evodrgn Posted July 22, 2014 Report Share Posted July 22, 2014 So I'm planning a re-do of my 20gallon long tank hopefully at the end of this month or early August. I have one 9l bag os Aquasil Amazonia and about half a bag of a leftover 9l bag as well. I noticed with my 7.5g Mr.Aqua cube with 1.5in substrate it took a month and a half to cycle where as all my other tanks with 3+" have tanken over two months are are not yet fully cycled. Mind you I'm cycling using nothing but the soil and blasting the heater to 80 degrees as I dont have enough plants/mosses for all three tanks. The 20long currently has about 2in of substrate. With this tank I have some small downoi and mosses that I'd like to put into the tank so what are your recommendations for substrate level in this tank? I just have a feeling that the higher the substrate the longer the tank takes to cycle since its happened to me obviously haha I'm going to be using Ebi-ken Kou Yin, Bacter ae and MK-Breed Zsilver powder for the bottom then layer the soil and put some Prodibio as well as Seachem Stability to help start the cycle in the tank Any info is greatly appreciated! Thanks! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
h4n Posted July 22, 2014 Report Share Posted July 22, 2014 Yes the thicker the substrate the longer it will take to cycle but the longer the substrate will stay active. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
evodrgn Posted July 22, 2014 Author Report Share Posted July 22, 2014 Thats what I was told too...that it would last longer. Only using distilled water so hopefully it lasts a while but for the duration of the cycle ill be using tap water with remineralizer...tap water gh is 2-3 and bacteria thrive in gh5 lol Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jayr_Tigley Posted July 22, 2014 Report Share Posted July 22, 2014 It also help the pH stabilize more with higher substrate Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
High5's Posted July 22, 2014 Report Share Posted July 22, 2014 I wouldn't re mineralize, I'd just use prime to treat tap water for the cycle no use wasting product, because your going to be doing big water changes first few weeks . The additive will do there job by the time the cycle is done. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
evodrgn Posted July 22, 2014 Author Report Share Posted July 22, 2014 I wouldn't re mineralize, I'd just use prime to treat tap water for the cycle no use wasting product, because your going to be doing big water changes first few weeks . The additive will do there job by the time the cycle is done.....this is where things get confusing but interesting at the same time.I hear a lot of people do daily water changes and some do weekly while others do none. I usually do weekly water changes or none but use remineralized water again because bacteria need a higher GH to thrive whereas if I kept using low GH treated tap water it would take forever for the bacteria to grow Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
High5's Posted July 22, 2014 Report Share Posted July 22, 2014 The low PH that the Amazonia is going to drag down to 5.5 to 6.0 is what makes it hard for bio to take hold that and temperature. If you weren't using additives it would take 2 to 3 months to cycle using additives will speed it up a bit. Be sure to use 1/2 dose of your additives when you water change to keep the bacterial colonies strong. You could always up the temperature to 78ish degrees and do a 10 hour light cycle to speed things up even more but... you also risk the chance of algae/bad bacterial bloom. I think treated tap water will be fine for your cycle. What ever way you do it 2 to 3 month's is pretty much the standard for cycling shrimp tank's. I will be setting up two tibee tank some time in the next few weeks I am going to use old sea mud and lowkey's speed sand treated tap water for the first few weeks once ammonia levels drop I'll start dosing bt-9 and de nitro till I get to 2 to 5 ppm ammonia after that I will do a 100% water change with ro/di re mineralized to 130 TDS that give me a GH of 5 and age the tank for 3 to 4 weeks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
evodrgn Posted July 22, 2014 Author Report Share Posted July 22, 2014 No lights for me on the cycling haha...dont want bad algae bloom! I keep tank at 80 when cycling so that should be okay. Yes i do 80-90% water change once levels are stable Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
evodrgn Posted July 23, 2014 Author Report Share Posted July 23, 2014 Okay well I set up the tank today using Ebi-Ken Kou-Yin, Glasgarten Bacter AE, and MK-Breed ZSilver powder as the base layer, then added all of my Aquasoil Amazonia which amounted to being roughly 4" and dropped in a new Eheim 2213 canister filter with all new biomedia and maybe a tad bit of some old dried biomedia. The heater is a dinky Archea 25w heater which obviously I'll be replacing with a 75w Eheim Jager heater this weekend LOL. I added two caps full of Seachem Stability to help with the biofiltration and will be using water from my other cycled and non-cycled tanks this weekend for changing out some of the water. Used Seachem Prime for dechlorinating the tap water and used Mosura Mineral Plus to help get the GH up a bit. No lights, no aquascape just plain ol' Aquasoil for the cycling period as of now. The waiting now begins. Thanks for all the help in helping me get a target substrate level since now I realize that the higher the substrate the longer is lasts and keeps buffering! High5's 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
High5's Posted July 23, 2014 Report Share Posted July 23, 2014 I'll be doing 1 inch of lava rock over the under gravel filter with 3 inches of Amazonia. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
evodrgn Posted July 23, 2014 Author Report Share Posted July 23, 2014 I was recommended to do UGF but went against it because I read that they make the substrate lose it's buffering ability quicker and that it's not good for rooted plants. Looking forward to seeing your set up High5's! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
High5's Posted July 23, 2014 Report Share Posted July 23, 2014 Air driven is pretty easy on the soil, also you leave some area with no ugf to cultivate anaerobic bacteria. There is a dyi style ugf that you could plant over with out issues. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
evodrgn Posted July 23, 2014 Author Report Share Posted July 23, 2014 I think I read mostly HOB and canister filter driven UGF rather than air driven. Too late for me now as I already laid everything into the tank... lol Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
High5's Posted July 23, 2014 Report Share Posted July 23, 2014 They all have there pro's and con's. The main reason for ugf in tibee/rcs/cbs shrimp tank is when you do a water change because the water flows through the active substrate, It buffers the incoming water faster. I'm hoping to get my tank's to 5.6 to 5.8 ph, My ro/di comes out at 6.2 zero tds if I drip in my water changes the parameters are constant, the bio is a bouns the lava rock has huge surface area to grow bacterial colonies which should eat ammonia like whoa and give very low if any nitrates. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
evodrgn Posted July 23, 2014 Author Report Share Posted July 23, 2014 ...i'll have to try this when I set up another tank and see how it works! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
High5's Posted July 23, 2014 Report Share Posted July 23, 2014 I'll let you know = ] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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