Curious who STILL does this.

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R

Rakie

Candiru
MFK Member
Jul 8, 2007
650
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So Cal
I'm cycling a tank right now, it's boring and makes me anxious for fish and I think back to my reefing days... Reef people take their aquarium params more seriously than almost any FW guy I've ever met, and most of them (albeit the "old school" guys) swore by it.

I know it used to be common practice, and I know someone here must have done it before.

I go with the shrimp method, I just leave it in there for 1 day and the tank (and room) get rotten (82* water), take it out and the next day it's barely noticeable, chuck in some food pellets and give them a week or two and it's usually done.

I will say, I thought about... Haven't tried it though.
 
No need for all that, just get some ammonia.
I did my first fish less cycle with ammonia 5 weeks ago. It cycled in 3 weeks with washing out a biobag in the tank. I added some giant danios after doing a 50% water change. Then after a week I did another water change and added my fish. The params stayed perfect and all the fish are fine, except the late giant danios that my 5" PB picked off one by one. :)
Previously I've done it with fish and did water changes everyday. What a PITA!
 
in the times over the years that I have not been able to seed a new tank with established filter media, I have always used the fish IN cycle method..and got into some heated debates with fishless cycle advocates who swear it cannot be done properly and safely..which is pure BS.

stock very light at first
feed light.

your tank will cycle with fish and you will never get a readable ammonia/nitrite reading. its there of course but being broken down as quickly as it is being produced by your growing bacterial population. you get your nitrate reading usually after 36-38 days but every tank is different. that is the theoretical length of time it takes to get to the nitrate stage, the supposed bacteria in a bottle supplements MAY speed the nitrogen cycle up..

but you have to know what you are doing.

screw up (over stock and/or overfeed) and you have stressed fish along with ammonia/nitrite..which is a bad combo :)
 
when i need to cycle a tank i use the shrimp method, but just leave it in till its gone. usually on a fw tank there will be goo left over after a week or so. when i had my sw tank cycling a shrimp, shell and all would dissapear out of a nylon in 4 days.
 
If I can hi-jack for a moment.............I have been fishless cycling a tank for around 4 weeks with seachem stability. BUT for the last 2 weeks have only had very high ammonia readings and low nitrites and it hasn't changed. I stopped adding the stability when I got ammonia readings and my lfs said just leave it now, no water changes or anything until the cycle kicks over, but I am getting frustrated! Had organised awhile ago to pick up fish next week as I was sure it would be finished by then, but no such luck! Any ideas?? I have a cannister filter which has bio balls, foam mats and ceramic noodles in it. It's a 4ft tank and the filter does 1000 l/h. I am also showing very low ph and kh readings and was told to dose the whole tank again with ch powder which I did yesterday, will check KH and PH again tomorrow. Help??
 
I would do a water change. right now, there is too much ammonia for the growing bacterial population to handle. following a water change, there will be less and they may be able to handle it such that you will have zero ammonia and just have nitrites left.

a few water changes to lower the existing ammo/nitrite levels may be just what you need to get both to zero and you are good to go. you will be lowering the levels but not touching your bacterial population.

contrary to what the LFS said, there is no harm in doing a water change to a tank with no fish. stablizing the environment is stablizing the environment whether there is fish in there or not :)

this should also help to bring your pH back up.

just always go light when you initially stock.

do you have nitrate readings yet? you should by this time.
 
my salt tank i filled it, added live rock and let it run for about 2 weeks added my fish, and ive been building my healthy reef since :) i also didnt turn on my skimmer till 3 weeks after initial start up only a week after the fish, my other 2 filters were running however to build up bio in them.
 
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