Cycling Your Tank?

[GriffinC18]

Hey guys and gals. So when i was a beginner in fish keeping, which i still am, I had an emergency in which i had to move a fish from a ten gallon to any other tank that i had. At the time I only had a empty one gallon (uncycled). I don't remember what the specific emergency was but i thought, okay well the choices are, it definitely dies if i keep it the ten gallon, or take a risk and see if it lives in an uncycled one gallon. I do believe the situation was a fry that i did not know that i had and wanted to save it from being eaten like the others. (I now know to be prepared) I did not have a filter for the one gallon, or a heater actually. I just poured in tap water, added the proper amount of conditioner stuff and placed the little fish inside. Now, that fish is still alive to this day, it's been about 5-6 months. The problem is it has not grown very much, little by little it grows, the baby endless are already bigger than it and they are only like a couple weeks to a month old i do believe. It's fine that he's small, i'll still love him anyways lol. But i thought that this might have something to do with the conditions.
 
Also, I guess i do not understand cycling, cause shouldn't this fish have died?
 

 

[Mamashack]

The fish don't always die straight away from being in an uncycled tank - they can develop health issues tho and die much younger than they normally should.
You are probably witnessing one of these issues if it is not growing properly.
Take a look at the articles 2 thro 4 listed on this page (the ones that have a red cross next to them)
http/www.fishforums.net/index.php?/forum/291-cycle-your-tank/
They explain how to cycle a tank properly and how to rescue a fish-in cycle (not many people would recommend fish-in cycle- it's far better to do a fishless cycle)

 

[GriffinC18]

So i guess i'll say that my 10 gallon tank isn't cycled either, but the fish in there have been fine. In my filter there is one of those bacteria growing plastic things, i think that helps and fish have been in there for over a year and a half now. The most recent death was from (i think and hopefully is) old age. The other deaths was one got sucked into the filter.......dont ask my how cause the slot is tiny, and one just disappeared right out of the tank, the biggest one was gone the next day and i still do not know what happened, no i do not have cats.
 
 
So is it possible that the 10 gallon already grew bacteria and is cycled? how do you tell?
 
 
If you test the ammonia and all the other stuff in the other tanks and they are all at okay levels, do they still need to be cycled?
 
For the tank to be cycled do you have to add ammonia or will the ammonia from the fish and the bacteria that builds in the filter be enough? in a different post a very nice woman said to take some media frim a cycled filter and put it into the new one and that it would speed it up, so would it be able to cycle that way without a fish in the tank?