cycling water question

[shavo]

OK so here goes. My brother is starting a new 55 gallon tank. I have a 125 gallon tank and I was going to supply him water from my tank for his new tank.

I had a conversation with a friend who told me that would not do any good that water doesn't get cycled but the live rock gets cycled.

2 options are new live rock or no live rock.

if new live rock i would think that the rock has to cycle and he would have to wait the few weeks for the cycle, is this correct?

if no live rock would my bro be able to throw in fish almost immediately?

he is going to have a skimmer going on the tank so i would think it would be good to go

thanks guys!!!

 

[Anonymous]

If all he wants is fish, no corals or inverts, then yeah, rock and roll pretty much. (Depending on what kinda fish, if its delicate / has special habitat needs or whatever then you gotta work with that..)

Rock is essentially your biological filtration. If thats gonna be taken care of with with a power filter or (even better) very regular water changes, go for it.


What kinda fish is he shooting for??

 

[shavo]

i am not 100% sure what he is going for for fish yet

he is aware of the water changes he is going to be doing

thanks

 

[Microcosmos]

Hi! I vote to add LR and a lot of it, simply because it adds bio filtration and most small fish love to live in it and it provides small critters to eat and it's pretty. But it definitely depends on the kind of fish, if he's going for a large bottom dweller like a shark or ray then LR would cause belly scratches but I wouldn't recommend a big fish like that for a true newbie unless he relishes expensive lessons in disappointment. LR is expensive, but worth it.

 

[Anonymous]

OK so here goes. My brother is starting a new 55 gallon tank. I have a 125 gallon tank and I was going to supply him water from my tank for his new tank.

I had a conversation with a friend who told me that would not do any good that water doesn't get cycled but the live rock gets cycled.

Well, true and not true. The water should have some beneficial bateria in it but it is minimal. You are better off giving him detrious and substrate from your tank to seed the newone.

2 options are new live rock or no live rock.

if new live rock i would think that the rock has to cycle and he would have to wait the few weeks for the cycle, is this correct?

Weeks to a month, depending on the quality of the rock and how it is handled.

if no live rock would my bro be able to throw in fish almost immediately?

Uh, not if he wants to keep them alive. Adding fish right away, with live rock or not is a really bad idea, and wrong way to go about things unless he is planning on HUGE water changes and even then it is iffy due to the fluxing of the water conditions. Changing large amounts of water while closely matching SG, Temp and pH is a challenge for experienced hobbyists, much less a new one. Even if he is going fish only without liverock, he should have some sort of substrate and filter setup, right? Even those need time to 'cycle' i.e. grow enough beneficial bacteria to support the waste generated by the fish. Fish produce far more waste than a coral only tank and need a more mature system to a) process the ammonia and b) not turn into an algae ridden mess due to excess nutrients.

Remember, nothing good ever happens fast in this hobby. If money is a concern, buy dry rock (dead) and seed it with a few pieces of good live rock and detrious from your established tank. Think about the time and money he would spend changing out 50%+ water a week until things stabilze, not to mention replacing any livestock that dies due to the cycle and you'll see if isn't worthwhile.