has anyone ever had a tank and did not cycle it and the fish survived?

Answer 1

You can't get around cycling a tank. It's just a biological fact of life. Fish produce ammonia if there aren't enough bacteria to break it down your fish die of it. Now it you know what you are doing. You can speed up the process, and keep the ammonia down in other ways.

1)Get a filter that does biological, chemical, and mechanical filtration. That is slightly overspeced for the tank.

2)Don't add more 2 fish a week per 30 gallons. Add 10-20 will simply not work in under 100 gallon tanks.

3)Don't over feed.

4)Monitor, monitor, monitor. You need at minimum to watch the Ammonia pH, and Nitrates.

5)Use chemicals to remove ammonia as needed. Also use treatments to speed the development of the biological filter. Be sure not add a bit extra or anything. Make major adjustments slowly.

6)Be aggressive about weekly gravel vacuuming.

7)Do water changes based on your testing, but never more than 20% per day. If your ammonia is out of control do the needed water changes over the course of several days.

8)Avoid fish which are labeled by the store as not being beginner fish. They are less hardy.

Note that doing only a couple of the above things is not an option. Just throwing 10 fish into a 30 gallon tank with something like prime, and cycle to deal with the nitrogen cycle. Will result in a lot of dead fish.

Answer 2

I have two tanks that I have put goldfish in the very day I got them. One of those fish has been alive for 6 years, and he is HUGE! I've only had the other 2 for about 3 weeks, and everything seems fine.

I used de-clorinater, and water conditioner.

Answer 3

Your best bet is to buy a decoration, plant or a handful of gravel form an established pet store tank to get the bacteria introduced into your tank. Then add a fish every four days to give the bacteria time to build up.

Answer 4

Yess, you can. I have done it.

It can ONLY be done with Fresh water fish and is NOT recommended.

I was working at a pet store when I used to do it, so had easy access to the materials needed (live bacteria, water testing solutions, ammonia destroyer, etc.). It requires a lot of work, as the tank has to be monitored on a daily basis, and the correct chemicals need to be on hand to adjust fluctuations.

It can be done, but its a lot of work.

Answer 5

i tried this and only guppies can survive at last.. i couldnt save any gold fish in this situation, because i'm too lazy to change water regulary..

without any filter and facilities, the best thing to help ur fish is change water at least every week.. or they will surfer ..(but i think goldfish may need to change water within 3 days, they are too dirty..~~!! ) feed them less so that the water condition would not get "poluted" easily

Answer 6

No, I think they'll die if you don't cycle it...or get one of those sucker fish that clean the walls. What do I know? I've only had goldfish twice and they've died both times!!!

Answer 7

I was so busy working and I had two fat goldfish who stayed alive too long. Someone brought to me without asking me. The tank was usually filthy and they still lived way too long. You might not want to know what I did with them.