Cycling Question

[plantropimunity]

would the ammonia produced by flake food breaking down in a newly set up aquarium be enough to kick off the nitrogen cycle?

 

[Captain Retardo]

yes, you could cycle your tank that way, but it is better if you find ammonia because:

1. Ammonia is cheaper
2. You can control the amount of ammonia you put in

 

[plantropimunity]

how much food should i use if i was to go that way?
this is a total newbie question but where do i get pure ammonia?

 

[Gav_B_UK]

this is a total newbie question but where do i get pure ammonia?

Most hardware stores sell amonia in a diluted form. You just need to multiply the amount up depending how diluted it is. Also...make sure its a ammonia + Water (or aquarium safe) solution.

If you're in the UK, Homebase do there own household ammonia in the household section (cleaning stuff). A lot of people on the forums have used it...I'm about to.

Hope this helps.

 

[brownbread]

Do you know that using food in the cycle has a high risk of produceing phosfates which can be harmful to fish

 

[BHornsey]

Do you know that using food in the cycle has a high risk of produceing phosfates which can be harmful to fish

Actually, it's a little known fact that nitrite reducing bacteria need a (small) supply of phosphate to reproduce otherwise the cycling process can be halted (a condition known as 'Phosphate Block')

It's a condition which occurs frequently when cycling tanks that use RO Water.

 

[plantropimunity]

i originally was using a bio bag with some flake in it.
today i found ammonia at my local ace hardware.

now i am cycling the "right" way
thanks for the advice folks

 

[Talz]

i originally was using a bio bag with some flake in it.
today i found ammonia at my local ace hardware.

now i am cycling the "right" way
thanks for the advice folks

Yay!

 

[Captain Retardo]

That's were I found my ammonia! Where are you from? or is Ace a global store?

 

[plantropimunity]

i am from MA.
i dont know if ace is a national store or not, but if you have one in minnesota, then my guess would be yeah.
thanks so much for the encouragement

 

[plantropimunity]

okay so i originally dosed my aquarium with waaaaaaay too much ammonia. i have made several water changes over the past week or so and finally gotten the level down to 4-6 ppm. if i leave it alone, will the cycle happen naturally or am i going to want to add more ammonia as the level drops? i also added some sand from my ten gallon to this tank to get some bacteria in there.

 

[Joanna69]

okay so i originally dosed my aquarium with waaaaaaay too much ammonia. i have made several water changes over the past week or so and finally gotten the level down to 4-6 ppm. if i leave it alone, will the cycle happen naturally or am i going to want to add more ammonia as the level drops? i also added some sand from my ten gallon to this tank to get some bacteria in there.

Yep, leave it and just test every day. The ammonia should fall off and nitrites rise. Once the ammonia goes back down to 0 top it up again to 5. Carry on repeating this process until you find you are adding in ammonia every day with it being 0 the next day. So long as this has happened and all your nitrites have gone (as they've been converted into nitrates) you can add fish (just do a 25% water change before you add them to lower the nitrates).

I used 3ml of Homebase ammonia in my 63litre tank to get my ammonia to 5ppm.

 

[plantropimunity]

so i need to spike it again when it goes down. i thought that when it went down, it would spike nitrite, then that would go down and i would be done.
so i guess i will need to spike ammonia again to keep all the kinds of bacteria fed. that makes sense. thanks