Ammonia to cycle tank

[tiggerfish]

Is it necessary to use ammonia to cycle my new tropical aquarium ? What should I do and how should I do that?

 

[Essjay]

To do a fishless cycle it is necessary to use ammonia.
Fish excrete ammonia and micro-organisms turn this ammonia into nitrite. More micro-organisms turn this nitrite into nitrate. There are very very few of these micro-organisms in a newly set up aquarium and a lot more of them need to be grown to make the aquarium safe for fish. Using ammonia from a bottle simulates fish waste and feeds the micro-organisms so they multiply.


This is the forum's method for fishless cycling.

Cycling Your New Fresh Water Tank: Read This First!

Cycling Your First Fresh Water Tank What is Cycling and Why is it Important? Fish waste, and especially fish breathing, plus uneaten food and other organic matter breaking down in a tank all produce Ammonia. This can quickly become toxic to fish if it is allowed to build up to any measurable...

www.fishforums.net

Unlike other methods you'll read, this method says to add ammonia only when specific target readings have been reached. Other methods say to add ammonia too often; this creates so much nitrite the cycle stalls.
Ammonia is becoming hard to find nowadays. A lot of available ammonia contains detergent or perfume which means it can't be used for cycling. However, Dr Tim's Ammonium Chloride is available on Amazon and eBay and this was intended to use for cycling. The bottle tells how much to use as drops per gallon.




If you intend to have live plants, they can be used as a different way of cycling. Plants take up ammonia as fertiliser and they turn it into protein rather than nitrite. But this method involves using a lot of fast growing plants; just a few slow growing plants aren't enough.
The tank is planted then we need to wait until the plants show visible signs of active growth. A few fish are then added, and then wait a few weeks before adding a few more fish, and so on till the tank is stocked.

 

[TwoTankAmin]

You can use ammonium chloride for this. You have two options commercial options that are essentially the same things.

Dr.Tim's Ammonium Chloride
or
Fritz Fishless Fuel

Fritz also sells a large jug of dry ammpnium chloride but it is emough to cycle at least 100 large tanks. O use it as I regualrly used to have to cycle 8 or more tanks at one time once or twice a year. I also keep a bottle of Dr. Tim's One and Only bacteria for FW tanks in the fridge.