Warning- long post ahead.
At this point in my 25th year of keeping fish my best guest is that I have cyclled about 150 tanks. At least 1/2 of them were temporary tanks set up exxentially outdoors over the summer months. Initially, I cycled them one at a time. However, I was not really interested in waiting for 4-6 weeks before I could stock the tanks fully.
Early on I did my first bio-farm. As I was ramping up my permanent tanks I realized that I coule work with filters as opposed to tanks. Mostly I wanted to get a couple of filters ccycked and then as I began to change filters of tank down a tank from which the fish had been removed, to keep the filters from that tank cycled for as long as necessary as I knew I would need them again. So, I dosed the farm with ammonia every few days and it went smoothly.
I have used both Dr. Tim's bacteria and ammonium chloride. The latte is pricey expecially when one needs to be dosing ammonia into 6- 8 tanks. And when I began to get serious about using a bio-farm to cycle the filters for an assortment of 8 summer tanks which ranged from 10 to 40 gallons, I knew it was way less work tyo cycle the filters than to cycle the tanks.
I had the knowledge and the tools and supplies I needed. Instead of using a small bottle of ammonium chloride, I bought this 500 gram container of dry form of ammonium chloride
https://fritzaquatics.com/products/ammonium-chloride Here are the doosing instructions:
Directions & Dosage
Use 4.5 g (approximately 1 level tsp) per 100 U.S. gallons (380 L). This dose will create an ammonia concentration of approximately 4 ppm.
I know that Dr. Tim uses the nitrogen scale for measuring ammonia levles and most of our test kits use the total ion scale. I had to contact Fritz to ask which scale they were using when they said 4 ppm. I turned out they also use the nitrogen scale, That means their 4 ppm would read about 5 ppm on my API ammonia test. I had no need for that level, my target level was 3 ppm. I would be stocking heavily otherwise I could have reduced that to 2 ppm. (I will never use the entire container up before I hit the point of never cycling another tank. I am now down to 11 with plans to shut down more of these over the next 12 months.)
The summer season for my outdoor tanks is determined by the overnight low temperatures, I could handle down to the mid 50sF with the 10-20 wpg of heaters I had in the tanks. A single much lower temp night could be handled by covering the tanks with large towels. However, the tanks usually were put place in Mid to late May and usually had to be taken down by mid October. Most of the fish that would be in them needed warmer water (80-86F, many could even handle water into the low 90s).
So, I would use one of the 40 gal. breeder tanks as my bio-farm into which went all the foam filters that would end up in all the tanks, I cycled them all at once in one tank. I stopped doing summer tanks after the 2023 season. By then I could cycle the filters for all 8 tanks and what was 200- 220 gals of capacity in total in about 12 days +/- 2. By the time all of the filter were fully cycled I was having to dose over 22 ppm of ammonia daily into the bio-farm. I had do do this in several smaller additions over the course of the day.
When all the filters were ready to go, I began to stock the tanks over as much as the next 10 days. As I needed to get a tank stocked I moved the filters for it from the farm to the tank and then added the fish. This way I could reduce the ammonia being added to the farm so it was appropriate for the remaining filters.
What became to more important issue with this process was keep the KH level in the farm up. The bacteria need inorganic carbon and most of the KH in tanks comes from carbonated and bicarbonates, Crushed coral is calcium carbonate. It turned out that I need a couple of nesh bags filled with crushed coral in the tank to insure a lack or carbon slowed or even stalled the cycling process. I also needed to regular, almost daily, large water change to clear nitrate out of the system.
I used a similar methodology when I would be selling from the vendor room at the annual NEC weekend event which was held in late March/early April, I always brought tanks and cycled filters with me.
Here is a pic of a recent bio-farm tank:
Here is my work table with supplies:
The 1 gal. jug held RO/DI water. I would weigh the ammonium chloride and mix it in the measuring cup filled with the RO/DI water. I would also refill an empty 4 oz bottle of Dr, Tims ammonium chloride at the strength to produce 3 ppm/gal on the Total Ion scale. The allowed me to dose ammonia into a single tank. I did the math needed to calculate the weigh of the Fritz dry ammoniun chloride I needed for any purpose.
In order to get those filters cycled in the short time frame, I had to seed a decent amount of bacteria. Dor that purpose i used two things. The first was some of the Dr. Tim's One and Only. To save money I bought much less than would be required to almost imnstantly cycle 200+ gals. I also squeezed some of the media from my established tanks into the farm.
