Confused about cycling the tank?

Question

can i just rinse it, put the gravel in the tank, poor water, turn on the filter,put water conditioner in the water, and put up the heater?

Answer 1

http://www.aquatic-hobbyist.com/profiles...

No you need a source of ammonia to get the bacteria growing.  It is cruel to do it with fish and subject them to the high ammonia levels needed to get the cycle started.  The heater is irrelevant to cycling.

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Answer 2

negative need to run your tank with hardy fish for about 1-2 weeks so beneficial bacteria can be established and once that is done do a 25% water change than add your fishes in.

Answer 3

Thats the correct way to do the initial setup, but it's not cycling.

Cycling is the process of building up a population of nitrogen cycle bacteria that will process the waste ammonia from the fish.

If the cycle is not established and you dump in a full population of fish, they WILL die.

You can set up the cycle several ways, adding a few small hardy fish and leaving them for a few weeks will work, or you can do a full fishless cycle by adding a source of ammonia other than the fish.

Have a read of the link below for more info.

Ian