Need to cycle new tank SUPER QUICK

Question
I am in a emergency situation.  We have a large pleco in a 22 gallon tank.   This tank cracked.  So we had to buy another tank in hurry and bought a 30 gal tank.  The tank failure happened at a very bad time.  We are going on a 7 day vaction in 10 days.  Is there any way humanly possible to cycle the new tank to an acceptable level in that time?  In the meantime pleco is in a big plastic tote with a filter.  I should add we have a very responsible pet sitter who will be looking after the fish.

What I've done so far is this.   I've been swapping water from the tote ( which contains some aquarium water from the original tank) and putting it into the new tank.  I also took the old filter from the orginal tank and put it into the new tank.  I will also take a bunch of the gravel from the old tank and put it into the  new tank.  And I plan on using the trick of adding ammonia to the water to jumpstart the cycle a bit.

If the new tank gets out of whack while we're gone, is it safe for our pet sitter to use the additives to lower ammonia, raise/lower Ph, lower nitrites, etc if needed.

Again we have a large pleco.   He is 5 years old and a beautiful fish and means a lot to our kids as a pet.  I would hate to lose him over vacation, would be very sad if he died.  

Thank you so much for any help you can provide.

Laurie

Answer
Hi Laurie,
If you "seed" a tank which you did by transferring the used filter cartridge to the new tank, it will greatly decrease the time of cycling.  Especially if its a 30 gallon which is small enough to cycle quickly.  You also transferred the old water to the new tank along with the gravel.  All of these things you did should contribute to cycling the tank within a week.  "Seeding" a tank without doing the rest that you did will cycle a tank within a week 1/2 - 2 weeks.  Yours will probably cycle within a week or less.  

Being gone for 10 days should not cause any toxin build up.  Medications to lower ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate do not work, it just makes it non-readable by tests but is still there in the tank.  Before you do your trip, I recommend you do a 15% water change before you leave to lower nitrogen levels and another 15% water change when you get back.  And if you are worried about the tank being overloaded in nitrogen you can tell your pet-sitter to do one water change during your trip to keep all 3 nitrogen levels low during your trip.  

Doing a 15% water change weekly is just a general rule of thumb, you being gone for 3 days extra than a week will not affect your fish.  Your fish will be perfectly fine.  If you do tell your sitter to do water changes, remind her to condition the water to remove chlorine+chloramine before adding to the tank and to not overfeed or your fish will die.

Hope I helped.
-Matt-