best way to jumpstart a biofilter?

Question

Can anyone please help me? i need to fast track my biofilter. i know there are some stuff out there one can buy, but im not anywhere near where i can get any processed stuff? anybody know of any natural materials? i hear cow dung is good to place in the filter tank. what else can i find openly?

Answer 1

If you want the most effective jumpstart possible, it's filter media from another, established tank. By taking media from the filter of another tank and placing it in your own filter the result is lots of healthy, fully formed bacteria already attached to a surface and ready to go - more effective and reliable then any bottled bacteria or squeezing filth from another filter into your own tank (and cleaner too). If it's a tank with an undergravel filter you are getting it from, then just use some of their gravel, but still put it into your filter for the best effect.
The idea is to add your fish at the same time as this media so the bacteria doesn't starve first (if you can get live bacteria there literally is no reason to do a fishless cycle, you can add fish right away, i've done it many times).

This method will not only speed up the cycle, but do it instantly if the bacteria you add is equal to the fish you add. I've set up tanks from mature tanks like this many times and find it the most effortless and reliable way of doing it.

A friend might be able to help you with this, or a fish store should give, or at least sell, you foam or substrate from their own filtration systems to help you out.

Using cow dung, urine, or any source of ammonia does not make the cycle go quicker - it's just different methods of adding ammonia to start the cycle process. Nothing is better then a pure ammonia/water bottled mixture for a fishless cycle, available at most hardware stores. You still need to work out getting your hands on some bacteria though if you want that cycle to go fast.

Answer 2

In my opinion the various materials sold that say they contain the bacteria needed to speed your cycle aren't worth the containers they fill. Most are complete junk and if anything will actually make more troubles than they fix. The best way to jump start your biofilter is to 1) make sure there is adequate ammonia for the bacteria to grow (about 1-2 ppm is enough) and 2) obtain a supply of the bacteria from a known source. Probably the best supply you can readily find will be from another aquarium that is already cycled. If you can get a shop to squeeze a filter cartidge or two into a bag of water, you can add that to your tank and seed your with all the bacteria you'll ever need. Pour the seeded water slowly into your filter behind your filter pad so that much of the bacteria will stick to your filter pad. This will seed your tank and help it to become fish safe in a matter of days in most cases. Cow dung would be a very bad idea in my opinion. It will produce FAR too much ammonia.

MM

Answer 3

If you cannot use gravel from an established tank, the best thing I can say I've seen works to HELP get it going is BioSperia. Cycle isn't bad either. You're still looking at about at least a month or so before you levels are going to zero out or approach zero readings on ammonia and nitrite.

This is one of the very few times I do not agree with the higher level people on this one. I am not saying Ghapy is wrong, but in all seriousness, how fast borrowed bacteria is going to establish and grow is going to depend on the source of ammonia, and also nitrites for the secondary bacteria. It would go much faster then adding cycle or Bio Spheria I agree on that. But no matter what, if you add say a couple small danios for ammonia source, and use gravel to establish, you are only going to establish a SMALL colony, and a colony takes 24 hours to double in size. For the current load that would be suffecient, but not many people stick to just a few simple small fish, and they ramp up the stock slowly. Fish respiration naturally produces ammonia and use of ammonia in the water as the source will get depleted at some point in time. This is why I do not agree with fishless cycling on that point only. I always like reading over the top contributers and 99% of the time I agree. This is just one of those times I do not.

Answer 4

Biofilter Bacteria

Answer 5

There is a product fron nutrafin called Cycle that introduces HUGE amounts of bacteria to start your biofilter

Answer 6

Hagen makes Cycle,as well as ceramic rings that go into your filter, when you jump start it will get cloudy for/in about 2 weeks,,this is NORM dont try to fix, some places will sell you gravel from their healthy tanks to jump/buffer transition

you didnt say salt/fresh,,im going with the fresh assumption