Johnfish Posted September 11, 2016 Report Share Posted September 11, 2016 Hi All. I am a new here and want to thank everyone for all the great information. I presently have a 10 gallon shrimp tank with blue velvets and blue dreams. It has been up and running for about 6 months and everything is stable. The shrimp are reproducing and seem happy. I also have pygmy cories in the tank. The tank is planted and I am using a finnex stingray for lighting and a AC 10 hob for filtration, I want to move the cories to a new 10 gallon tank and start a new nano fish tank. I am going to purchase another AC10 Hob for this tank. My question is how do I use some of the media from my existing tank to seed the new tank with out disturbing the original tank? Is there a a certain percentage of the media i can move? The HOB at present has a sponge at the bottom. activated charcoal in the middle and ceramic balls at the top it also has some filter floss on the intake so I don suck up any shrimp. I am sure the activated charcoal is expired but I have been afraid to replace it because it might disturb the balance in the tank. Parameters are as follows. TDS 240, ph 7.6 GH and kh i havent tested in a little while. Thanks in advance. John Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Greenteam Posted September 11, 2016 Report Share Posted September 11, 2016 You can run new filter on old tanks to help it seed or you can take sponge from old tank and squeeze that mucky buildup onto the new tank. Just a side bar tip: in your HOB filter I recommend you place Media at the bottom and sponge on the top. Reason is the media will never need a cleaning since the sponge will actually be one catching small particles of waste. So when you go clean the HOB you just take the sponge from the top and squeeze it out but never rinse under sink water. Also if you have live plants you wont need the active charcoal since the charcoal is taking away all the goodies plants need. ohmiko, Soothing Shrimp and Vpier 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Johnfish Posted September 11, 2016 Author Report Share Posted September 11, 2016 Thank you Green Team!!! So if I remove charcoal should i add more ceramic balls or sponge? The reason I havent removed the charcoal Is I am afraid that there is bacteria in the charcoal and I may disturb the balance. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shrimple minded Posted September 11, 2016 Report Share Posted September 11, 2016 I didn't know Aquaclear made a size 10 HOB..........I thought the smallest was a 20 (for 5-20 gallons). Yes, you could add extra filter media (ceramic balls) in the space gained by the removal of charcoal. You could also "save" this space for later in case you want to add Seachem Purigen. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nubster Posted September 12, 2016 Report Share Posted September 12, 2016 If you are removing fish and media...there won't be a problem in the shrimp tank. They have such a low bio-load that they need very little nitrafying bacteria that the tank shouldn't miss a beat. Unless you have hundreds of shrimp packed in there. The fish contribute the biggest bio-load so removing them removes most of the load. I'd remove the charcoal regardless and move the ceramic to the new tank with new filter media or vise versa, add new filter media to the shrimp tank and use the old sponge in the new tank. Chuck the charcoal but make sure you have some on hand just in case something happens. Something bad gets in the water or you need to medicate the tank...you'll need the charcoal to remove that stuff. If you want to be super cautious and you aren't in a big hurry...get the new filter and put the new media (sponge and ceramic) in the old tank for a week or two. It will get seeded and you can setup the new tank and be good to go. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Johnfish Posted September 12, 2016 Author Report Share Posted September 12, 2016 Thank you all for the replies! It is an a.c. 20 not an ac10! I will probably put the new filter media in the old tank for a few weeks. I am not in a super big rush. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vpier Posted September 14, 2016 Report Share Posted September 14, 2016 On 9/11/2016 at 5:24 PM, Shrimple minded said: I didn't know Aquaclear made a size 10 HOB..........I thought the smallest was a 20 (for 5-20 gallons). I have several. Its made for the Fluval Edge tanks, great little filter. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Johnfish Posted September 14, 2016 Author Report Share Posted September 14, 2016 Thanks again everyone. I have the New filter running in tandem with the old filter on my existing tank. Is 2 weeks enough to seed the new filter? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vpier Posted September 14, 2016 Report Share Posted September 14, 2016 5 hours ago, Johnfish said: Thanks again everyone. I have the New filter running in tandem with the old filter on my existing tank. Is 2 weeks enough to seed the new filter? Two weeks might be enough depending on the maturity of the old sponge. Do what greenteam said, give the old sponge a little squeeze in the new tank. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.