water chemistry

[gypsy3]

g'day all - this may be a silly question, but if you've got a q/t tank set up and get all the water paramaters where you want them, do you still have to put stuff in the water to keep them there? In other words, if you have no need to use the tank for a long period of time, will the bacteria in the filter stay stable, or do you have to keep feeding them, such as putting in a prawn or whatever?

[boost.puppy]

hey simple answer, yes the filter requires a fish or two in there to keep it cycling, the bacteria dies quite quickly so I would reccomend a fish to stay in there while you don't require the tank.. second option is to run the filter from the hospital tank in with your normal tank (so buddying the two up)

this keeps the filter cycled, and you can leave your hospital tank empty until you need it!

[gypsy3]

cool...i'd rather just keep the q/t tank running on a permanent basis, so just throwing a dead prawn in now and again would keep everything going?

[Matt15]

I keep some small tetras in my breeding/Q tank to help keep it cycled. Tetras are easy to move around and feed in seperate tanks.