new 29

I'm starting a 29 gallon planted tank and I wanted to know if it would cycle faster if I put some of the filter media(bio max) that I have in my already cycled tank into my hob power filter on my 29 gallon tank.would that work? or do I need to add bacteria?

 

Oh yes, moving filter media from a cycled established tank is the quickest way to cycle a new tank. I do this all the time by keeping more than one filter running on my large tanks and by squeezing muck water out of my sponge filters. Dumping muck water into a new tank makes it look really ugly for a few hours but it instantly cycles the tank.

Depending on how much media you move and what the bio load it had will determine how many fish you can safely move into the new tank without over loading the bio load of the filter. As long as you stock it lightly at first and increase the stock slowly you shouldn’t have any problems.

 

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That's what I do is move media over to a new filter.

Also squeezing dirty filter media in front of the the filter's intake.

 

alright on my established tank all I got is a canister filter with sponges and biomax.I don't think I have a big enough filter on my new tank to be putting a lot of biomax into it.so what if I just squeeze all the excess out my sponges that are in my canister filter into my new tank?Would that cycle it instantly?

 

Doubtful. But just putting some seeded biomax would speed up your cycle condiderably. The bacteria allegedly doubles every 24 hours, and your biomax should be loaded with bacteria.

 

I am not totally confident that it would do a complete instant cycle but it would give the cycle process a good boost. Clean your sponges out in the new tank near the pick up area for the new filter. It will make your new tank look ugly for a few hours but the filter should clean it up rather quickly. You could also dose the tank with a product like Seachem Prime if you see any ammonia or nitrites show up in the first few days. Prime will only detoxify the ammonia for 24 hours so you would need to do water changes and dose again to keep the ammonia and nitrites safe for your fish.

You could also dump a bottle of Tetra SafeStart into the tank to help the cycle process out. If you do that don’t do any water changes or tests for the first 10 to 14 days. Now if you go this route don’t use Prime or any product like it because it will make the TSS useless.