3 weeks in, no nitrites or nitrates yet

[TissueTenant]

Hello! I've been doing a fishless cycle for my 10 gallon tank using fish food as the ammonia source. My parameters are are like:
Ammonia: 2ppm
pH: 7.5
Alkalinity: 300ppm
Total Hardness: 25ppm
Nitrite and Nitrate: 0ppm
Water temperature: 69.8 F / 21 C

The tank itself is super cloudy and everything is coated in a ton of biofilm. There's 2 plants in it (a java fern and a moneywort). The water is dechlorinated as well, following the directions on the bottle. I have an HOB filter running 24/7 as well. I leave the light on for the plants about 8 hours a day.
I haven't added any bacteria in a bottle since I've heard mixed reviews on it, but should I do that? I've tried adding a tiny bit of soil from my garden to introduce some nitrifying bacteria near the beginning, but it didn't do anything either. I'd really appreciate some help, since I'm excited to get some fish once it's done! Thank you!

 

[Slaphppy7]

Welcome to TFF

Crank up the temp to 82F, and get a bubbler going, if you don't have one already

Beneficial bacteria (BB) will grow faster in warmer water; warmer water holds less oxygen, though, so the bubbler will help with surface agitation & gas exchange

What kind of test kit are you using?

 

[TwoTankAmin]

Using shrimp or fish food​

One of the more popular fishless cycling methods is to buy a few dead shrimp at the grocery store, cut them up into chunks and add them to the aquarium. The shrimp decay, which produces ammonia to feed the nitrifying bacteria. There are a few drawbacks with this method, one being that the hobbyist really has no way to know how much ammonia is being produced by the decaying shrimp, and the aquarium does not look very good with dead shrimp laying on the bottom. Also, the organic material of the shrimp can cause bacteria blooms which turn the aquarium water cloudy. This method works but it takes time and patience and you will probably see a spike in ammonia and nitrite if you add a medium to heavy load of fish after the initial cycling. Note that some people use flake fish food instead of shrimp but this is not recommended because flake food does not have much organic material compared to shrimp and so does not add a lot of ammonia to the water, but you can use cut fish instead of shrimp.

from https://www.drtimsaquatics.com/resources/fishless-cycling/
Bold above added by me.

 

[TissueTenant]

Okay, I'll look into getting a new heater because mine is cranked all the way up. My house might be cold hahaha. I'm using TopFin 5-in-1 test strips for most things, then an API liquid test kit for ammonia.

I'll look into getting some dead shrimp, then! Thank you for the advice!

 

[GaryE]

The dead shrimp is one old gross way of doing it. I suspect the fishfood is rotting, and not really helping much.

As a fellow Canadian, I get the temperature question. Heaters are made to raise the temp a very few degrees above room temop, and are notoriously unreliable if you try to keep things a lot warmer than the environment in the house.

Siphon out any rotting food, and why not buy some easy, inexpensive plants for the tank? That'll get the cycle started quicker than all the convoluted methods.

 

[TissueTenant]

I was under the impression that I want the fish food to rot so it produces the ammonia I need? If I get rid of it, what should I do for ammonia then? I looked at ordering some of Dr. Tim's ammonium chloride or whatever but it would be $50 to get it where I live

Also as a little update: I got a new heater earlier and the tank it up to 78 degrees now, so hopefully things should start moving along a bit!

 

[Slaphppy7]

I used pure ammonia (no additives) to cycle my tanks...the Dr. Tim's stuff has worked well for many, but no idea why it is so pricey up there

The problem with rotting food (or shrimp) is that it is hard to control the levels of ammonia in the tank; pure ammonia (or the Dr Tim's stuff) is much more precise, and controllable

 

[TwoTankAmin]

You can use plain household ammonia with no additives. Surfactants are OK as they are minimal and once cycled the big water change and a little carbon for a few house will insure all is safe. I did this for years before finding the ammonium chloride.

 

[TissueTenant]

I looked everywhere I could think of, but I couldn't find any ammonia without a bunch of other stuff/perfumes in it Will the fish food/shrimp method not work, since it's already been a long time and nothing has happened? Or do I just have to be more patient, in the event I can't find any ammonia?

Thank you all for your help so far!

 

[Alice B]

I looked everywhere I could think of, but I couldn't find any ammonia without a bunch of other stuff/perfumes in it Will the fish food/shrimp method not work, since it's already been a long time and nothing has happened? Or do I just have to be more patient, in the event I can't find any ammonia?

Thank you all for your help so far!

cheapest grocery store in town should have plain ammonia. or pretty plain

 

[Ichthys]

I looked everywhere I could think of, but I couldn't find any ammonia without a bunch of other stuff/perfumes in it Will the fish food/shrimp method not work, since it's already been a long time and nothing has happened? Or do I just have to be more patient, in the event I can't find any ammonia?

Thank you all for your help so far!

Fish food will work fine, but first you had to grow a colony of heterotrophic bacteria to break down the food and release ammonia. At 70 degrees, three weeks isn’t that long. Now that the temperature is up you should see some results soon.

 

[TwoTankAmin]

So one person says fish food will work while a PhD microbiologist says it wont. Hmmmm.

It takes me between 7 and 10 days to fully cycle tanks using ammonium chloride and a bit of seeding of live bacteria. I use Dr. Tim's One and Only and/or filter squeezings from my many other cycled tanks.

I actually prefer to cyle filters than tanks. Then I fully stock the the new tanks with the cycled filters n them. But that can be difficult if one is trying to cycle a number of filters at the same time in a small tank. You really have to knwo what you are doing because the cycling uses up everything in the water very fast. Si I do daily water changes and usually end up adding 18-20 ppm of ammonia daily. This is not done all in one go but, rather in several 4-5 ppm additions throughout the day.

I do the above when setting up summer tanks or preparing for a weekend fish event where I am selling. I use cycled filtersfor this.

 

[Ichthys]

So one person says fish food will work while a PhD microbiologist says it wont. Hmmmm.

There isn’t a post on this thread that says fish food won’t work. Hmmmm.

 

[TwoTankAmin]

You must have missed the quote in Post #3

One can read about Dr. Hovanec's qualifications here https://www.drtimsaquatics.com/about-dr-tim/

 

[Alice B]

I've been keeping fish a tad over 35 years, I have used fish food to finish a cycle that started by fish that died, I've used ammonia for fishless cycle. Both worked