Help Please!

[soniauke]

Thank you in advance for any suggestions you may be able to give me.

I am starting a brand new tank...a 54 gallon corner bow front tank. I have a well established tiny 15 gallon tank that has been problem free for 5 years. In that little tank, I have 2 clowns, an aptaisia file fish, a dottyback, an anemone, live rock and some snails, mushrooms and beginner corals.

Eventually, I want to move all of these things to my big tank and disband the little tank.

I have called 4 different LFS and have gotten 4 different answers as to how to get my bigger tank up and running well. Two of the stores are pushing a bacteria in a bottle (like Turbo Starter), one is telling me to add some chromis to the tank. One is telling me to simply add live sand, saltwater and next week to begin adding some live rock.

I have begun the tank by doing the last suggestion of adding the live sand and saltwater. Iconnected a large cannister filter and thermometer, and have two powerheads nicely moving the water (gently), by using a Hydor wavemaker timer. So...salt is at 1.023, temp is now set at 76 degrees.

I have a friend who had been helping me and was strongly suggesting yet another option (he actually got angry when he found out I had filled the tank completely). His suggestion was that I fill the tank with 25 gallons of new salt water and live sand, then do water changes on my old tank and transfer the old water into the new tank. While I understand his logic, I did not follow his suggestion. I figured it would take me just as long to get the new tank cycled, by only being able to add 3 gallons of my "used" tank water at a time. There is only so much I can pull per water change.

I guess my question is...what do I do next? Do I add a "starter"? Do I put in chromis? Do I add live rock next Saturday then wait till the tank begins to cycle from the live sand and rock? I am soooooo confused at this point. There are too many cooks in the kitchen right now giving me advice!

 

[Pete Luna]

Live rock which has organisms on it or Dry rock which is mostly sold. Your path is up to you. You can cycle with or without fish, I recommend without.

 

[soniauke]

I would like to put in some live rock this coming Saturday. I would also like to consider adding ammonia...when do I do this? How much do I add?

I will only be adding a little new live rock from my LFS, as I have well established live rock in my small tank that I want to transfer when the tank is cycled. I know that adding live rock helps to cycle the new tank, but I have corals, zoanthids, palys and an anemone on the rock and don't want to risk losing any of these things.

 

[Pete Luna]

Put a piece of raw shrimp in there. I’ll decay, watch the ammonia. Rock if its live needs food which the decaying shrimp will provide. You’ll cycle quicker with live rock in tank.

 

[foxt]

"cylcing" a tank starts a biofilter. That biofilter lives on rock, in sand, and on the glass surfaces. If you are moving rock from the little tank, you are "seeding" the biofilter in your new tank by moving the biofilter from your old tank. Moving the water, as your friend suggests, doesn't really do much for you in terms of the biofilter - there isn't much bacteria floating around in the water. Move the rock, and you probably won't have a cycle in the new tank - the biofilter will just keep going.

are you moving the contents of the little tank to the big tank all at once? If you at least move the fish, you don't need to do anything other than continue to feed them - their waste will feed the biofilter that moved in with the rock that you moved.

You could have a valid concern about some of the life on the rock though. The anemone should be ok. But what kind of corals do you have on the rock? Some of those may night be happy about being moved, or being in a "new" tank, even after you seed it from your old tank.

 

[Ralph Ritoch]

I don't have a lot of experience but I understand the science. Whatever you do, dose your tank with some good bacteria, like API quick start. Use your existing live rock but don't risk using any new live rock. Fill the new tank with "dry rock", or I think you can even boil live rock to turn it into dry rock if need be. The point is, you don't really want to risk hitchikers if you have a tank that has been healthy for 5 years. In fact you want as much of the bacteria and life from that tank in your new tank as possible. Cycling is something that you probably don't want to do, its great as a science experiment but cured live rock, which you have, and dosing bacteria will skip the cycling step, in a safe and PROVEN way that won't introduce new problems. If you are extremly patient you could cycle the tank by putting dry rock in your existing tank for awhile and moving it to the new tank to cycle it, but no matter what you do, dosing bacteria is the way to go because it leaves no question if your tank is cycled or not. The bacteria will go right to work! My tank, which everyone said was doomed to fail has been doing great, the keys were dosing bacteria and using cured liverock from day one!

 

[Jekyl]

If transfering all of your current rock to the new tank you shouldn't have an issue with adding all live stock at the same time. Let things simmer for a month before adding any new fish though.

 

[Jon Fishman]

What I would do (set up 4 tanks in about 6 months with no idea what I was doing, for what it’s worth)

I would put sand and some dry rock in there, fill it with SW, dump a bottle of bacteria in it, and drop however much good-live-established rock you can afford from your LFS. Keep powerheads on etc and it will eventually cycle. While it is doing all of this, keep track of what, if any hitchhikers came in on the live rock. Remove/keep them based on what they are. Keep this tank running until you are happy with it, have algae controlled, etc.

Add CUC and just let it run “as is” for awhile, and when you feel it is stable, etc. Acclimate all of your fish etc and just drop them and all of your rock/coral from your other tank.....

Old tank becomes your new quarantine, so leave it running, and quarantine whatever new fish you decide to buy to introduce to your new tank.