Cloning A Tank

[lyotim88]

so i picked up a 20gal L today and im going to clone it with the media running in my established tank. my question is do i still add ammonia or will it be cycled on its own? thanks

 

[Tolak]

This depends on the size of the donor tanks and filter, as well as the stocking level of the donor tank and what you want to stock the new tank with. The length of time the donor tank has been running has to be taken into consideration as well. Nearly all of my tanks are cloned. I clone tanks on a regular basis, mostly for fry, or new fish I get in.

Let's say, for example, that you have a 20 gallon tank with 20 guppys. The media will support the bio load of those 20 guppys. Half of that media will support 10 guppys. Ypu could take half the media, put it in a new filter on a new tank, add half the guppys, and be reasonably sure it won't have a problem.

A mature colony of nitrifying bacteria is capable of doubling in 24 hours. Mature means running 3 months with no problems. Knowing this, you could take a percentage of media from a mature filter, guesstimate the bio load, and start a new tank, with fish, using this media.

I always suggest taking no more than 1/3 from the donor tank, fasting the donor tank for 24 hours before removing media, and feeding lightly for the next several days. This gives the nitrifying bacteria a chance to catch up on what it perceives as an increased bio load, less food means less waste produced.

So with our example tank, you could take 1/3 of the media, start a new tank, and add 6-9 new guppys. In the real world few people have a tank set up as our example, and start a second tank as our example. What has to be done is estimating the bio load, and the bio load of any new fish you wish to put in the new tank. This is why I suggest the 1/3 thing, as well as fasting, it leaves some room for error.