What do you guys think of this?

I agree with the author that people get really worked up about the technical end of this fish stuff. not to suggest that cycling doesn't exist but all of the old timer fish keepers I have talked to really don't think that all of this crap is that neccesary. Bio-spira and fishless cycling or any of the things that are highly recomended by lots of people on this forum I REALLY AGREE that we get a lot of people on this forum that present their opinions as facts or they copy and paste info they find on other sites (some 13 year old canadians who shall remain nameless...) I feel that this forum is more about chatting about fish tanks and it is a mirror to help you make decisions about your tank. Educating people about the details of fish keeping is a great thing and I have found a lot of help in a lot of situations but I think some people need to remember that this is supposed to be a nice relaxing hobby not constant water testing and stressing about nitrAtes and nitrItes.

Bring it on.
:argue:

I believe in the 1 day cycle as well. People cycle for several days to grow benificial bacteria. The main reason why the bacteria is benificial is because it eats decomposed junk in the water that can harm your fish. But for the first few days of setting up a tank there is nothing in the water to harm your fish. I just set up the new tank, do a 90% water change after several hours then get the fish the next day.

As for the information people give you on forums, you just have to be smart about what you read.

While fishkeeping is a hobby for most and is meant to be relaxing, we are also dealing with live animals and as such should do all that we can to ensure their livelyhood. The aspect of cycling a tank may seem like an unnecessary hassle (we're asking people to hold off from putting their fishes in for weeks or even months), it is not something the industry and aquarium elitists made up and there is a science behind it.

The cycling process has been explained numerous times in this forum so I won't go into that detail. Suffice to say it will occur in all fishtanks given time, the question is can your fishes survive until water conditions stabilize? In some cases the answer will be yes, but there is a definate risk involved that has been shown many times in many forums in the form of posts asking for help.

People who advocate the cycling process are trying to reduce the risks for the fishes, some may be overzealous and some may be flat out wrong but that is the nature of message boards and the anonymity of the internet. Aside from loving their fishes, many aquarists want to share their hobby with others. What they don't want to see is someone enthusiastically trying out the hobby only to be turned away shortly after first attempt at fishkeeping ended up in disaster.

Well said phanmc.

I suppose in the end its up to the fishkeeper to decide how far they are willing to go to make the tank as ideal an environment as possible.

Great thread. I've never been a huge advocate of fishless cycling, or even for using the term cylcling (i don't think it accuratly reflects what happens). There is a time and place for it. New fish keepers with first tanks, and tanks where people want to add a full stock right off the bat are two times that I would advocate it.

When I set up new tanks, I use established media from other tanks, and add stock slowly. That way I can watch how each new fish fits in, and plan the next addition (half the fun for me is browsing the lfs and going over possible combos in my head).

I think it's important to note that when zman talks about never cycling, and just adding a mature filter, i believe he's refering mostly to breeding projects where he's moving pairs of small fish into large tanks (ususally as the sole inhabitants) and moving filters from tanks that have a much larger stocking density than the tanks he's moving them into. Lastly, using established media means you already have a balanced population of bacteria. There's no waiting for the nitrosomonas to start creating nitrite and then waiting for the nitrobacter to start dealing with the nitrite. It's just a matter of the populations growing together to meet the new bioload, which happens very quickly imo.

Cycling a tank fishless etc. is great advice for newcomers who end up overstocking a brand new tank and filter and wondering why all the fish are dead 4 or 5 days later from a massive amonia spike. Who knew?
There's a lot of heartache in it for parents with little kids who watch their fish die overight and not knowing why.

I know an old aquarist who just throws in a couple black mollies or goldies for a week, does a water change a few days later, and stocks right away.

There is however, a science to it. And no matter how you get to the end of the cycle, its always the same: amonia -> nitrites-> nitrates.

After you understand the cycle, you can play with it. But for newcomers its best to monitor the cycle to know how far along its progressing.

Right now, I'm at the point where I add a big chunk of dirty filter floss to my new filter, lightly stock with the guppies I have and wait one to 2 days to make sure levels are ok. (water changing if needed) The 2 x 25g tanks I started up were cycled within a few days.

