Cycling A Tank

[thisguyek]

After a disastrous first run with my 55gal, I've decided to start completely fresh. I soaked everything down in a salt bath and began anew.

I've got a few questions about my cycling 55gal tank.... I was sort of forced into doing a fish-in cycle as i didnt have an adequate home for my big pleco. I know the ideal situation would be to find mature media from someone... but having the problems that I've had i was leery to bring any foreign objects into my tank just yet.

1. Actually... as i was typing this... i thought of something... I've got a 10gal set up (been set up for a few weeks now) That had mature media in it from my 55 gal originally. the stocking is in my signature. Would it be enough to set a spare floss filter (bio filter) into my 10 gal to accumulate bacteria and eventually into the 55gal filter?

2. If I can do this... how long would you say it would take this spare filter to become mature?

3. do you think my pleco would then be enough to keep sufficient bacteria?

4. what can you tell me about Ph and cycling? When i cleaned it out... it was filled and drained several times. the Ph of my straight tap water is right around 7.5 if i remember correctly. When i put my plec in and started testing I noticed that the Ph had jumped to roughly 8.3! I've got cichlid stones in there now.(I believe they are made of ceramic or something like that...) would this cause the rise or does it rise on its own during a cycle? I do have a nice large piece of driftwood soaking right now, which will bring it down.

It's been 10 days since i started fresh with my 55gal. the first seven days I used stability by seachem. Testing every other day I have not picked up an ammonia or nitrite reading. Testing my tap water, i pick up about a 5 reading for the nitrates, which is what my tank also shows.

Sorry for such a long post! All opinions welcome and any other info you got would be nice! I've been researching a while... sometimes helps to hear about others personal experiences rather than some scientific report...

thanks for your time!

 

[fluttermoth]

1: It takes a long time (6 weeks or so) for a filter running in a tank to pick up enough bacteria; they stick very strongly to the media (that's how come you don't lose it all when you clean your filter). You'd be far, far better off taking as much media as you can from the cycled filter and putting that into the 55g filter.

2: As, I said, six weeks; but swapping some media around is better.

3: Yes; plecs are pretty messy and will feed a good bacterial colony. Remember, when you come to stock, not to add more than 50% of your current stock and don't get anything else for a week or two. It might be tricky to work out how many tetras (or whatever) = half your plec, but I'm sure you'll manage!

4: 'Cichlid stones' are often made so that they buffer harness and thus raise pH; I'd take them out and test them (put one in a container of water and have another, identical container filled with plain water, test both after a week and compare).