My LFS will swap you bio-wheels from their established tanks. You bring them in a new bio-wheel and they will swap you one that has been running for no cost. I guess it is my LFS going the little extra step to help the customer instead of trying to make a dollar.
Why doesn't every LFS ???
- Thread starter JK47
- Start date
It is a great idea as long as it was not a fish sump. If they fishless cycled it and kept it all loaded with ammonia to cycle the media well I would jump all over it being disease free. Great ideaJK47;2964989; said:Oh, and yeah, that was a hint Zennzzo!
One thing yall have to realize is a LFS has to make $ to say open...its not just to rip you off altho sometimes it might be lol. You can and will loose a lot of fish for different reasons plus all the other expence that is there. It cost to keep the doors open and you dont make a ton of $ off reg FW fish at .99 each. And some LFS carry all that CHEM crap becasue customers come in and ask for it and if you dont have it they leave and go somewhere else to get it so why not sell it. Even if you try to explane to them its bunk stuff. ITs always "ohh my friend been using this stuff for years and never did one water change and all his fish live blah blah" Also a lot of customers would think if they got the cycled bio material from the store they should be able to go home and overload the tank with all the wrong fish and overfeed and not clean it and then blame the LFS for selling them bunk stuff to make a buck. Even if you try to explane to them they did some stuff wrong.
Now I do think it would be a good idea if properly done but it would take a lot of room...and then you would have to set up some system that you could tell what media is really fully cycled and not just replced from all the stuff that was sold over a weekend. Might turn into a headache or they could really sell something that was not fully cycled and really kill a bunch of fish.
As for the SW sand and live rock...thats easy to do...when you get in live sand to sell...its cycled and live...no need to try to add dead sand to it and wait to have it ready and the other stuff to wory about. Same for the rock...once its cured its done...you order more.
I used to work in a LFS for many years...started out as one of those teenage kids that didnt know much but I never acted like I did...I just learned. ONce you work in a LFS you see the different kind of people in the fish world...the good ones like on this site...and the ones that should be banned from keeping anyhting but a loaf of bread.
Now I do think it would be a good idea if properly done but it would take a lot of room...and then you would have to set up some system that you could tell what media is really fully cycled and not just replced from all the stuff that was sold over a weekend. Might turn into a headache or they could really sell something that was not fully cycled and really kill a bunch of fish.
As for the SW sand and live rock...thats easy to do...when you get in live sand to sell...its cycled and live...no need to try to add dead sand to it and wait to have it ready and the other stuff to wory about. Same for the rock...once its cured its done...you order more.
I used to work in a LFS for many years...started out as one of those teenage kids that didnt know much but I never acted like I did...I just learned. ONce you work in a LFS you see the different kind of people in the fish world...the good ones like on this site...and the ones that should be banned from keeping anyhting but a loaf of bread.
In my guess its because most beginners are impulse buyers and as so would buy the flashy packed chemicals they sell, instead of some dirty old scrubbie. And people who know how effective old gravel and sponge sqeezings are would already have established tanks they can pull biobacteria from.
You would need a VERY large bio load to have any sort of large amount of cultivated bio media quantity to sell. Your best bet would just be to build a system without a pond to which just recirculates the water wthin itself with ammonia being dripped into the system at a specific rate to cultivate the max amount of bio media.
When people say, "My tank has cycled". That means the toxins in the water have gone from Ammonia to Nitrite to Nitrate. You can't say bio media is cycled because there is nothing to cycle. You can say its cultivated with bacteria though. Doesn't matter if some has more or less bacteria, if it has any, its cultivated, ready for use, ready to cut down on total cycle times if any.
The problem with this as well is the cost of the bio media to out weigh the cost of operation, maintenance such as water changes to keep Nitrate from going off the charts. Maybe setup a Nitrate filter of some sort instead.
Its not that the "media" wont be cycled. Media can not get cycled. Its your aquarium that gets cycled. Any amount of bacteria on bio media will quickly cultivate more bacteria in much less time than starting from nothing. You can see what bio media would be cultivated by looking at it. The bacteria is kinda tan or brown in color.
The main issue is that you do not know what bio load they have in their tank and what the bio load's needs are. So you would want to sell bio media which is has cultivated as much bacteria as possible.
The lfs by me has one of there tanks divided up packed full of bio-balls that they sell as established media. I think its a good idea i would have bought some when i first started out. The wait for my tank to cycle was dredfull.
Jgray152;2968375; said:
Your right...wrong terminology...I should have said cultivated.
These days tho...doing fishless cycles seem like the way to go. Am I wrong in thinking it doesn't take as long as doing a fish cycle? I haven't tried it out yet...but will on my new 240 once its ready
In my experience the fish less cycle happens quicker and you get a healthier aquarium because you did not have to stress out some cheap fish to get your bio media making your tank more "virgin" if you will. Although now I have a huge bacteria colony to draw from so cycling should be able to finish in less than two weeks.
Jgray152;2968375; said:
Yeah those are great points, especially the nitrate. Dammit I thought I was onto something too! It seems like in a drip system with some major nitrate control it could be feasable for hobby based stores who care and are not as revenue oriented. Maybe just as a "prefered customer" type thing. I was not thinking on a Costco scale or anything just that it would be cool on a smaller scale for your customer you wanted to retain long term.
My company has us thinking of creative ways for customer retention and I could not help but think if my LFS would have offered this to me a few tanks ago I probably would have a few more set up's than I do now and I would have come back to them for the livestock. Thanks for the responses!
