Question about new fish tank

Question
Don't worry about taking a while--it's not a problem. ;)

The filter and air pump and everything had to be thrown out--they hadn't been run in ten years and had accumulated all sorts of grime and junk that I just didn't want to deal with. So I got a new air pump and filter. I ended up just getting new gravel, too--I can't even begin to describe what that stuff was like. It almost seemed like my neighbor used mud and gravel together..possibly he did. Fifteen years of grime. *shudder*

We ended up taking it out to the lawn and hosing it and scrubbing it. We did use a little vinegar (I'm glad I got all that right). There was a lovely tank underneath all that grime--it was certainly worth the effort! (Six hours emptying it and cleaning it! Took quite a while, ne?)

Look at this:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v98/reefkitty/Pets/tank/fish4.jpg
This is the male swordtail, when I was floating his bag in the cleaned tank. See how disgusting that old water was? Yuck! Here are a few more pictures, just for the heck of showing off my lovely fish. ;)
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v98/reefkitty/Pets/tank/fish1.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v98/reefkitty/Pets/tank/fish2.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v98/reefkitty/Pets/tank/fish3.jpg
Hehe, I love my swordtails! They're so cute! (Is it weird to think a fish is cute?)

The only fish that didn't survive were two of the female swordtails. What I have now are seven guppies, two platys, three Pineapple swordtails, a Black Moor goldfish, and a betta. I know the betta shouldn't be in a tank with other fish, so I'll probably buy him a 3-gallon.

One of the swordtails is gravid and I expect fry soon. I bought a breeder net for the fry so they don't get gobbled up by all the other fish. I'm not sure what I'll do with all the fry once they grow into adults, though; should I sell them to my LFS? Or find someone I know who wants them?

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Followup To
Question -
Alright.. a long story, so I'll try to keep it short...

My next-door neighbor decided to move out, but he can't take his 55-gallon freshwater tank with him. His friend, who he was going to give it to, suddenly couldn't take it. So my neighbor thought of me, since I like aquariums and want to be an Ichythologist. I said I'd be happy to take it... oh, if I'd only known what I was asking for.

Yesterday I went to his house to unload the aquarium and transfer it to my house piece by piece. The thing was overrun by plants and the water was an eerie green color, soon to be turned brown by the crap at the bottom. My brother and I took most of those plants out (almost all of which I'm not going to keep; there was an entire trashbag full of them!) then tried to locate whatever fish might be alive in there. Turns out there were about ten guppies and what look like fry (probably from the guppies?), a Goldfish, a betta, a couple platys, and something I'm absolutely unfamiliar with. I'm not necessarily sure yet, though, what all the fish are since the water was so murky/muddy when we got them, but I can recognize some of the species. And I know that not all of them are compatible.

The gravel bed (mud-bed might be a better term) was even worse, if such a thing is possible. There was an inch-and-a-half of fish waste and gunk sitting on top, and below was very muddy, slimy, disgusting 'gravel.' The filter likely hasn't been run since the eighties.

So, in conclusion, my neighbor is the worst aquarium-keeper to have ever existed and now I have a grimy disgusting tank and I'm not sure what to do with it. I'm thinking I should throw away all the gravel and get a new filter and aeration system and decorations and clean the thing spotless. I'll likely need to replace all the water too, so I'll have to treat the fish like I'm introducing them to an all-new environment, and float them in bags and slowly add new water over a long period of time... The fish are in large buckets with water from their old tank at the moment.

