Any cycling tips?

[aqua_holic]

Chocolates are awesome

 

[Jessiicaxrosex3]

They are! Full grown theyre beautiful

 

[Jessiicaxrosex3]

these are the little guys

 

[aqua_holic]

Wait, are you talking about chocolate cichlids or is chocolate a type of discus?

 

[Jessiicaxrosex3]

Oh no, chocolate cichlid!!

 

[Jessiicaxrosex3]

this is mine

 

[mikem691]

View attachment 257546 this is mine

One of my favorites that I haven't owned yet.

 

[PB_Smith]

Im trying to figure out fish to use, since my lfs wont take fish back and i cant put them in with the sa cichlids or discus tank afterword. The tank is bare-bottom, so im not sure if thats going to make this process harder. I agree, cycling my old tanks with the cichlids was seemingly easy

with a bare bottom tank you need to take extra care when cleaning the filters as you will not have the benefit of the passive biological action of the BB in the substrate.
Never clean/change both filters, always stagger by about two weeks.

Bacteria colonize surfaces, so the more surface area made available, the better and bigger the colony will be.

Personally I have always and will always employ some form of under gravel filter simply for the enormous bacterial colony it can support.
The trick is to have a slow flow rate through it, either pulling through the substrate or in a reverse flow configuration.
It should be slow enough that detritus does not get actively pulled deep into the substrate, not an issue with reverse flow.
Combine that with a decent current around the bottom, some other means of mechanical filtration and all the caveats of under gravel filters pretty much go away.

So far having an under gravel has saved me twice from extended (6+ hours) of power outage. Simply hooked up a battery powered air pump up, maintained some degree of filtration and water movement and parameters stayed fine.

If keeping it bare bottom then I would suggest decorating with as porous of rocks as you can find that still meet your design aesthetics, that way BB can colonize the rock surfaces, external and internal, and help with biological filtration, much the same as in salt water set-ups.

Good luck

 

[Jessiicaxrosex3]

Im sadly set on a bare bottom tank, although that is a great idea. Thankfully i have a generator that powers the whole house, props to hurricane sandy. I have a lot of drift wood, that would be good for growing some bacteria? Good tip with the filter media. I usually put three pads /2 sponges in so that i can move the third to another tank if needed.

 

[Jessiicaxrosex3]

Mike, its funny how i learned about the chocolate. I bought the 125 from a employee of my lfs and at his house he had a dozen tanks, and in one was this beautiful huge fish.. Asked what it was called, lfs got some in (havent seen them since) and now i have my guys