But at the beginning, I added fish to a brand new tank and lost 2 mollies from an amonia spike, later I found this forum and all is well since I got 'edjumacated'.

Whatever way you arive at it, the cycle is amonia-> nitrite -> nitrate. Can't change that fact.

I think Tickle brings up a very good point. Many of the things said on this forum aren't necessarily the gospel truth, but they are taken that way. Oftentimes newbies will change their opinions in a thread because one or two "heavy hitters" (those that have posted 1,000's of times) put their .02 in, though other expeienced hobbyists would say they were right originally. This is neither here nor there. However, there is more than one way to skin a cat and just because TFH hasn't written an ariticle on a subject in a few years doesn't make older or more classic approaches to fishkeeping wrong. If you find this hard to believe, look what Innes was suggesting somwhere around the turn of the century (the other centry, not this one that just came around). Much of what he advises for tropical fish husbandry is still extremely poignant today. For example, I am a strong advocate of adding fish to an aquarium slowly. I think it's a good idea to quarantine fish. I treated all of this as gospel truth until just for grins I set up a 29 gal. planted tank. I work as a tropical fish wholesaler and our company allows its employees to purchase fish once a month. I had all of the aquarium compontents (not set up, mind you, I just had the parts), and houseguests that weekend. I figured "why not? I need a good looking tank in the house and I have one chance between now and then" and gave things a shot. I purchased 2 angels, 24 cardinals (tank raised in Florida), 6 ger. blue rams., 6 cories, approx. 12 amano shrimp, 12 or so oto's, and a battery of plants (crypts, various bunched, smaller swords, anubias, vals, etc. etc). I got home, filled the tank, set up the CO2, planted, plugged everything in, added ferts, let the tank run for a few hours and added fish. I thought I simply wasted money on fish and they would all be dead within three days. After all, who in the world adds 50 or so fish to a 29 gallon tank that hasn't even been set up!? Well, what amazed me was the few articles I've read saying that planted tanks don't exactly cycle due to the nutrient uptake from the growing plants were exaclty right. Ammonia never went to dangerous levels, nor did nitrite or nitrate. I experienced the typical new planted tank algae blooms, but adjusting ferts and lighting schedules solved that. Ultimately, I did take the angels out as they got too big too fast and added a few flag-fish to fight a minor hair algae problem. In the end though, I only lost a few Cardinals in this whole ordeal (less than 6). This was nearly 2 years ago.
My point to the story is this: If I were to post this as an idea on a forum, there are several people on this board that would lose their minds telling me what kind of idiot I am. I would like to think that I didn't get lucky and experience taught me how to make these things work, but who knows? In the end this is what worked for me.
Sorry for the long post, but I had to get that off of my chest.
Also, as someone that works very closely with LFS operators, I'm considering writing an article in defense of the LFS owner. There is a lot more that goes on behind the scenes than sitting behind the counter collecting money and every once in a while a lot of the regular posters go into their "listen to what kind of dumb*** this guy is" session. Sometimes they're right, sometimes they're waaayyy off. I think it would be fun to write something to try and set the record straight...

I think Hennie Landman http://reefmaniacs.com/hl/, offers a balanced view of cycling in this article on keeping a marine tank. I am sure I would not drop $4-800 dollars of marine fish in an "uncycled tank".

Biologists have provided scores of technology and techniques to the hobby aquariast, and to discount it seems foolish. If we can reduce the stress to our fish and reduce our risk of loosing money by doing dumb things I for one will. Much of the information that is repeated in the forums originated or has been validated in a University biology department like Scripps UCSD etc...

http://www.thetipsbank.com/marine.htm

" From reports I have read, you must purchase some; how many I never figured out yet. But some fish you don't really want in the first place and put them in the new tank and they will "cycle' the tank or possibly even die! "

Well, apparently this paper is not exactly scientific, heck its barely english.

People kept fish for a long time before we even knew of cycling. I suppose all those people could also say that they didnt 'cycle' their aquariums. All of this guys tanks 'cycled'. Just because he had no clue of it taking place does not mean it didnt happen.


" No problem yet! AND I didn't even cycle the tank! I don't think!" -Perhaps the most telling line of the entire article.