Moving Cycled Water

[Dr_Shakalu]

Well, my son has a 20 gallon planted tank with guppies, mollies and platies. Petco just had another sale $1 per gallon up to 55 gallons. I'm off this weekend and I want to do this quickly. The new tank is 29 gallons. I was wondering about cycling the tank. If I take the water, filter, gravel and put them in the new tank, adding 9 gallons of fresh would it be considered cycled and can I immediately put the fish? Also, there are some benificial bacteria in the gravel so would I have to rinse the gravel in some of the fish tank water and will affect the water quality in the new tank and start a re-cycle?. Thanks in advance.



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[Lgw]

You can transfer everything over and start up straight away, just don't let the filters dry out and you'll be fine!

 

[RampageRR]

Yup, the water itself doesn't really hold any of the bacteria. As long as you have water the same temperature and something like Prime added to remove any chlorine/chloramine, the filters you already have the established bacteria on should be fine. You can rinse the gravel in the old tank water and then move it into the new tank as well.

 

[Dr.B]

Just dump the gravel and plants and filter media into the new tank and it should be and instant cycle if the BB aren't dried out. You don't have to wash your gravel, but if you feel that this'd be a good time to clean it then you can. However just makes sure that you have something else that contains BB and add it to the tank such as the filter media. As long as you have something that BB is on (decor, gravel, media, etc..,) if it's stays moist you can just put it in the new tank and it's pretty much and instant cycle.