How long to leave starter gravel in new tank...

[eah]

Hey everyone! A good friend of mine set up her tank last weekend using a five week old filter cartridge and about 3 pounds of gravel from my established 55 gallon tank.

She stocked the tank with a few platies, a gourami and a small school of tetras. The bacteria transfer has worked like a charm and now (2.5 days after placing the fish in the tank) she still has 0ppm readings for both ammonia and nitrite. Here's my question -- she is using black gravel and she didn't want mine to mix with it so she put mine in some pantyhose. How long does she need to leave it in there (keep in mind she won't be removing the old filter cartridge because the filter had room for two cartridges in there)? I really had no idea so I told her it was best to err on the side of leaving it in longer. However, it's a bit of an eyesore so it would be great to know when she can get rid of it.

I know a lot of you have used this method when setting up a new tank. How long did you leave the old gravel in the tank if you didn't want to keep it in there? A week? More? Less? I really have no clue on this one. Thanks in advance!

 

[Lonewolfblue]

I'd say 2-3 weeks to be sure.

 

[Lonewolfblue]

Double post. oops....

 

[eah]

I'll tell her 2-3 weeks, thanks!

I'm really curious about the ammonia-nitrite and nitrite-nitrate bacteria we all have in our tanks... does anyone know of any good online articles that go into a bit more detail about this topic? I'd really like to understand a bit more about how the bacteria works!

 

[fish_4_all]

Look up nytrifying bacteria Here Also try nitrifying bacteria, nitrogen cycle and other terms that show up in the reasults. I wish I could explain it but I barely undertstand the biological process myself.