Made a dire mistake last night

I'd also like to add, why are you cycling a planted tank? If this is a high-tech planted tank, and you completely fill it with plants, they will aid in the cycle and you might not ever see one really.


yes, it is going to be high tech. Right now my 29 is just a few feet away and I plan on adding everything from that to this one. I was thinking of doing a plant cycle but I have some rummies in the 29 and I dont want to kill them if there is a spike.
 
Wow, what a mess. That's no fun.

I'd also like to add, why are you cycling a planted tank? If this is a high-tech planted tank, and you completely fill it with plants, they will aid in the cycle and you might not ever see one really.

^^ Now you tell him. He's probably 8 water changes into this. lol.
 
im on waterchange #12. gonna do a few more. I got my coralife aqualite today so I can switch everything over but would anyone advise against adding the fish at the same time?
 
Any "surfactants" in the mix are just organic compounds that reduce surface tension. They aren't going to stay around long term, they aren't going to change your substrate in any permanent way. Especially not when only 0.0018% of the tank volume has been added.

If you're extremely worried, do a couple big waterchanges.

This is not a break-down-and-scrub-the-tank issue, IMO.
Man, I wish I'd found you when I made this mistake. Would have saved me some trouble!
 
If you aleady have an established tank, you really have no need to cycle at all, you can instantly cylce it by seeding it with bacteria from another tank.

If you are moving the plants from an established tank, move the fish over with them. There is really no need to do a cycle from start. I havent cycled a tank in , hmm....well so long I cant remember becasue I have had tanks to seed new tanks.

I havent seen anyone mention putting carbon in your filter, do this as well after you get done with your water changes and start things back up.. I think you will be fine. BUT, I will suggest you add a few fish, such as danios to test the tank out before putting your reg stock in it. I have a school of danios that I have kept around for that purpose because I have set up 2 tanks that I was unsure of what could have been in them, and wanted to be sure they were safe for fish.
 
yea im moving everything from that tank over to the 75 so im pretty sure the duration of the cycle will be less than a day. To be safe, after I did my water changes today I threw some carbon in an old fluval 404 i have laying around and im now in the process of getting the temp nice and stable. Thanks everyone for your input!
 
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