Ditto on
@ZapataInc . All of this! And Turbostart is a great bottle to go with if you’re looking for nitrifying bacteria.
If your goal is to be fast; use your old tank water! If your goal is to be clean, then mix new tank water with 100% dry rock. I’ve done both; depending on my goals.
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Regarding Tank Cycling, I think it’s important for beginner readers considering this to understand:
I disagree that so many companies push products onto others for immediate cycling of a tank; that’s not how it works.
Cycling takes time (plus it is not a process that ever completes; it is ongoing). Adding these chemicals can facilitate the process. Essentially, the act of cycling allows water to permeate your rockwork, organics to decompose, and nitrifying bacteria to disperse and reproduce through multiple generations and create a stable population for the given amount of nutrients. At that point; it’s slightly more correct to say that you’ve ‘allowed your tank to cycle’ but can be misleading to say that ‘the tank is cycled (implying completeness)’. But clown fish are tanks! And can handle anything.
By analogy, being able to feed your kids and have a safe home won’t make them become adults any faster. You’ll still have to wait 18 years for them to be 18. However, it will allow you to have more kids and at a younger age. So it increases growth rate, but only to a certain degree. There’s no substitute for a little time to help develop a robust population and stable parameters.
