need to cycle with heavy water changes?

[Todd]

I had the question posed to me that if you changed 50% of water daily couldn't you put discus in a new tank with new filters and that they would cycle over time without ever reaching levels harmful to the discus? I wasn't sure how to answer that and got to wondering myself. Any thoughts or experience?

[CajunAg]

I suppose it would be possible, but not recommended. Even with 50% changes you will still have fairly high levels until the tank is established.

[Chunks]

That's what I'm doing, but I'm changing 95% of the water everyday.

[lipadj46]

i did that after killing my filters. it took twice daily 95% changes to keep the ammonia under 1 ppm

sent from my ti-85 during chemistry class

[Skip]

the tank would cycle because fish are producing waste in the tank..

what are the ammonia levels?

ps.. that would be like only flushing your toilet 50% per day instead of the normal 100%.. how would that look..

things could go wrong.. thats why you use $1 tetras.. not $89 discus

[Northwoods Discus]

Ammonia and nitrite are much more toxic than nitrate. Cycled tanks have zero ammonia and nitrite, it is all converted to nitrate immediately. I agree with above that %50 daily is not enough in a non cycled tank.

[Sean Buehrle]

Just get a cycled sponge filter from your discus supplier.

[roclement]

Get a bottle of Dr. Tims bacteria for freshwater and you are done! Simple effective, and no risk of either contaminating your tank, or harming your fish, and no wasted water.

Rodrigo

[DonMD]

Certainly, you can cycle your tanks using discus, I've done it after I crashed my biofilters and had no choice. My recommendation, if you do this, is to only stock your tank to half capacity (meaning, 1 discus per 20 gallons) during the proess, and as Chunks says, change 95% daily.

[Chicago Discus]

Get a bottle of Dr. Tims bacteria for freshwater and you are done! Simple effective, and no risk of either contaminating your tank, or harming your fish, and no wasted water.

Rodrigo

Rod your so cool I'm glad I know you, I totally agree with him.................................Josie

[DiscusLoverJeff]

I cycled my 20 gallon and 30 gallons with water from my main tank and a sponge filter pre-soaked for a week.

[Melissa]

I'm cycling my 125g with 12 x 4" discus in it right now... To start my sponges were already going to crap and falling apart- then meds nukes my bio anyway so I'm starting fresh with brand new sponges. Daily 100% WCs! Drain it til they're floppin! no biggie when you aren't dealing with buckets and have a good pump- and when you only have one tank like me :( lol sometimes I do a second WC in the middle of the day for good measure.
Got to be SOOO careful cycling with discus. But it is definitely doable.

[nc0gnet0]

I'm cycling my 125g with 12 x 4" discus in it right now... To start my sponges were already going to crap and falling apart- then meds nukes my bio anyway so I'm starting fresh with brand new sponges. Daily 100% WCs! Drain it til they're floppin! no biggie when you aren't dealing with buckets and have a good pump- and when you only have one tank like me lol sometimes I do a second WC in the middle of the day for good measure.
Got to be SOOO careful cycling with discus. But it is definitely doable.

The problem with this is it actually retards the cycling process. But, if you have fish in the tank, you really have no other option. Always much better and much faster to do fishless cycling with seeded sponges and straight ammonia. Low PH will also retard cycling.

[TOFU]

It will definitely slow down the cycle. Best is to cycle finish then add those discus in. If not, you gotta wc until the cycle catches up.

[Chunks]

As Don says the trick is to keep your fish stock low... Or you would have to do more than one wc a day.

I have 2 medium size discus in 60gals so they have 30gals each, so things happen slower, ammonia and nitrite wise. Still I do a 95% wc every 1-2 days. I have been doing this for 5 weeks now and the bio is catching up so sometimes I push the wc to a second day, but never three... not yet at least. Any how I'm trying to grow them out so I'll be keeping up the frequent wc for a few months.

[Dennis The Mennis]

Maybe this would help.
http://forum.simplydiscus.com/showthread.php?87792-Kaldnes-Bio-Media-and-Evolution-Aqua-Bacteria-Available

[zimmjeff]

the real problem with that process is if somethinf goes wrong. Something happens in life and you can't do the water changes for a few days. Instead of just a dirty tank for a day or 2 you loose all your fish.

[JenTN]

the real problem with that process is if somethinf goes wrong. Something happens in life and you can't do the water changes for a few days. Instead of just a dirty tank for a day or 2 you loose all your fish.

Bingo. And it always happens that way! Last week I had a tank full of juvies and ended up sick as a dog, missed three days of work, sick kid too..misses two days of work. Discus definitely got stressed IMO but if Id been cycling Id have had losses or passes out trying to wc!

[discus day]

more reasons to have another tank =p simply move filters over. i have multiple tanks and i ALWAYS have 2-3x the filtratin i need in tank in case one tank bio crashes or i need to set up a tank FAST!

like what happened this past week. kenny got in a shipment earlier than i had anticipated and i needed a qt tank as soon as possible, got one of craiglists and stuck a few use filters in a crank up the heat and dose with amonia and so far everything been great and im ready for his shipments