New Fluval Edge Cycling Using Existing Tank Water

[joeyh51]

Hi all,

First time posting here as I've only just got my new fluval edge set-up. Few quick questions, as my friend downstairs has a 180 litre tank thats been going for a couple of months now, would it be a wise idea to use the water in his tank to start the cycling of my own? instead of using water from the tap and adding the supplement that came with the tank?
What is it in the fully cycled tank water that would be beneficial to my filters etc?

Also would I need to keep adding anything to my tank to get it fully cycled? Like water changes from the existing tank? My friend suggested adding ammonia (fish crap) every now and then.

Thanks for the help.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

Hi Joey, congrats on the new purchase.

by far the best way to cycle a tank is to do a fishless cycle which involves adding ammonia as your friend has suggested. there is a link in my signature which explains the whole process to you. In short you add ammonia to the tank which replicates fish being in there and over the course of a few weeks some bacteria will grow in the filter to process this ammonia firstly to nitrite and then to nitrate. both ammonia and nitrite are toxic to fish, nitrate is fine unless it's in very high concentrations. you keep adding ammonia until your filter can process 5ppm of ammonia down to 0ppm ammonia and nitrite in 12 hrs, this usually takes 4-6 weeks.

I'm guessing the supplement you mention is some sort of bacteria in a bottle product, these are largely considered to be useless and just a sales gimmick. they claim to contain the beneficial bacteria that you would grow during your cycle and that processes the toxic fish waste (ammonia) to the less harmful nitrate. would be lovely if they did but bacteria is a living organism and as such needs food and oxygen to survive, if the supplement you have has been sat on the shelf in your fish shop for god knows how long then whatever bacteria was in there in the first place will be long dead by now.

you're very lucky to have a willing friend who keeps fish as you can undoubtedly get something from his tank to give your cycle a kick start..... but his water will do you no good at all. what you need to get your friend to give you is some of the bacteria I just mentioned, this bacteria lives in his filter. so if you can get some of the filter media (sponges, ceramis shapes etc in his filter) from his filter, put that into your filter and then start adding ammonia immediately as the fishless cycling link tells you. it's considered polite to replace the media that you have taken with new, you may just be able to do a swap with whatever you have in your filter at the moment. take no more than one third of their media otherwise you may cause problems in your friends tank.

because your tank is smaller than your friends even taking one third of his media may completely fill your filter with mature media which would be really excellent. You'll cut the time taken to cycle significantly by doing this, you may even find that your filter can process the 5ppm of ammonia straight away but at worst it'd probably just be a week or two before you're ready for fish.

 

[joeyh51]

Thanks very much for the info.
My friend has a 180 litre Jewel tank so which part of the media is it that I would need a sample of to put in mine? Is it literally just any of the sponge? And how much of it as if I only put a very small amount of the media in, any addatives left over could just wipe out the bacteria. Again thanks for the help, much appreciated!

 

[waterdrop]

As far as how much media, the most important guideline is as MW has mentioned, that you want to limit yourself to taking no more than 1/3 of the biomedia from the friend's filter. That way the friend will not suffer any problems from the removal of the bacteria. If your filter is enough smaller, you may not even need 1/3 and that is even better for both of you.

The sequence of events is that first you work with your friend to buy some new replacement media to match the type that will be removed. Say you buy a new entire sponge of the type that goes in the mature filter. You then remove the mature sponge and cut one third (or less) off with scissors (yes, its messy) and cut off a matching shape from the new sponge, maybe a tad larger. You press the 2/3 leftover sponge and the 1/3 new sponge together in the tray or other container and close the mature filter back up (the new piece of spong will be populated rather quickly because there are so many bacteria in a mature filter.)

Then of course you will just figure out how and where to put replace some media area in your new filter with the piece of mature sponge. Keep the sponge wet throughout the process (submerged in tank water ideally, but just don't let it dry out.) Be aware that bacteria that is moved is not always a perfect solution, sometimes it seems to go into shock and not process for a day or two and sometimes it just dies and does not "take" in the new filter at all. But the vast majority of times it will leapfrog a fishless cycle much closer to completion.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[Miss Wiggle]

yup WD's advice is spot on.

don't be scared to cut up and squash the filter media to make it fit into your filter, if it really doesn't fit though then cut the foot of a pair of tights and wrap it up in that then hang it in your tank somehow near the filter inlet. this will populate your filter with bacteria although not as effectively as if you'd got it into the filter. it also means at some point you'd need to take the mature media out, it'd be advisable to do this in stages and keep an eye on the water levels to make sure the media that in your actual filter can cope with the bio load.

 

[joeyh51]

My friend is being a little sceptical as to how much and of which sponge we'd need to take and which one. He's got Dual compact filters with 2 fine, 1 course and 1 nitrite sponges.
I'm not sure that his tank has fully cycled however, the bacteria that remove the ammonia seem to be fully developed however there still seems to be some nitrite left over, he's currently counteracting this with regular water changes but as not all the bacteria has developed he's worried taking a small amount of sponge out could throw a spanner in the works, so we just want to be sure that in helping to set mine up, its not going to kill the livestock he has in his!

So basically, what is a minimum amount of sponge we can take out (bearing in mind my filter system is tiny anyway), and which one of the sponges would be of most benefit?

Thanks again.

Joey

 

[Miss Wiggle]

hi joey, ah i didn't realise your friend was still cycling his tank. if he's still getting readings for nitrite then his tank isn't fully cycled and you're quite right that removing any of the media from his tank could set his cycle back a little bit.

suggest you leave well alone for now and just do a regular fishless cycle by adding ammonia according to the instructions in the link i mentioned before.

i wouldn't take any media from your friends tank until he's had 0 readings for both ammonia and nitrite consistently for 2 weeks without any water changes needed to keep the levels down. however if of course he reaches that point before you have finished cycling then you can take some media then and give it a nudge along.

 

[waterdrop]

Yes, this is the reason its referred to as "getting a *mature* media donation"... a filter that is still cycling does not have "mature" media yet. WD