Going From 25L To 200L Any Advice Please

[nick1986]

Hi
 
I'm going from a fluval chi 25L to a fluval roma 200 picking it up today.
 
It comes with the heater and external fluval 206 filter, T5 lights and a bubbler.
 
just want a little help is there anything I should be doing apart from a water cycle on it. also is it worth upgrading to LED lights instead of the tube type that are with it. iv got a small 25L now and apart from my fighter getting ill not so long ago been nice and the kids love looking at the fish. main reason for change is my guppies are pregnant and want a larger tank to keep them all in and I can use the old one as a nursery / hospital tank.
 
thanks
 
Nick

 

[ricbea]

Hi Nick,
 
My advice is enjoy it. MTS has hit you and now there is no going back. Welcome to the club. I am just in process of cycling my 5th tank and already working on the wife as to where the next one can go. Trying to convince her that we need a 4 metre long 60 cm high 60 cm deep in the living room.
 
Now onto the serious stuff:
Personally I love led lights, they are more expensive but to my untrained eye they just look so much better.
 
There may also be a small worry that your new tank will not be cycled by the time that your guppies give off their fry, generally there is a 6 week window for cycling a new tank. I dont know really know if there is a truly effective way to speed that process up but I think you may find yourself between a rock and hard space. 
 
There a re load sof people on here who are truly knowledgable when it comes to cycling, hopefully a few of them will pick up on this and be able to answer in more detail.
 
Good luck,
Richard.

 

[nick1986]

thanks for your reply Richard swimming pool in the living room sounds nice lol! iv been reading on how to speed up the cycle on it and there are a few posts saying that if I add some water from an established tank this will really speed it up, and the more water I can get the faster it will be. anyone heard of this or is this right or wrong?
 
 
thanks
 
nick 

 

[ricbea]

HI Nick,
 
I am sorry to let you know that that information is totally incorrect. The water is not the key component in the cycle, rather it is the media in your filter, the substrate and plants in your tank. Adding "seasoned" water to a new tank will give no benefit. This is only the way I understand it. I have read a fair bit on this and the "good" bacteria that grow in your tank as it cycles will attach themselves to items i listed. Please don't think that you can use water from your other tank all you will likely end up with is some dead fish and some very sad kids.
 
Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, one possible way of helping the process on is if you have any friends who are into fish-keeping maybe you could have/borrow some of their media to help get your tank rocking and rolling.  
 
Good luck,
Richard.

 

[RCA]

Hi Nick, how exciting for you, a new tank. If you search or look at the menu on the forum you will find info about cycling a tank safely. Richard has advised you well, however, you also really need a liquid test kit, and then I would use pure ammonia to ensure the bacteria are fed until the tank stabilises.

Personally, with LEDs I read a lot prior to upgrading the lights on my Juwel. I decided to upgrade to the newer version of tubes, as these are sufficient for what I required. I felt LEDs were over priced, had been proven to dim over time, and also if cells fail they are not easily replaced. There will be many varied opinions, but trust I did a lot of reading/research prior to my decision, and I am happy with the plant growth rate.

Look forward to pics of your new tank developing.

 

[Oswegofish]

you should not get a new led light bc my tank came with one and still working great

 

[Gruntle]

If you take 25% of the media from your existing filter and put it into the new filter you'll get a kick start on the cycling process (provided the filters are compatible - let us know what sort of filters you have, and what sort of media they contain, and we should be able to advise you). If you have ceramic noodles or bio-balls in both, you should be able to swap the media.
 
Once you have your media in your filter you'll still have to do a fishless cycle with ammonia, but if you have even a small colony to start with from your existing tank you will dramatically reduce the cycling time required. If I recall correctly, ammonia bacteria colonies can double in size in 8 hours, while nitrite bacteria colonies take a bit longer (16 hours I think). But starting from even a small colony is better than starting from zero.
 
And you can see with a colony able to grow quite quickly, your existing tank should have no issues replacing what was lost.

