Bio balls

[leen.tu]

Hi
I have bio balls media that was given to me i asked my friend to pick it up because it was a 2 hour drive and he did i did tell him to keep them in water and the guy gave him leaking ziploc so the water drained and he added tap water before asking me

Did all the bacteria die? He put them in for only 10 min then he called me
What do i do?

Thanks

 

[SudzFD]

It’s hard to say. I gather you are hoping to skip/shorten the cycling process in your tank. Bacteria is pretty resilient. But Regardless of if they were cleanly brought in saltwater and not dipped in the freshwater, you need to watch your parameters. So test your water and watch for it cycling. I recently upgraded from a 3 year old 46g to a 60g. Used the same sand, live rock, and some if the same water. New filter and additional sand and dead rock added. I didn’t think my tank would cycle with all of that, but it did.

so just treat it like a new tank and it’s a bonus if you get through the cycle faster because of your media.

 

[redfishbluefish]

There is likelihood cells underwent lysis...they burst. However, if bioballs are your thing, I'd still through them in your filtering system because they'll reseed themselves fairly quickly.

 

[leen.tu]

Thank u so much
My tank is new but completed the cycled i thought i would introduce variety of bacteria to my system and should help the overall health.

 

[Luisn17]

I don’t know if using another system stuff is a good idea, if they ran high levels of nitrates or anything, it will leach out to your system.