Hospital Tank

Does my hospital tank need to be cycled???

 

There has to be something in the hospital system to deal with the waste the fish that are put in there produce.

You can:

- Do extensive water changes - need to re-dose any medications
- Use a de-ammonizer repeatedly and often during care (though some are not compatible with copper, if you're treating parasites with such)
- Have a cycled tank - as long as you don't need to treat with antibiotics - you also need to keep something in the tank to support the bacteria when not in use

Personally I've only ever used a hospital tank once and it was for a parasitic infection. I bought cured based rock and used that as a quick-setup biological filter then dosed with copper. It worked well for me, but then I broke it down (and disposed of the rock) as I did not want to maintain it.

 

It would depend on what size the hospital tank needs to be and how much work you want to put into it. Personally, I don't want mine running all the time, so mine is never cycled. I had a 10 gallon HT with my smaller tanks, 20 long when I had my 200 running. In either case, it was just a tank, cheap hang on filter, small airstone, heater, and a few pieces of PVC for the fish to hide in. I just did 20% water changes every other day and it was always fine.

 

If you can cycle it, I would....it takes a whole lot of stress out of the situation for you and the fish. all the water changes gets old real quick. the last thing you want a sick fish to be dealing with is an ammonia spike.

 

So what should I cycle it with??

 

If you did it that way, I would just keep a yellow tail damsel in there 24/7.

 

Really dont want to do water changes every other day...