 

[nick1986]

Hi thanks for your reply's I still have not put any water in it yet lol its a lot bigger than I was expecting, my chi tank only has a sponge filter and a fine filter but wont go into my new one. I watched a vid on youtube yesterday

and it tells about different ways of speeding it up and I was thinking of putting a few fish in to start the cycle off. but don't know. 
 
like I say I have not put any water in yet need to go get some gravel and make the layout of the tank. I'm thinking of a beach layout il upload some photos when iv done it.   

 

[Gruntle]

PLEASE DO NOT PUT A FEW FISH IN TO START IT OFF!
 
Sorry for the all-caps, but it's been a struggle to get the idea of a fishless cycle into the fish keeping community. You will be causing a great deal of stress for the fish, and they have (in my experience) a better than 50% chance of dying before the cycle completes (if they don't die, you'll be severely shortening their lifespan). Dead fish plus children is also something you want to avoid, again from my experience.
 
Have a read of the article posted in the top ribbon entitled Cycling a Tank. Ask as many questions here as you think are necessary (no such thing as a dumb question except for the one you don't ask), we are more than happy to help you through the process. 
 
A fishless cycle will take around a month with about 1/10th the effort of a fish-in cycle and you won't be causing pain to any fish. A fish-in cycle can drag on for months (in my experience).
 
Fish-in cycling means a lot of water monitoring and a fair amount of water changes (along with stressing the fish). Fishless cycling means a couple of doses of ammonia (which you can find fairly readily in the UK) and a few water tests every second day (about 5 minutes work).
 
Again, sorry for the all-caps but not sorry for my passion. If I'd have known about fishless cycling I wouldn't have lost about 20 fish (and about $100) before my tank finally cycled itself. I made all of the rookie mistakes (mainly from listening to the advice of the "fish expert" in the local fish store) - fill the tank up and let it settle for a couple of days and you're right to go. Change your filter media every month. Buy some goldfish, they're easy to manage. And so on. And so forth.
 
It's great that you haven't started yet, but I beg you to go the fishless cycle option.

 

[nick1986]

ok il do the fishless cycle il be filling it up today when I get home and il start to do the layout. one thing is it better to have live plants or is that just another thing to worry about?

 

[RCA]

I love live plants, you can see my planted tank in the link in my signature, as well as the image of an older setup. You can get plants that are low maintenance such as Anubias and others.

You are right to do a fish less cycle and there is plenty to read on here. I use pure ammonia to feed the bacteria and tested with an API liquid test kit.

 

[nick1986]

RCA just looked at your tank build looks very nice and very well put together!! were can I get the pure ammonia from will dobbies sell it not that many fish shops here in Liverpool well that are what id call clean and fish look happy, been to 3 by me and tell you the truth I wouldn't buy the fish from them as they don't look right if you know what I mean.

 

[nick1986]

o one more thing is it better to have gravel or sand at the bottom of the tank?

 

[Gruntle]

It depends on the fish you want to keep. I'd suggest if you are thinking of getting corydoras (or other fish that like a sand base)at any point now or in the future, go for sand. It's not hard to change substrate, but it takes a while.

Make sure you wash the sand thoroughly, and then a couple more times just to be sure, before putting it in the tank.

I have gravel substrate, for the record.

 

[RainboWBacoN420]

thanks for your reply Richard swimming pool in the living room sounds nice lol! iv been reading on how to speed up the cycle on it and there are a few posts saying that if I add some water from an established tank this will really speed it up, and the more water I can get the faster it will be. anyone heard of this or is this right or wrong?
 
 
thanks
 
nick 

 
 
Adding water from an established tank won't increase the speed of the cycle. I think you're thinking of adding water to a quarantine tank for the fish, so adapting to the tank they're going into won't be so hard on them.
 
 
And Nick, I would go with sand, I will personally always go with sand with maybe a mix of peddles just to spice things up. But in my opinion, sand always looks nicer, and i'm sure it's easier for live plants to spread out their roots in sand, I never tried live plants in rocky gravel.