Upkeep Of A Cycled Tank(s)

[The Equillibrium]

I have a cycled 29 and 50 for breeding angels. I was wondering how I could keep the good bacteria alive until my angels decide to pair and come in this tank? Theyre empty now.

 

[Edge]

I'm no expert, but when you do fishless cycling you keep the bacteria alive using small quanitites of pure ammonia. Then do a large water change just before you add the fish, to get rid of large Nitrate build up. I've done it with two tanks and it works great. I used Homebase Household Ammonia for about £4

 

[piper]

or just keep a few small fish in there

 

[Irf]

And you can also get Household Ammonia from larger branches of Boots..... costs about £1.80 I think.

Irf.

 

[The Equillibrium]

I cycled them with a cycing medice called stability. Before you say Those dont work, I have used it on my 46 and an old 10 gallon both going perrfectly. And about the ammonia. Where do you get it?


Thanks

 

[Cheffi]

The other way to do it is to run the filters from the unused tanks in the cycled tanks until you need to move the fish.

 

[The Equillibrium]

Thats a good Idea except my current filter(in my sig-too big to type)takes up about half of the back of the tank. Another tetra 40 and 60 would Blow it up.

 

[The Equillibrium]

Sorry for the double post, ut could I add some fish food in there? I cant find ammonia.

 

[Irf]

I believe you can (I've heard that it can help). I'm only recently trying fishless cycling myself, so I'm not an expert. However it's possible that the decomposition of the fish food may help your bacteria growth.

I'm sure an expert will be along in a minute....!

I'm amazed that you can't get household ammonia over there. I had a little difficulty here in the UK, but not really very much. Have you tried your local hardware or janitorial supplies shop? It's called "Household Ammonia", and typically contains just Ammonium Hydroxide and water.

Irf.

 

[scubadoo]

Sorry for the double post, ut could I add some fish food in there? I cant find ammonia.

You can but it's hard to assess how much ammonia you're adding that way.

By the way, if the tank's been empty for a few days now without a source of ammonia it's likely that you will have already lost most of your bacteria - they need a constant supply to maintain a colony.