Fishless Cycling

[Mikaila31]

I'm planning to stock my planted 20 gal all at once, cuz the store I get my fish from is a good hour away. I would like to stock it with about 5 sparkling gouramis and about 7 threadfin rainbows. To do this I'm planing on doing a fishless cycle in my quarantine tank but i'm confused at the amount of ammonia the tank should be able to process at the end of the cycle to be able to hold all of these fish. Any ideas on how to figure this out?

Thanks, mikaila31

 

[Puffdaddy]

This would depend on the amount of filter media space there is for the bacteria to grow on. The more the better

 

[rdd1952]

If you do a fishless cycle as in the pinned thread (link in my signature), you should have plenty of bacteria to handle that quantity of fish but it depends on the size of your q-tank. If it's a tank that would normally house that many fish, then you will have plenty of bacteria. If it's only a 5 gallon tank that would normall only house 3 or 4 small fish, then you may not have enough. In either case though, if your tank can process 5 to 6 ppm of ammonia in 8 to 10 hours, it should handle the load of the fish you are talking about, especially if you feed them lightly.