New Tank- Help please?

[Sammy S]

Hello,
I have had a 10 gallon saltwater running for over a year with just a cleaner shrimp and toadstool coral and some rock. I am upgrading to a 35 gallon which was started last night with live sand, a c2 pump, some dry rock (thoroughly washed and dried) and Seachem Prime and heater.

My question is: when can I begin putting the liverock from the 10gallon into the tank? And how long to wait for cycling before I move my coral and shrimp?

I am keeping a check on nitrites, nitrates and ammonia!
Salinity- 1.023
Temp- 74F
35 Gallon Long
Uses RO water

[Sniperhank]

Present an ammonia source into the new tank, be it pure ammonia or a cocktail shrimp. Then monitor your ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate levels. When the ammonia and nitrite are 0, you can do water changes to bring down the nitrates and transfer the livestock. I'd go this path due to the shrimp simply not causing a need for much beneficial bacteria in the current tank and even adding one fish could cause issues w/o a proper cycle.


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[Sammy S]

You mean a piece of food or an actual live shrimp?
I have a skunk cleaner shrimp but my parents got him for me in December and he was $40 so I do not wish to try putting him in there first.....

I thought in small tanks there couldn't be any more than one shrimp per tank? Thank you so much for your help, I'm a bit rusty (haven't started any tanks in a few years)

[54seaweed]

A Deli shrimp it will bring up your ammonia level to start your cycle

this will give you a better understanding of using a deli shrimp with your cycle

Cycle your salt tank - Aquarium Advice

[Sammy S]

Thanks so much!

[PB_Smith]

you are thinking this is more delicate than it actually is and there really is no reason whatsoever to not transfer the rock now, the sooner the better.

you could transfer everything into the new tank and monitor the levels and do partial changes if needed.
As long as you don't add any new livestock and reduce feeding for about a week, chances are it will be fine. You will see a brief minor elevation in levels, but I imagine no more than a few days.
I have done this many, many times with success.
I transferred the entire contents of a 30 gallon into my 50 and experienced a "cycle" of about 30 hours, if that and that was about 7 fish, lots of inverts.
I threw together a 10 gallon by using rock and filter media from my 50, dumped a trigger and two eels in there and never saw so much as a blip in readings.

If you do transfer everything, rinse the sand well in the old tank water to remove as much detritus as possible, but it will retain bacteria to help seed the new tank.

OR you could leave the filtration in place on the 10 gallon, leave the critters in there and move the rock to the new tank and that would help get the new tank started and shorten the cycle time.


a single shrimp and coral are not going to produce so much waste that it would be problem while the tank settles and adjusts.
just transfer everything into the new tank in a few days when you know all is good on the new setup.


No need to deal with rotting shrimp in the tank when you already have the needed bacteria and stuff in the ten gallon.


telling you to cycle from scratch is poor advice IMHO.

[Sammy S]

Really?
I just worry about my shrimp is all n.n;
I may add in one of the rocks now then to start and just add a little each day. All I have is one large Toadstool and my little cleaner shrimp along with some marine plants and a bunch of rocks (along with a few astarina sea stars here and there). I haven't had any fish in it!

Unfortunately my gravel in the 10gal is crushed coral and I wasn't a fan of it, so I changed to sand!

[PB_Smith]

This is my thinking on it.
If you do the whole cocktail shrimp cycling of the new setup you have 6-8 weeks of cycling, then the process of slowly introducing livestock.


BUT if you transfer the live rock and filter media from the old tank into the new one and monitor it, chances are very likely that between the greater water volume with the same bio-load being handled by the already established rock/bacteria, it is very likely that you will see no increase in ammonia, nitrite or nitrate levels at all.


Then let it ride for 2-3 weeks then slowly begin to add new livestock, one critter at a time with at least 2-3 weeks in between additions.
you still need to stock slowly and carefully so the BB can catch up, but you save yourself weeks of time.


It is your system and critters, so do what you feel best, but I personally see no need to go through the whole cycling process whenever you already have well established bacteria colonies available.

[Sammy S]

Thanks!