Best way to cycle my newest tank?

[SkarloeysMom]

I currently have -

cycled 2.5 gallon Minibow with 1 betta
cycled 5 gallon Minibow with 3 white clouds and just added 2 male fancy guppies- they all seem to be doing well so far but I know they need more space.

I will be buying a used 10 gallon from someone tomorrow and I want to move everyone up one size tank, leaving the 2.5 gallon empty? (yeah, right!):hmm3grin2orange:

My question is - What is the best way to accomplish this without killing anybody?

I'm a little worried about getting the new tank cleaned up sufficiently. Its currently in use but the seller will be moving his fish to a bigger tank before I go pick it up. I asked him if the tank was cycled and he said he didn't know. He's had it for a year and so I suppose it is and he just doesn't know it. Anyway, any suggestion about how to do this successfully would be greatly appreciated.

[Lady Hobbs]

It would be easier to just read the Newbie Tips in the Tank Set up thread. Tells all about cycling right there and would save me re-writting it all over here. I just cycled a 29 gallon in 5 days.

[SkarloeysMom]

Thanks for pointing me in the right direction! I'll read and see if I still have any questions.

[cocoa_pleco]

Do fishless cycling. theres a stickie on it. Its faster than regular cycling since you can crank the temp up and use more ammonia

[SkarloeysMom]

I read the Newbie tips and I am familiar with how to cycle a tank. I have two that I have cycled already. I was thinking I could use the water and substrate from the 5 gallon in the new tank and fill it the rest of the way with conditioned water, sort of like doing a 50% water change only to a bigger tank. Would that speed up the cycling of the new tank? I assume the new tank will still have to cycle.

[cocoa_pleco]

using seeded filters, or decorations, or gravel tremendously helps. Water, not so much since most of the bacteria is in the gravel and filters

[Lady Hobbs]

The bacteria is in the gravel and filter media.....not in the water......so if you could transfer the others over it would be great. If you don't want to use the gravel in the new tank, put a bunch of it in a nylon and hang it where an air stone can go thru it or add it to the back of the filter if you have room.

[SkarloeysMom]

Thanks Cocoa Pleco and Lady Hobbs! That's what I needed to know. I think I've got a plan now. Hopefully the cycling will only take 5 days like yours LH!

Thanks again

[SkarloeysMom]

I got the 10 gallon set up today. My son picked a sunken treasure/pirate theme and I used one of his painting for a background. I like this idea because we can change it whenever he paints something he likes! I think the tank turned out looking good. I used fake plants because I haven't had any success with the real ones. Maybe someday I'll figure that one out.

I'm doing a fishless cycle now and hoping the rocks from the previous owner with help speed up the cycling process. I'm not sure if I'll need to add ammonia as our tap water comes complete with its own dose of .50 ppm of ammonia straight out of the tap. Yuck! We'll see if its enough to get the cycle going. Oh and our tap water is also super hard (about 10.0 Ph) so I got some SeaChem stuff to neutralize it. I'm going to test the ammonia and Ph again tomorrow and see where it is.

My little fishies are going to love all their new real estate!:malelovies:

[cocoa_pleco]

lol, "dont drink the water"

[SkarloeysMom]

Yep! I have a four year old son. I have to post the "Don't drink the water" warning! HAHA! He picked that sign too.

[cocoa_pleco]

lol, tomorrow you see the tank half full and the filter grinding.

[AquaQueen]

lol, tomorrow you see the tank half full and the filter grinding.
lol...yeah, because CP came by and drank the water!:laugh1blue:

[cocoa_pleco]

hope the water wasnt cycling and full of ammonia! lol

[SkarloeysMom]

OK, so I've been to the grocery store and the SuperWalmart and found no ammonia that was only ammonia. It all has surfacants or dyes or stabilizers or some extra ingredients so I don't know what to do next. I want to fishless cycle this new 10 gallon but can't find the ammonia. Any ideas were to find a straight ammonia brand sold in the U.S. with no additives? :confused:

As suggested in the Stickie on fishless cycling, I went ahead and put the filter cart. from the 5 gallon in the 10 and added an air stone bubbler and cranked up the heat to like 85 to try to speed the cycle. This morning I had about .25 ammonia and no nitrites yet. I'm not sure the filter was old enough to provide much bacteria since I changed it just a couple weeks ago before I got "new tank fever." When I brought the 10g tank home I cleaned it out totally and rinsed the gravel really well because it was really dirty when I got it and I thought I needed to start fresh. I'm thinking that might have been a mistake to clean the gravel so throughly but I thought it would be better because I was not sure about the previous owners water quality. Any guesses as to if this tank will cycle without the ammonia being added and if so how long it might take??

[cocoa_pleco]

home depot?

I can name tons of only- canadian stores, but home depot is the only american one i can name

[SkarloeysMom]

home depot?

I can name tons of only- canadian stores, but home depot is the only american one i can name

Really? I didn't think of that. I'll check their cleaning product section next time I'm there if the cycle hasn't gotten going on its own from the other stuff I'm doing.

Thanks for the suggestion!

[kenyth]

using seeded filters, or decorations, or gravel tremendously helps. Water, not so much since most of the bacteria is in the gravel and filters


Don't forget though, there is plenty of bacteria in the gunk vaccuumed from the gravel along with the water!

[cocoa_pleco]

Thats how i cycled me new 33g.

I did water changes for all my tanks besides the bettas and salt tanks and added the waste to the 33g, cranked the temp to 87F, added bacteria supplement, and 7 day cycling.

[SkarloeysMom]

So today, just for fun, I decided to check for Nitrates in my newest 10g tank that's been set up since Sunday PM. If you haven't read the rest of this thread, I've been trying to fishless cycle but had no luck finding pure ammonia. So I do my test and lo and behold- there is a 5 reading for Nitrates! When I set up the tank I had a .5 ammonia reading and I tested for Nitrites a couple times and never saw a spike. Anyway, after the first test I decided to go ahead and test everything else.

Ph - 7.0
Ammonia - 0
Nitrites - 0
Nitrates - 5

Is it possible that this tank cycled in 3 days without even adding any additional ammonia??:confused:

Well, it looks that way to me so I went ahead and moved my 3 White Clouds to the new tank and they seem to just LOVE all the new space. I think I'll leave the Guppies in the 5g for now since I just bought them last week and they've already been through enough trauma I think. I think they will enjoy having the 5g to themselves. One of my White Clouds is kind of bitchy and I think she's been picking on one guppy and nipping his tail fin. I've noticed a bit of it was gone after the first couple days. I'm so glad I have them in separate tanks now.

[kenyth]

That means you had ammonia in your water to begin with. Test your tap water. Ammonia contamination isn't uncommon.

[SkarloeysMom]

Oh yeah, our city water does have ammonia straight out of the tap. I tested it and found that out when my Betta got sick last year. The new tank started with .5 ppm even after adding Amquel to the water when I was setting it up. I guess that was enough to cycle the tank, eh?

I will still keep a close eye on the levels for the next couple of weeks to make sure that something doesn't go wrong.

[Lady Hobbs]

I got my pure ammonia at Family Dollar Store. Often the old mom and pop hardwares will have it as well. The big chains don't care it much but hopefully the Home Depot, huh?