Of course, I need your opinion and ideas. I'm pretty much a novice at fish- and aquarium-keeping; the only tank I have is a little three-gallon tank with a betta, and I haven't yet started to venture into the great big world of fancy aquariumkeeping. This is definitely a huge project; chances are I'll spend all of tomorrow just getting the tank clean. Ew.
Answer -
Hi Kat,

First of all, let me apologize for my [extremely] delayed response.  This AllExperts thing lets you take "vacations" every now and then, but it doesn't tell you how to do it.  So now I'm answering 21 questions tonight.  We'll start with you. :)

Okay.  Opinion and ideas.  Opinion: You're very lucky to get all of this, regardless of the hours and hours of work it must've taken (or will take) to clean it out.  And, if you decide it's not worth the hassle, just send it on down to Texas for me. :)

I do have some ideas for you, though.  As far as cleaning everything goes, there are ways to deal with algae and grime.  Grime can be taken care of with a garden hose, no problem.  I'd fill up a 5 gal. bucket halfway with some of the gravel, take the hose to it and rinse it until the water you pour out of the bucket runs clean.  If the gravel is nasty and covered in algae, you can bleach it.  I'll give you instructions for bleaching below.  Decorations like fake (or real) rocks and fake plants can all be bleached as well, but anything real like wood pieces should be either gently scrubbed with your fingers under warm water or just thrown out.  Nasty white or brown stuff on/in the tank itself can be taken care of with a bit of vinegar on a paper towel. (Just make sure you don't put the vinegar in the water with the fish.  Bad.)

Instructions for bleaching:
1 part bleach
10 parts hot water
rubbermaid containers or 5 gal. buckets
nasty gross aquarium stuff

Fill containers with nasty gross aquarium stuff.  Add hot water to fill containers, covering all nasty gross aquarium stuff.  Add bleach.  (You can do a bit more than a 1:10 ratio, sometimes I'll even do a 1:3 mix, but for this stuff I wouldn't do any more than 1:5 if you have to do that much.  Just guesstimate.)  Soak overnight, check to see if they're clean.  If not, continue soaking until 24 hours have passed.  Drain bleach water from containers.  Remove sparkly clean aqarium stuff, rinse under hot fresh water, scrubbing with your fingers until they don't feel bleachy or slimy anymore.  Let air dry overnight, then place in tank.

As for the fish...  If you can set up a cheap 10 gal. temporary living quarters for them -- all you need is their current water (with a little new water, gradually do 10% water changes daily until they're in all new water) and an air pump with some fake plants or decorations for them to hide in -- that would be best while you clean out the tank and add new water.  They should be just fine -- if they can survive that tank, they can probably survive anything.

If the filter and air pump/powerheads/whatever still function well, I would keep them.  You can use the vinegar to wipe out the filter if there's nasty stuff on it.  If it's the standard hang-on-tank filter, you should be able to find an impeller (little magnetic spinny thing) at the bottom of the intake inside the filter.  If you can get it out, just rub it between your fingers and rinse it off.  Sometimes the impellers get all grimy and stop spinning, but once they're cleaned off the filter works like new.  If the airline tubing feels hard and not very flexible, I'd replace it, but as long as everything else works you should be good to go.

When you do fill up the tank and get it ready for the fish again, make sure you add some good chemicals to the water.  I prefer Stress Coat and Stress Zyme together for starting up a tank and every time you add new water (like for a water change).  When the tank's been set up for two days with the filter and everything running, I'd go get some black skirt tetras or red eye tetras (or zebra danios) from the pet store -- 5 or 7 is good to start off with, they're cheap and live through anything -- to use as your cycle fish.  You can introduce your fish the same way you normally would after about the cycle fish have lived in there for two weeks.

I hope this helped, and again, I apologize for my lack in timing.  Let me know if there's anything else I can do, or if you need help identifying the mystery fish.  Good luck, and have fun!

-Lindsay

Answer
I'm glad you got the tank back to good.  And you're right, your fish are quite lovely!

When the swordtail fry get about an 1 1/2 inches long, excluding tails, you can take them up to your LFS and they'll usually buy them from you.  Places like PetCo and PetsMart can't take them, but sometimes the employees have tanks at home.  This is where a lot of my fish come from. :)  But if you do try to sell them, they do need to be fairly big.  Not huge and full-grown, but about the size of the platys and mollies you see in stores.  And usually the more females you have the better -- they like to sell livebearers in harems (1 male to 3 or 4 females).

Have fun raising babies!

-Lindsay