Cycling a sponge filter

[Shana0310]

Hi,

I recently changed my HOB filter with a sponge filter. So, I'm having to recycle my 5 gallon betta tank. I started this process Saturday, 3 days ago. I am using Seachem Stability since it has always proved itself to work for my other tank.

Tonight I tested the water and here are my results...

Ammonia - .25
Nitrite - 0
Nitrate - 0
Ph - 7.6

I was concerned about the ammonia, so I did a 20% WC

My question is...do these number seem right based on where I am in the cycle?

In the past I had not tested to Nitrate or Nitrite since I did not have an API test kit. But now I do and I just found it to be odd that they were both at 0.


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[FWFishTanks]

Did you keep the hob in the tank as well?

 

[Shana0310]

No. The current was tearing up my betta no matter how much I tried to divert it. I hadn't had the hob filter in the tank very long so the media wasn't fully cycled. I ended up adding it to another tank.


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[FWFishTanks]

The best thing you can do is go to your lfs and get cycled media or cycled media from a cycled tank of your own

 

[jrc0528]

If you have a fully cycled sponge in another tank you could just squeeze it into the beta's tank. The squeezings will nearly instantly cycle the new filter.