Other ways to cycle your tank.
- Thread starter severum mama
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jetajockey
come get me tang police!
One very important factor in getting a tank established that is often overlooked is the process of building biofilm.
skiweeangel
Aquarium Advice Addict
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- Mar 24, 2011
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Could you elaborate?
Fish in cycling can be faster in some cases. I believe that as long as you seed it, increase the bio load a little bit at a time, and do a lot of water changes, it is very possible. 
fishless cycling can get kind of boring sometimes...
fishless cycling can get kind of boring sometimes...Flossie said:Hey severum mama
Imo some (live, not raw from the grocery store, just to be clear) shrimp and snails would be good for a small bioload... but since it is a 55 gallon, you would need a lot of shrimp and snails... so I would recommend a small school of hardy fish... danios are pretty hardy...
eco23
Aquarium Advice Addict
maxwellag said:
One of the points of doing a fish-in cycle is that if it is done responsibly and with commitment..."hardy fish" are not necessary. If you do the process correctly, monitor parameters and do pwc's as needed...there is no reason to use, or sometimes sacrifice fish for that purpose. Fish you permanently plan on keeping are fine unless they are some type of uber sensitive fish IMO.
I think one of the reasons fish-in cycling has such a bad rap is from the old school methodology of sacrificing feeder fish or a few "hardy" fish for the cause. To this day there are major corporations (stores and suppliers) who strictly advise adding hardy fish, not changing any water, and letting the "scout fish" (as Tetra refers to them) cycle the tank for you. I truly believe that once that stigma is removed and people understand the responsibility it takes to safely get your fish through the process...the negative view of fish-in cycling will be somewhat diminished.
(Not picking on you Max, I just wanted to address the term.)
jetajockey
come get me tang police!
Sure, biofilm is the building block on which the bacteria colony establishes itself.
If nitrobacter and nitrosomonas were peanut butter and jelly then biofilm would be the bread.
It takes time for biofilm to get established, one way to see if a tank has it is to run your finger against the inside tank wall, if its slippery then you have biofilm, if it's squeaky, like rubbing your finger across the outside of the glass, then it's not there yet.
Nitrifiers anchor into biofilm, so without it they won't be very productive.
Flossie said:
Yeah, they are... but ghost shrimp are dirt cheap... but like Eco said, you don't have to use hardy fish, you can put in any fish that is compatible with stocking limits... and you just have to do what it takes to keep it alive.... that way you have the fish you want, and don't have room being taken up by fish used mainly to cycle your tank... if you seed it with some good media and put it in the filter or in a high flow area, and put some raw shrimp in, or do the industrial ammonia thing, you'll be fine... but if you are certain on going fish in, put in what you think you will want in the future, after it is cycled. You will just have to make sure that toxic levels are low. Very low. Do whatever it takes to keep them low.
maxwellag said:
Yeah idk I was thinking of getting some
Zebra danios but idk.... I may just need to wait.
I really don't want to do pwc daily to cycle. I am trying to keep up with weekly pwc on 2)55 and 2) 10s right now. Just got some dechlor and it's going fast lol!
jetajockey
come get me tang police!
You don't have to do PWC daily for fish in cycling if you keep the stocking very light, it's actually really easy to fish-in cycle if the stocking portion is done correctly.
I agree about the not getting hardy fish thing, I don't get fish that I don't plan to keep.
I agree about the not getting hardy fish thing, I don't get fish that I don't plan to keep.
jetajockey said:
Oh ok well I threw in some food but I really don't want to try and keep the BB that way bc it's messy and I don't want rotting fish flakes in my tank.
I tested today and had .50 ammo and .25 trites and 5 trates so idk if it'll support any fish. My tap does have chloramines so it shows ammo sometimes but I use a ammonia neutralizer
Would it be ok to add some ghost shrimp!? I was wanting some anyway
Flossie said:
Imo definitely, if you wanted some anyway, and because they are a small bio load, so ammo wont build up and bite them back as much (hopefully)... I also suggest amano, red cherry, or mandarin shrimp... amano shrimp are really good for algae control. Cherry shrimp are red colored. They are better looking than ghosties. (Imo) mandarin shrimp are orange.... also look different.
bruinsbro1997
Aquarium Advice Addict
Great article! They should make this another sticky. I'll keep it as a reference when I'm setting up new tanks.
jetajockey
come get me tang police!
if you do decide to stock the tank, the first thing to do is a thorough water change/cleaning to get any possible ammonia source out of the water so you are starting with a clean slate, so to speak.
jetajockey said:
I don't know where ammonia would be coming from except the food which wasn't much but like I said my water has ammonia ( so to speak) in it. I just did a pwc yesterday or day before. I will test the water tomorrow and see if the ammo
Went down.
