Tank cycling

[Edmundo]

But most love to buy and load........... wahahaha

[downxxer]

Care to share what filter medias you pros use? Heard from a bro to use oyster shells or coral rocks. where to get this. And i am going to look for black gravel and more shapes of driftwood. where got a large choice. Been to NA, C382, seaview cant seems to find nice ones.

[Edmundo]

Oyster and cocker shell are useful for buffering the ph. I used cannister with BioHomme, red or grey i dun mind.

For nice dw, u can try Green Chapter at clementi. Ithink they sell ADA standard DW.

[Mr.XPlecos]

Originally Posted by barmby

Hi downxxer, i use 4 weeks to cycle the tank. by week 4th, i put some hatchet fishes into the tank and test out. Most time - they are perfect. it may seem not right to do for animal lover.

Any tank with sand looks nice. But sand is also hard to siphon out the dirt. Therefore, these are the consideration.

Actually, one don't have to put anything to ccycle the tank. Just anti chlorine, chloramine, aeration and don't always wipe the tank.

Originally Posted by Edmundo

IMO, if your cycling is done without any aid of BB media, it may takes as long a a week. If u intend to use BB media, i believe 2-3days is suffice. Easylife Fluid Filter Media is good.

Sands, i love, cos i like a natural touch, but not too thick, otherwise iz hard to maintain.

Part about sand, do becareful if you're going to run any OHF filters. I've lost 2 TOM 800 powerheads partly due to my own negligance to alleviate pump such that the inlet portion of the powerhead is a significant distant away from the sand surface.

The 1st one stopped running completely after 1 yr in the tank and the replacement I bought lasted like 3 months before problems surfaced.

Small particles of sand gets ****ed into the magnetic shaft, causing the shaft to be worned out. This causes unnecessary noise or vibrations, plus unpredictable stoppages of the powerhead especially when I off the power supply to maintain my OHF.

I'm still running on my 2nd TOM800 thou, but it is running at a significant low efficiency due to the worn out shaft. Would take pics to show if it stops working again. Time to change to some other brands of powerheads when my wallet recharges.

The plus point about fine sand is that it is easier to maintain compared to other forms of substrated as poops wouldnt get trapped in between (pleco poops are much massive compared to the gaps between sand particles), makes maintenance easy.

[barmby]

I use Dolphine power head for my planted tank to drive my outlet for CO2 distribution. It has been working really well for as long as I remember.

Downxxer, I use good old tradition Ehiem substrat and bio ring. The last layer before water goes to tank - I use biohomme. And this BioHomme - I never wash them but rinse with used tank water.