Over the years I have kept a small bottle of One and Only in my fridge for emergency use. Often I am using live plants in a single new tanks along with the bottled bacteria and/or filter squeezings. When I need to get a tank up and ready for fish fast, I make sure it will be fish safe this way.
I have a number of the API tests kits. I also have a couple of TDS pens which also read temp. in C. I mostly use one of these and an ammonia test kit for runnign the bio-farm. I never test for nitrite or nitrate. The TDS meter lets me know I am keeping the KH up. A lack of carbonates will show up clearly in the TDS reading if it gets too low.
Here is what I can say about anecdotal reports about cycling, especially when it doesn't work asexpected. Most of the time the cause is user error. I have not had a bottle of Dr. Tim's fail to work. When I do not have it on hand, I fall back on filter squeezeings. But there are instances when I do not want anything from an established tank that is basically "sterile" going into a new tank. This was the case for setting up a tank for newly imported Altum angels.
I cannot comment on Goop as it is not a USA product and I have never tried it. But I just spent some time on their site and can point out a few things. Dr. Hovanec et al identified the strains of nitrite oxidizing bacteria are foumd in cycled tanks. To do so they had to design probes for detecting them and a methods for using them. They were able to patent them bacteria. This meant others could not use them in their product without permission. There were also patents outside of the USA. The nitrite bacteria are Nitrospira strains.
The one thing to be avoided in this respect is to ID the bacteria in a started prodct as being Nitrospira/ Usually you will get no information on the specific strain it it will be stated they are Nitrobacter. Here is what Nitroco says is in Goop on their FAQ page (bolding added by me):
What is in Nitrico Goop?
Our goop is a complete bacterial colony, predominantly from the Nitrosomonas and Nitrobacter genus of bacteria, although there are over 100 other detectable bacteria present in the colony. We have tuned our bacteria culture with the use of synthesised feedstocks to minimise the unwanted bacteria, whilst enhancing the environment for the Ammonia and Nitrite Oxidising bacteria. Our colony is the culmination of around 4 years of selective addition of bacterial strains optimised for both growth and environmental stability.
Here is what I can tell you. If you cycle your tank using Goop and you then could afford what it costs to iednetify the nitrite oxidizng bacteria after several weeks they would likely not detect and Nitrobacter but would detect Nitrospira.
Next, the bacteria in One and Only is alive in the bottle but it is in a state of dormancy. When we put it into a tank we need there to be ammonia and nitrite present to wake the bacteria up and put them to work. The can stay in this condition at room temps for about 5 months. If you put the bottle in the fridge, the useful life becomes 1 year. Those times are determined by the fact that when dormant individual bacteria will naturally be dying every day. The dying process is slower when the temp. is cooler, hence the difference in the two termperature conditions. But, this does not mean the are 0 viable bacteria left inthe bottle. What it means is there are no longer enough to be ables to shorten the time a tank will be fully cycled. It will still take about as much time as if you had not added it at all. This is why bottles of One and Only have the date when they went into the bottle stamped on them.
Because they are in a dormant state, they have a shelf life. You do not need to use One and Only as soon as it arrives. Killing the bacteria is not easy. Freezing will do it, so do any number of chemicals we should never have in out tanks and so will getting it too hot. The number for how hot and for how long have changed since Dr. H. and others identified that bacteria.
It has also been discovered that there are other microorganisms called Archaea which has strains that can also oxidize ammonia. the work in a similar way to the bacteria but these Archaea can thrive on even lower levels of ammonia than the tank bacteria. I know that One and Only also contains some of these Archaea.
I know that in my bio-farm when I cycle filters that I am seeding both the Nitrosomonas for Ammonia and the Nitrospira for Nitrite. If i used Goop I would need to cucle for linger to get the Nitrobacter to mostly fie off and for the Nitrospira to replace them. However, during the transition Nitrite would still be handled. But Nitrobacter need higher levels of nitrite than would normally be found in established tanks.
Tye thing about using living microorganisms to seed a tank. it is possible to make m a mistek anywhere fron the bi-farm to the tank that might cause it not to work as expected.
. My lucks always tragic, but I wouldn't have imagined this considering how many people have such good things to say about it.
