Getting A Bigger Tank... Cycle Process?

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Bloopie

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I currently have an established African Cichlid tank running for almost 2 years.
In the next few weeks I'm planning to get a new, bigger tank.
How do I go about preparing it for my fish in the fastest way possible to save cycle time?
I will be putting in the same rocks I currently have, and the same gravel...
Will that make the cycle process faster?

Thanks.
 
If you are planning to move everything from one tank to the other and not have but one tank, just move everything over (including the water so you don't have to acclimate the fish to new water), start the old filter along with the new one and you are done. You will have transfered almost all of the bacteria so you won't have to worry about cycling it. Just add new fish slowly to allow the bacteria to catch up each time.

If you plan to run 2 tanks, set up the new one and add some filter media from the established tank to the new filter. That will give you a jump start on the bacteria. Use ammonia to do a fishless cycle which should go pretty quickly. You could probably move close to half the media from the existing filter without any problems since the bacteria in the existing tank would double itself again in about 24 hours. The rocks and gravel will help a little but not very much. The vast majority of the bacteria colony are present on the filter media.
 
If you are planning to move everything from one tank to the other and not have but one tank, just move everything over (including the water so you don't have to acclimate the fish to new water), start the old filter along with the new one and you are done. You will have transfered almost all of the bacteria so you won't have to worry about cycling it. Just add new fish slowly to allow the bacteria to catch up each time.

If you plan to run 2 tanks, set up the new one and add some filter media from the established tank to the new filter. That will give you a jump start on the bacteria. Use ammonia to do a fishless cycle which should go pretty quickly. You could probably move close to half the media from the existing filter without any problems since the bacteria in the existing tank would double itself again in about 24 hours. The rocks and gravel will help a little but not very much. The vast majority of the bacteria colony are present on the filter media.

Thanks.
I plan to have one tank and use the same filter I currently have...
 
As long as the filter is big enough that will be fine but if it's made for a smaller tank, it probably won't give you the filtration you need. It needs to process the water at least 5 times per hour.
 

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