Best Way to get friendly Bacteria?

[newland]

Hi all

I've one tank fully cycled and i'm in the process of setting up 2 new tanks.

I'm happy with cycling the tank fishlessly and am going to try it on these new tanks.

My main question is whats the best way to get friendly bacteria from an onld tank into a new tank without disterbing the old tank too much?

My first thought was when i do my next water change to clean the filter media in the water that was removed and then add this water into my new tank.

would this work as i'm assuming that some bacteria will leave the media when being cleaned and hopefully attach to the new filter.

Alternatly i thought of putting the new filter into my existing tank alongside the existing one and leave it for a week. Then add this filter into the new tank and start the fishless cycle.

Good ideas or not?

Thanks All

 

[ravekiss]

Alternatly i thought of putting the new filter into my existing tank alongside the existing one and leave it for a week. Then add this filter into the new tank and start the fishless cycle.

I would go with this idea...i did it when I upgraded my tank...worked out well.

 

[paulthegreat]

I set up my 2nd tank with conditioned water, added plants and then cleaned the filter from the first tank in the second tank. Added a few neons for a few days had 0 ammonia 0 nitrite and 10 nitrate. Moved the neons back to the first tank and put in the fry and a flying fox. Worked like a charm.

 

[Inchworm]

Hi newland

The success of starting a tank using bacteria from an established tank depends on the size of the tank you will be taking the bacteria from and the one you are moving it too. In many cases, especially if you are setting up a smaller tank, you can move enough so that you will not have to go through the cycling process at all. This is one of the advantages of using the same kind of substrate in all your tanks.

Since the beneficial bacteria clings to the surfaces, rather than floating in the water, the more surfaces you move from one tank to another, the better it will work. Since the filter has many surfaces it houses much beneficial bacteria. There are also many surfaces on the gravel, especially if it is fine, the plants, decorations, etc., and they all have bacteria on them.

This bacteria reproduces itself quickly if there is a steady food source for them and you can remove quite a bit of it without causing harm to your established tank. For example, you could switch filter pads, if you use the kind that has them. (From time to time you replace them without harm, right?) Or take out half the gravel (after giving it a good vacuuming) and sprinkle it on top of the new gravel in the new tank. Just replace it with new gravel and it will soon be back to normal.

If you do these things, just stock the new tank lightly at the start (immediately after moving the bacteria) and the bacteria will increase to keep up with small additions of new fish. This is, in effect, cycling, but without that high spike that is harmful to fish.

 

[newland]

Cheers for all the info.

I'm confused with what to do completly now.
Right the established tank is 6 gallons and the 2 new tanks are 15 gallons.

How does this effect everything?

I'm only planning on moving 3 guppies and 2 babies from the smaller tank into one of the bigger tanks.

As the new tank is a lot bigger will it have that much of an effect on it?
Once this tank is established and the cycling is finished i'll transfer the fish to the other new tank and replace the established tank with new fish of the same size.

I don't want to keep guppies. Eventually the guppies will go to another home as my mate is setting up a tank soon and wants the guppies.

 

[newland]

Has anyone else got anything else to help me?

 

[nc_nutcase]

I think the advise thus far is excellent. When I 'seeded' my 55 Gal for cycling I used 2 lbs (1kg) of gravel in nylon stockings, a couple large rocks and several smaller decorations from an established tank. My Ammonia spiked around 3.0. I didn't do daily tests but I got the impression that my nitrIte spike wasn't very high. I did this while cycling with a ton of small guppies. I had very few casualties and even had about a dozen female guppies give birth in the tank and the fry did wonderful (until I added a baby convict who ate them all).

If I were in your shoes I would be tempted to cycle one of the new tanks at a time. I like the idea of (and also did this on my 55 Gal) running double filtration on your established tank for a week or two then transferring the filter to the new tank.

I was also warned that it is possible to over seed your new aquarium. So after my spikes I removed one piece of 'seeding' material every 3rd day until I only had left what I planned to leave in the tank. This way if by chance the seeded material contained sufficient bacteria to deal with the entire bioload, the aquarium didn't loose all of these items at once leaving the aquarium devoid of enough bacteria to handle the bio load.

Cycling one tank at a time (or even off setting them by two weeks) will allow you to reuse the seeding materials as well as run your second new filter on the established tank as well (I just can't see 3 filters on a 6 Gal tank).

It sounds like you have a pretty good understanding of what your looking to achieve and with the established tank, are in a good spot to move forward with ease. Best of luck!

 

[Inchworm]

Hi newland

Shifting bacteria around is a whole lot easier when you are setting up a small tank from a big one. It will be hard to take much from your small tank.

My first thought was when i do my next water change to clean the filter media in the water that was removed and then add this water into my new tank.

I don't think this is a good idea because you could get a case of cloudy water going that could be hard to get rid of, and the dirt itself won't contribute much to the cycling.

I'm only planning on moving 3 guppies and 2 babies from the smaller tank into one of the bigger tanks.

That much is good news. That's very little fish in a good sized tank. I would just take a cup or two of gravel from the small tank and sprinkle it over the surface of the gravel in the new tank. I'd also use a couple of gallons of water from the small tank when starting up the new one. This will not add any significant amount of bacteria, but will help condition the water by keeping the formation of those little bubbles that appear on the walls down and let you add the fish right away.

Unless you are in a great hurry to add a lot of fish, and I don't think you are or you wouldn't be thinking about doing a fishless cycle, you can let the bacteria grow naturally using the wastes from the guppies. In other words, do a cycle "with fish."

In a couple of weeks, you can add a few more fish, and a few more each week as the bacteria increases to accommodate them.

 

[newland]

I just thought i would update you on my plans.

I'm planning to put some of my new gravel into a net and add that into my existing tank.

Also i'm purchasing some new plants to they too will start off in the existing tank.

As i'm adding a lot of stuff to my existing tank i'll remove some gravel and put that into a net into the new tank.

Then run a fishless cycle on 1 tank. Adding the net of gravel from the existing tank and an old planyt from the existing tank.

After about a week i'll start the second tank off on a fishless cycle adding the new plants that were put into the existing tank and the netted gravel.

Once one has cycled i'll move the 3 adult + 2(maybe more) baby guppies into this tank. Also is i'm taking some fish out of my main tank to keep the balance i'm going to add a couple of new ones possibly a simise fighter.

Has anyone got any comments on this way?

Once the other tank has cycled i'll buy some new fish and add them into this tank.

 

[One_Trick_Pony]

yakult is full of freindly bactreia! tho perhaps not a good idea to put it in a fish tank

 

[nuttyfishgirl]

hmmmm bloooo blocks for the toilet make smelly tank water smell better and a bit blue in colour but kills fish ... i found out when my daughter added it to her dads tank cos it stank lol (we are divorced )
shes very young so we forgave her

 

[Inchworm]

Hi newland

It soundl like you have a good plan. Please post back on this thread and let us know how it works out for you.

 

[newland]

I will do.

I must remember the yakult trick to speed up my cycling. lol.

At least she use Bloo and not something else. It would have been funnier if she put an air freshener in there.

 

[nuttyfishgirl]

yeah i guess so lol