How to maintain BB colonies in cycled Fluval f4x filters not in use

FishHobby99 said:

Can I do something like keep the inserts in conditioned water and feed with aquarium ammonia or fish food to maintain the BB?

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Colin_T said:

Yes. Either clean the filter materials/ media in a bucket of tank water and put the media in the aquarium with the fish. Or clean the media in a bucket of tank water and then put the cleaned media in a bucket of clean tank water and add some ammonia and an airstone.

You can use fish food instead of ammonia but it's harder to maintain a stable level of ammonia. Use a bottom feeding pellet or algae wafer and leave it in the bucket of water until you get 3ppm ammonia. Then remove the food.

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