# Substrate moved out of tank for 24 hours, will it cause new cycle when reintroduced?



## Greg_o (Mar 4, 2010)

Display tank started leaking yesterday, got all the fish snails shrimp plants etc out and are living in rubbermaid tote along with the filters and heater.

Substrate was put into two buckets..

Got new tank today, currently filling.

Can I assume the substrate (~8 year old eco complete) will cause a new cycle? (Ideally I would have added aquarium water and a filter to the buckets but that wasn't possible since I ran out of buckets so the substrate is filled to the brim)

Anyone with experience here?


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## tom g (Jul 8, 2009)

*Cycle*

I would assume it will do a re start. Most likely there was die off .I would go slow with adding fish....
The last thing u want is to loose your fish ... if fish are in Rubbermaid containers as temp tank I would cycle tank and add fish slow 
Jmho
Cheers and good luck 
Tom


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## Jeepcarpenter (Sep 29, 2018)

I may be wrong, but I don't think the bacteria in the substrate would survive for that long of period without at least water trickling over/through it, or submerged with at least a bit of aeration. If the tank is not heavily stocked, could just give it a light rinse with dechlorinated or conditioned water and set it back up. As long as the filter is still colonized, especially if it's a decent size filter; then it may only get a few minor spikes from being entirely disturbed. I would think no matter what there will be some fluctuation, even if it survived but as long as you check on it and do water changes, can't see it being a huge issue. As previously stated, I may be wrong, I am no expert that's just how I see it.

Edit: of course, took forever writing my run-of-the-mill two cents while Tom courteously answered with great advice, without me noticing. 
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## Greg_o (Mar 4, 2010)

Your input is greatly appreciated Tom and Jeepcarpanter.

I wasn't expecting this but it looks like I got really lucky here.

After adding the old substrate and 2/3 filters to the new tank I tested the water every two days, and I consistently saw 0 ppm Ammonia and Nitrite, and just a touch of Nitrate. I didn't verify these against other test kits but the kit I used was brand new.

Fish and all moved back in two days ago and everything seems ok. 

Talk about dodging a bullet.

If you find yourself in a similar situation and a google search brought you here, hopefully you see a similar outcome, but I wouldn't let this single experience be any kind of guarantee of what to expect.

Some things I'm left wondering if they were factors to my luck:

Old, established tank, with two AC70's and an Eheim 2215

Maybe the substrate was starting to break down and the filters were simply able to manage that with out any spikes in Nitrogen or Ammonia.

Pretty clean substrate - I have two filter feeding shrimp so I have a beefy power head that I move around the tank aimed at various places in substrate to continually stir up crud for them.

I'd mention high plant load but they weren't in the tank the first couple tests.

The beneficial bacteria that are key to the Nitrogen cycle - I assume it's lack of O that would kill them when out of the tank too long? Mine was stored in a relatively cool spot. I mention the coldness because from what I understand when eg. a heater malfunctions and gets too hot, it's not necessarily the heat that kills the fish, but rather, in warmer temperatures the water can't absorb as much O and fish suffocate..


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## Karin (May 21, 2019)

I had a similar experience. My friend, who generously/gleefully gifted me her aquarium and fish, cleaned the entire tank out, rinsed the gravel and filter and gave me the tank, mostly dried out filter and a bucket of gravel. Oh, and a bunch of guppies in a little plastic bowl.
I didn't have anywhere else for the fish to go, so put them in with the still wet gravel and filter.
For good measure, I added a bottle of nutrafin cycle, and did partial water changes every day until I got my test kit a few days later. Lo and behold, the ammonium and nitrites were at zero. Nitrates are a bit high, seems to be coming out of the tap that way - hoping some plants will help with that....


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