Alternatives To Fishless Cycling With Ammonia?

[Jonno]

hmm never heard of them not stocking it... dod you look for yourself or did you rely on a sales assistant?

So have Boots suddenly stopped selling it?

i bought mine about a month ago so i assume not!

 

[A creature void of form]

hmm never heard of them not stocking it... dod you look for yourself or did you rely on a sales assistant?

So have Boots suddenly stopped selling it?

i bought mine about a month ago so i assume not!

I rang up a major store, but will go in person now. Thanks!

 

[rdd1952]

They probably dont know what you are speaking of when you ask for "pure" ammonia. Technically, I think true "pure" ammonia is a gas. What is really meant by pure is that it is free of detergents, perfumes and surfactants. Only water and ammonia and possibly chleating agents (they keep the ammonia and water mixed).

 

[Lion007]

I may get flamed for reccomending this - but dont cycle - use some well cycled used filter media instead
Most good suppliers will let you have some. As a safety measure - you can add ammonia to test if the level drops ok (which is what i did), but if you know its ok, then it should be fine - but it literally took 3 days to setup mine! (i was lucky as i allready had a used filter fresh from the old aquarium) - i got a mates kid to "borrow" me some ammonia from the school science labs

 

[rdd1952]

I may get flamed for reccomending this - but dont cycle - use some well cycled used filter media instead
Most good suppliers will let you have some. As a safety measure - you can add ammonia to test if the level drops ok (which is what i did), but if you know its ok, then it should be fine - but it literally took 3 days to setup mine! (i was lucky as i allready had a used filter fresh from the old aquarium) - i got a mates kid to "borrow" me some ammonia from the school science labs

Using cycled media is called cloning and is a form of cycling. You still need to add ammonia and test the media you have to make sure there is enough bacteria to process the ammonia. Obviously, it is the best way to go if you can find the media as you already have a decent amount of bacteria to work with. Unfortunately, I've never found a fish store that had media to give away (or sell). Most of their systems are very large and process large amounts of water and they aren't likely to open the filter up to get media out. Maybe others have had success with them though.

Edited for spelling.

 

[Lion007]

I may get flamed for reccomending this - but dont cycle - use some well cycled used filter media instead
Most good suppliers will let you have some. As a safety measure - you can add ammonia to test if the level drops ok (which is what i did), but if you know its ok, then it should be fine - but it literally took 3 days to setup mine! (i was lucky as i allready had a used filter fresh from the old aquarium) - i got a mates kid to "borrow" me some ammonia from the school science labs

Using cycled media is called cloning and is a form of cycling.

I knew that, it was a typo lol.
But thanks for clearing that up - its what i was trying to get across. I'm sure a member on here who is local to him/her would donate some media in place of a replacement

 

[piper]

Homebase sell pure ammonia. 99p done

 

[A creature void of form]

Thank you to one and all for the suggestions in this thread, but I finally managed to get a bottle of household Ammonia from Boots last night. Clearly, the person who I orginally spoke to at Boots was a bit useless.

Started cycling last night!

The moral of this thread?

Ask for Household Ammonia and not 'Pure Ammonia' when searching it out.

Thanks again.

 

[Jonno]

The moral of this thread?

Ask for Household Ammonia and not 'Pure Ammonia' when searching it out.

or even just "look for yourself" and dont rely on the dappy store staff

 

[fourthtimelucky]

In my experience if you ask for "pure ammonia" they tend to call the manager over to try and work out whether you're going to make a bomb with it.