somethingsfishy
Aquarium Advice FINatic
Basically i want to grow snails for my loaches but I'm afraid of them not bing enough to keep the tank cycled. Any ideas. Should I get some fish too?
The_Desacrator said:I keep a small school of neons(4) to keep the tank cycled. If someone gets sick ill trade the fish from the QT to the regular.
that's exactly what a quarentine is for. your not supposed to have it out all the time.There really isn't a reason to do that. There are better ways to prepare yourself for the need to quarantine fish.
All you have to do is put a filter that you intend to use for the QT on a cycled tank so it accumulates beneficial bacteria over time. Then, when you need to quarantine fish, just get your QT out of storage, fill it with declorinated water, add your heater that's in storage, move your cycled filter from the cycled show tank to the QT, and you're good to go. If your quarantining a fish out of one of your show tanks, you can put some of that tank's water in the QT when you fill it with dechlorinated tap water; if it's new fish your quarantining, then you'd be just fine using all new dechlorinated tap water.
There really isn't a reason to have a QT set up and running 24/7. It will be stressful on the fish you're keeping in it when they get moved in and out of it, and it will mean unnecessary water changes for a non-show tank.