Does Live Substrate Live Up To Claims

[Tonyb111111]

I posted on here recently regarding caribsea's live substrate. I opted for a white sand substrate packed in 10 kg bags in an apparently live wet fluid which claimed to support fish safely within 24 hours of filling my tank. The general consensus, myself included, was that this was marketing BS and I should start the fishless cycle. I agreed with this and waited for my API test kit to arrive. This arrived today and I duly tested my water this evening. The results are zero ammonia, 0.25ppm nitrite and 10ppm nitrate, pH of 10 and hardness of 10 degrees

I filled my tank Monday morning, planted it on Tuesday whilst adding RO to get the pH and GH down and also liquid and solid nutrients. I also added fluid filter medium and left it to settle until today

I will not be adding fish for at least a month, but do these results mean the substrate claim is correct. Opinions on this would be gladly received

 

[sheffieldlad]

Do you have anything putting amonia into the water? If you have no fish in the tank then none is getting in that way

are you adding any to help the bacteria in your filter develope to cycle it?

It sounds as though you have measured what is in te tank but when you add fish they will produce amonia if your filter has no bacteria to break it down it will poison the fish.

Get some amonia and pop some In the water.
If it clears you are good.
If it doesn't then you need to cycle.

All the best

-Paul.

 

[minnnt]

+1

 

[XeroTolerance]

Basically what sheffieldlad said. Add some ammonia (3ppm) and see if it is gone in 12 hours. If it is then the product works, if not then do a fishless cycle the traditional way.

 

[TwoTankAmin]

That is actually not quite a fair test. If the bacteria are the good ones, then they should be somewhat dormant. How dormant depends on how long in the bag. Therefore, they can still be good but need some time to fully "revive". This means the tank may handle some or most of the ammonia but not all of it initially. It could take a few days for things to get cranked up. On the other hand it may turn out it doesn't work.

I would see if you can get some of DrTim's Ammonium chloride:

We make it easy by providing a bottle of reagent grade ammonium chloride that is at a concentration such that adding 1 drop of solution to 1 gallon of aquarium water will result in an ammonia-nitrogen concentration of 2 mg/L (ppm).

Dose that and test in an hour or two. If the ammonia reading is close to 2, then the bacteria are not doing much if anything. but wait and test the next day. If the ammonia is still close to 2, not much is happening. However, if after an hour you test 1 ppm for example, then clearly something is working to lower the ammonia. I would again wait a day and test again. Then you should get a lot lower reading and possibly even 0. If you can dose and the next day you get a 0 reading, your tank is pretty much cycled. if you can dose and in a few hours you get a 0 reading, you are good to go. To be doubly certain, I would run a nitrite test right after a 0 ammonia test. This will confirm you are cycled if it is also 0.

 

[sheffieldlad]

Is there any way for me to force the bacteria to be dormant for example to transit the filter medium?

Thanks

-Paul

 

[Tonyb111111]

Thanks all for the sound advice, i will get some ammonia in tomorrow and see what happens to the levels. I am in no hurry for the fish until the tank is exactly right, so plenty of time. Thanks again

 

[XeroTolerance]

No problem. Glad that I could've helped.

 

[Tonyb111111]

Well I am very surprised at the results. In summary, I dosed ammonia for three consecutive days commencing 7th Jan and tested after 24hrs each time and got zero readings for ammonia and nitrite, and 10ppm nitrate which I believe is in the tap water. Based on these results, I introduced 6 zebra danios, 6 Colombian tetras, 3 corydoras and amano shrimp (algae starting to grow). I continued to monitor all parameters for the next two weeks, doing a 10% RO water change weekly, still no ammonia or nitrites. So, confident with the water chemistry I have added 6 scissortails, a male and female dwarf gourami, albino bristlenose cat, long finned bristlenose cat and two more shrimps. After 5 days, still no ammonia or nitrie, and nitrate is down to 5ppm. So it would appear that this sand substrate actually works. Another bonus is that it does not need washing before it goes in the tank. However, it is expensive. I am still monitoring the chemistry every two days but have yet to see any ammonia or nitrate after nearly a month. Thoughts would be appreciated on this subject.
On another point, can anyone give me any ideas on two bigger fish, and a shooling bright coloured fish that isn't a neon.
Thanks for reading

 

[Sailfin Zach]

Well I am very surprised at the results. In summary, I dosed ammonia for three consecutive days commencing 7th Jan and tested after 24hrs each time and got zero readings for ammonia and nitrite, and 10ppm nitrate which I believe is in the tap water. Based on these results, I introduced 6 zebra danios, 6 Colombian tetras, 3 corydoras and amano shrimp (algae starting to grow). I continued to monitor all parameters for the next two weeks, doing a 10% RO water change weekly, still no ammonia or nitrites. So, confident with the water chemistry I have added 6 scissortails, a male and female dwarf gourami, albino bristlenose cat, long finned bristlenose cat and two more shrimps. After 5 days, still no ammonia or nitrie, and nitrate is down to 5ppm. So it would appear that this sand substrate actually works. Another bonus is that it does not need washing before it goes in the tank. However, it is expensive. I am still monitoring the chemistry every two days but have yet to see any ammonia or nitrate after nearly a month. Thoughts would be appreciated on this subject.
On another point, can anyone give me any ideas on two bigger fish, and a shooling bright coloured fish that isn't a neon.
Thanks for reading

Sounds good! I would recommend Von Rio Tetras for a colorful schooling fish.