kindafishy
Aquarium Advice Activist
Thanks, Bubble_B0y. I guess I was making things a little more complicated than necessary!!
So how exactly do you manage that? I mean, theoretically, that would mean that you would need to keep a second cycled tank ready permanently, filter running and everything. Only problem with that is that you would have to stock it w/ something live to keep the bacteria from dying off, right? So THEN that would mean that you need a minimum of 2 tanks, in case a fish in tank # one goes ill. BUT, when you put the sick fish from tank one into tank two, you infect whatever living creature you might have in there, and potentially kill off the bacteria from the hospital tank. And the whole mess starts all over again.
biomedia (bioballs, biomax, ceramic rings, matrix etc.... )should never be changed. Just washed in water from the tank.
Sometimes, media such as sponges or cartridges, act and serve both as mechanical media and biological media.
These too should be washed in water from the tank.