Tank cycling ?

[Bubbles]

:hi: all

Well the tank is up and running and has been for a couple of days now, so now we come to cycling. Due to hubby being out the house most of the day, i think i will be doing this, so chris went looking for ammonia to use and came back empty handed, couldnt find any. I thought homebase stocked it? Anyway i was reading PFK forum and someone suggested boiling urine to sterilise and use that.

Could i really do that ( i know it sounds gross) all opinions welcome.


I did see about using fish food but then you have to consider phosphates.

 

[Irene0100]

hi, is this your first tank?
if you have another tank or you have a friend with a tank, add some used water from water changes. never heard of boiling urine!
I am sure you can buy some quick start bio from local fish shops. I have never bought any cos always set up new tanks using water and filter material form existing tanks.
what type of filter did you choose?
good luck and let us know how you get on.

 

[st24rsap]

if you have another tank running then just seed the new filter with some media from the established filter and then run both filters side by side in the old tank for a while, this will colonise the new filter with nitrifying bacteria and enable you to transfer it along with some of the old tank water across to your new tank, should only take a few days.

i have done this with all 6 of my tanks, i originally did a fishless cycle on the first tank and have since just seeded the new ones from an excisting filter

 

[Bubbles]

hi, is this your first tank?
if you have another tank or you have a friend with a tank, add some used water from water changes. never heard of boiling urine!
I am sure you can buy some quick start bio from local fish shops. I have never bought any cos always set up new tanks using water and filter material form existing tanks.
what type of filter did you choose?
good luck and let us know how you get on.

Hi Irene

No this is the third tank, it is a 540 litre our other ones are 106litre.

In it are 2xfluval plus 4 ( internals) and the external is a fluval fx5.

To be honest it didnt occur to use some of the water from the plec tank :wb:

 

[Bubbles]

if you have another tank running then just seed the new filter with some media from the established filter and then run both filters side by side in the old tank for a while, this will colonise the new filter with nitrifying bacteria and enable you to transfer it along with some of the old tank water across to your new tank, should only take a few days.

i have done this with all 6 of my tanks, i originally did a fishless cycle on the first tank and have since just seeded the new ones from an excisting filter

Unfortunately the smaller tanks have 2 x fluval plus 3's so the media is not the same.

Hence the 540litre tank we are doing a fishless cycle.

 

[st24rsap]

do the fluval plus 3 use sponge filter media? if they do then squeeze the sponges over the new filter media, this will also transfer some of the good bacteria across and give the new filter a kick start. 99% of nitrifying bacteria in a tank is in the filter, the water contains very very small amounts and the substrate will also contain a bit but not a lot.

 

[Bubbles]

do the fluval plus 3 use sponge filter media? if they do then squeeze the sponges over the new filter media, this will also transfer some of the good bacteria across and give the new filter a kick start. 99% of nitrifying bacteria in a tank is in the filter, the water contains very very small amounts and the substrate will also contain a bit but not a lot.

Yes they do will ask hubby to do that, sorry i must seem a bit daft not to think of doing that.

 

[st24rsap]

Yes they do will ask hubby to do that, sorry i must seem a bit daft not to think of doing that.

when you do it just dont over feed the old tanks for a few days as some of the bacteria will be transfered to the new filter so the old ones will need a few days to build the levels back up to what they were. reduced feeding and small daily water changes should be done to keep the water quality in tip top condition during the process

 

[Bubbles]

when you do it just dont over feed the old tanks for a few days as some of the bacteria will be transfered to the new filter so the old ones will need a few days to build the levels back up to what they were. reduced feeding and small daily water changes should be done to keep the water quality in tip top condition during the process

Ok and understood :thumbup:

 

[Bubbles]

Started the fishless cycle

:hi: all

Just to let you know chris managed to get his hands on household ammonia, so we followed the instructions given on a site for fishless cycling given to me by a kind PP member.

Thank you to everyone for their kind replies.

 

[st24rsap]

fishless cycling is easy enough, you can still use my tip with the media to speed it up as sometimes from scratch the fishless cycle can take a very long time

 

[Princess x]

I agree seeding with mature filter squeezes does indeed speed the whole cycle along :yes: cutting it down to 10 days in most cases

 

[st24rsap]

I agree seeding with mature filter squeezes does indeed speed the whole cycle along :yes: cutting it down to 10 days in most cases

yep which is a massive difference to the 30-40 days it can take sometimes from scratch

 

[Bubbles]

wow that is a big differance, thank you for the info much appreciated.

I can only take from the two filters running in the plec tank, as you all know i recently had trouble with ammonia and nitrite in the second tank that homed the rescued fish and dont want to de stabilize that tank.

Would taking just from two filters be enough?

 

[Princess x]

It will still make a big enough impact to cut it down any probs shout

 

[Rabbit]

As above i use water from an existing tank and filter material and will generally have a new tank ready to go in a week after ph, gh, kh, & Nitrates/Nitrites look good.
I only ever test for these things at the start of a new tank and will every now and then check gh & phosphate.
HTH

 

[Irene0100]

good luck, hope you can post some pics when its all set up.
what fish are you planning to put in it?

 

[Bubbles]

After discussing with hubby we have decided to carry on with the fishless cycle.

We really do appreciate your kind advice,and dont mean to cause any offence or appear to be disregarding your advice based on experience, but dont want to upset the smaller tanks filtration, and i know it will take longer, but that will give hubby time to finish the cabinet.

 

[Bubbles]

good luck, hope you can post some pics when its all set up.
what fish are you planning to put in it?

Eventually there will be : 2 common plecs,8 odessa barbs,2 clown loaches and 2 pictus catfish. We have plans to add to the clown loach and pictus numbers later.

Will get some pictures up : D

 

[N2Biomes]

I've read about fishless cycling, but never needed to do it, since I have many sponge filters to transfer as well as multiple filters using the same media that can also be moved over.

Please let us know how it proceeds, Bubbles. It will be a learning experience for a lot of us. :yes: