions, please ask

EDIT: Cross-posted with everyone there, sorry!