Seeding New Tanks with Old Tank Rockscape + Ammonia/MicroBacter

kitti-fish · Jan 20, 2025

A dumb question but getting mixed answers so though I would ask. I am upgrading my 13.5 tank to a 32.5 and I decided with the introduction of Tims Ammonia and Brightwell Aquatics MicroBacter Start XLM I would also incorporate one of the rockscapes I have from a tank that has been running for a little over 6 months with loads of coraline algea and pineapple sponges, assuming this signals a healthy and well established tank. The rock is small (the one on the rightside) and I am not sure if this is an issue. Will this distrupt my cycle or quicken it? Brightwell states it should cycle in a week. Currently ammonia is at 2.0ppm and I Nitrites still read 0ppm. New tank has a cloudy appearance so I am going to assume bacteria bloom is happening. Any advice is appreciated~! Tank is only 1 day old so I could be just impatient and just want to jumpstart this project I started in Oct 2024

lights stay off as well until cycled.

shakacuz · Jan 20, 2025

it will help the cycle if you include a "seeded" rock from a cycled/mature tank. i would still suggest to test accordingly to a normal cycle to avoid any hiccups.

kitti-fish · Jan 20, 2025

shakacuz said:
it will help the cycle if you include a "seeded" rock from a cycled/mature tank. i would still suggest to test accordingly to a normal cycle to avoid any hiccups.

Yes, that is what I have done. I wasn't sure if it would interfere with the Tim's Ammonia and Brightwell I also added or if it would even be enough as it's a fairly small piece of rock.