Is there such a thing as "over" filtration?

[1972ford]

Why not just set up a large sump and have a large biomedia section. Then over stock the main tank with African cichlids. You will have to do many water changes to keep the nitrates down but that's a good thing cause then you know you got a lot BB. then when stocking a customers tank with the media you could A. Sell some of the cichlids with it and take a proportionate amout of media to seed the filter with maybe a little more.

The only real drawback I see is that you tank will go through a mini cycle everytime you remove media without removing a coresponding amount livestock

 

[boldtogether]

The only reason people don't put bio media inside the actual aquarium is asthetics....however, there are plenty of ways to hide it and some people actually do put it in the aquarium. The media is just a place to allow the bacteria to congregate without being eaten by the fish. In a situation where you are trying to populate the media for instant cycling, placing the media in flow through bags directly in the tank with the fish all you have a fitler for is water clarity. When a setup is installed, you don't remove all the media from one tank, just portions from each....that way the ammonia will spike (probably not dramatically) in your shop tanks...not the customer tank. Then you can add new media to the tanks and the existing media will seed the new and the process continues.
Oxygen is used in an aquarium by the bacteria regardless of where it is in the water column....if fact, when you say you have a 100gal tank, and you have 30 gallons in your sump, essentially you have a 130gal system. The BB don't care where they live and you would be surprised to know where in fact BB does live.
Take marine setups. It's a common myth that marine tanks have no bio filtration. In fact, the bio filtration is most often in the form of live rock, inside the tank.
The multi tank idea is just how I used to do it...but I have friends that seed the new setups with bacteria they buy in a bottle or in powdered form like yeast...they set the tanks up, introduce the fish and bacteria at the same time and it seems to work for them...I have questioned their methods but honestly haven't heard of them losing fish.

 

[convict360]

I'm interested in hearing more about your renting out tanks idea.

In regards to the bacteria and filters, if I was doing that option, I'd get a large tank; say 100 gallons +, have about 20 sponge filters running in it with individual airlines, then I'd go wild and chuck in a school of large fish, or whatever really.

Ideally I'd then be doing water changes regularly i.e. daily, to deal with the massive amount of nitrates being produced, but the key point would be that hopefully the 20 sponges would all be seeded in time, whereupon it becomes a queue of one out, one in as you give them out to clients.

*Edit: when I say a school of large fish, I mean literally overstocked; you'd want them to be producing enough ammonia to support the bacteria colony of 20 filters, or 15 maybe. Yes this is a significant risk in terms of balance in the aquarium, but given the nature of the project, you'd just monitor it daily and measure nitrates. A further bonus could be growing plants in this type of tank, as the high nitrates would support them

 

[skjl47]

Hello; I set up a tank in a doctor's office waiting room some decades ago. My biggest issue was doing the water changes and other regular upkeep. In your plan to "rent" tanks are you also going to provide an upkeep service?

 

[duanes]

I also did not see the part about undergravel filtration.
And just to clarify, the UG filters really don't have a reasonable amount of beneficial bacteria in, or on the filter, it's the gravel that is the main substrate the BB live on, so moving 1 or 20 UG filter plates to different tanks would be a useless exercise, unless you also move all the substrate with them.
I also used UG filters back in the late 50s and early 60s, and only ran into problems if I didn't keep the substrate vacuumed, and it became compacted.
I would agree moving around sponges would be a more reasonable approach, but they must reflect the bioload of the tank you are going to populate, and should have been running long enough to acquire a healthy population of BB.

 

[skjl47]

Hello; An aditional tip on the sponge filters picked up from this forum. I bought some foam material at Wal-Mart. I cut it into the shape I wanted. It is thin enough that I can have two layers of the foam on my sponge filter base. This way I can peel off a layer if I need to ad some bb to another tank. I put a fresh new layer on the filter base and the remaining old layer still has bb on it.
A set of sponge filters should be much more cost effective than a set of HOB's. It might be worth it to try both types of filters and the other ways mentioned to find out in actual practice which will support the bb colonies and be a practical work-a-day practice. The HOB's may turn out to be the more practical in that if the same types are used on both the shop tanks and the rental tanks, then switching the media will be very simple.

 

[raubiy]

You can't over filtrate tank. How many fish poop that many BB. Other is wasted...

 

[spiff44]

I see no one suggested a micro drip using ammonia... that would keep as much of a BB colony going as you want, while also keeping the media free from possible contaminants from other tanks.

NVM..someone did suggest ammonia.. doh.. but the drip would make it pretty much maintenance free.

 

[Iron Cat]

If it was me, I'd keep a dozen or so decent sized sponge filters working off a decent sized air pump in a tank fed with ammonia drops and a pinch of food every now an then for any nutrients that might keep the BB happy. Another idea would be a tank full of ammonia-drop fed Kaldness with a small water pump. Either way, keep either systems fed with a relatively high dose of ammonia drops and you'll always enough BB on each sponge/scoop of kaldness and you'll be disease free since no fish were involved on your end.

 

[Buphy]

Sorry I haven't been keeping up, I've been busy. All great ideas! I only mention the UG filter because it illustrated the point of "too much BB" or so I thought. Anyways, convict360 the idea came from me thinking that this tea shop I regular at would look really good with a flowerhorn as a wet pet. Very oriental theme at the place. Anyways, I'm poking around to see if there's any interest in small businesses "renting" and tank set up and fish and have me come in and do 2 days a week maintenance. They'd pay X a month and have a 6 month contract.