Setting up a new tank

[CashFan83]

I am picking up a nano from a fellow reefer tomorrow so I bought new crushed coral and plan on buying the live rock either in Ypsi on my way back or romulous whichever is closer to west bloomfield. Anyhow I was wondering in hopes of cutting my cycle time. I am doing a water change in my 65g reef tank, can I use this water, along with some fresh made up water to help speed the cycling process along? Will the water change water be useless as having too many nitrates and should I just use all new water? Just curious as to if this will help cut down the time it will take to relocate my clowns and anemoneas. Any help is appreciated.

[Sir Patrick]

I dont have any hard proof, but I think adding "dirty" water, from an existing tank, should definitely give the tank a kick start. Not sure how much, if any, it will cut, but I think it will a bit.

Seems to me, instead of having fresh clean water with nothing in it, tossing something in to polute it, and waiting for the bacterias to grow would take a bit longer to fully cycle than just adding some already unclean water.

[rulost2001]

u can use a scoop of your existing ccrushed coral base to seed your tank....this should speed up process

[bluwc]

I'm not sure I would used crushed coral as a substrate, I personally would go with live sand. When coming to what makes your system run....it's not good to cut corners, but that's my opinion. As far as dirty water, I'm not sure how that would help as the bacteria grows on the rock/sand.

To help speed up my cycle, I threw in some shrimp.

[CashFan83]

planned on adding a scoop from exsisting tank, but I am hearing lots of bad things about crushed coral as a substrate. I know it's the same stuff fish drs uses and thats where I bought it. So how can crushed coral be so bad? The only advice I was given on MR was it's a waste and does nothing but trap nitrates. Also that the using water from my other tank won't matter. I actually like the look it's the Flordia crushed coral 40lb bag. The advice I recieved was to return it unopened and use sand but I really want to do a pistol shrimp goby combe and I don't see how they can burrow and make a cave in sand vs the crushed coral. I would think the cc would be alot better for this particular application and was also told that it would be horrible to use in a nano cube. If it makes any differnt the nano is drilled with a custom 10g sump/refugium, coralife super skimmer, etc. Come on chris I know you can help a fellow south easterner out.

[Sir Patrick]

Crushed coral isnt so bad, as long as its maintained. You will need to vacume it, and keep it shallow enough to not develop anarobic areas, which can cause issues when disturbed/stirred up.

Keep a clean bed, and you wont have much to worry about with the crushed coral.

[CashFan83]

okay so how shallow is shallow enough as I was thinking 2-3 inches deep would probably be needed for the goby/shrimp team. Also, from your MR's response what is MB7.

[Sir Patrick]

Brightwell Aquatics - Microbacter7 (http://brightwellaquatics.com/products/microbacter7.php)

---------- Post added at 12:36 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:35 AM ----------

I wouldnt go much deeper than 2 inches or so. As long as you stir it often, 3 inches should be fine.

[redemer123]

everyone has given good advice so far here, one thing id like to add is that gobies often sift through the sand to eat, one question you may want to ask yourself is how the goby will sift through crushed coral?, the crushed coral i've seen comes in quite large of chunks. I would suggest either choosing critters that dont burrow/sift through sand or just go with some aragonite sand... that's your best bet with gobies and pistol shrimp.

[larryandlaura]

You need to seed this new tank like everyone else is saying! Good luck but I don't belive there is any way to speed up a cycle.

[CashFan83]

Cool thanks for the advice everyone, I'll be trying to find some sand then.