Fishless Cycling With Bottled Starters

[D3m]

Hi guys im another newbie to aquariums and fish and im having a little bit of trouble getting my head around something that im sure you knowledgable folk could help me with. What I really wanted to do was a fishless cycle like everyone here reccomends and in theory I am but I live in the Isles of Scilly and have found that I have no chance of getting Ammonia until I go away in 6 weeks (Not great as I have the tank set up allready). So I have everything working great filter, heater and lights.

Heres the bit I dont quite get, Ive added Tetra Safestart to the water and on the bottle it says do this for 4 weeks and I know its a bacteria but does'nt it need the ammonia in the tank to work correctly? either Pure Ammonia in a bottle or Fish to get the cycle working.

Im waffling now and what im really trying to say is, can it be used instead of ammonia in a fishless cycle.

Any help would be greatly appreciated

 

[OldMan47]

Welcome to the forums D3m.

There are other ammonia sources that you can use to cycle a tank. Two that are often recommended when people can't find ammonia are fish food and prawns. Either one can be placed in the tank in reasonable amounts and will start to decay. The decay will produce ammonia that will feed your bacterial colony. Things like safestart are usually not very good at adding bacteria to your filter. The problem is that any bacteria they might have contained when they were bottled have had to try to live without a source of oxygen and without a source of nutrients. The only ones that people seem to have any luck using are Bactinettes and Biospira. If they are properly handled as a biological culture and kept refrigerated during shipment, they can sometimes work for you. If you get lucky with one of them, they can get your tank cycled in a short time and you then add your fish as soon as the cycle is confirmed. That can reduce your cycle time from 4 to 6 weeks down to about a week.

 

[D3m]

Thanks for the quick reply Oldman47k, so just to confirm I do need some form of ammonia for the tank to cycle? If so I will have to go with the fish food that came with the tank.

 

[OldMan47]

If you just make believe that you are feeding a few fish you will have enough decaying food to get your filter moving in a fairly short time. Nothing about using fish food is easy to control which is why we prefer pure ammonia if we can get it. With ammonia testing you can probably get control above 1 ppm and below 5 ppm which will be close enough to start to develop your bacterial colony.

 

[rabbut]

I agree with Oldman. If you are using fish food, though it isn't as precise as bottled ammonia, it will do the job well. Add enough food to feed the tank when fully stocked once a day, and do a sizeable waterchange whenever ammonia gets above 8ppm, or once a week, which ever comes first, to remove excess food from the tank. This will stop the ammonia level getting too high for the ammonia eating bacteria to work and also to prevent the pH "crashing".

It supprises people that too much ammonia kills the ammonia eating bacteria, but this in reality is what appears to happen, in most casses at or above arround 8ppm. A lot of rotting fish food can pull the pH down in the tank, as it's by-products other than ammonia are acidic. If left too long the pH will "crash" to levels too low for your filter bacteria. The fact that at some point you will add too much food is the reason why we prefur bottled ammonia, but if you don't have ammonia available, you don't have many other options

HTH
Rabbut

 

[waterdrop]

Yup, agree with both of the above. That should be the way to go about it.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[D3m]

Hi Guys, I have managed to get some Jeyes Cloudy Ammonia from my mother in law. The only problem is I dont know how old it is but looking at it its quite a few years old, when I shake the bottle it does'nt foam up but there is quite a bit of white stuff floating around in it.

What it says on the front is:

Jeyes Cloudy Ammonia
Scrubs Formulation
The Storng Household cleaner
and then its uses laundry, direction and cautions

Would I be ok in giving this a try? all opinions are welcome.

 

[Corleone]

Chances are, if it's cloudy, there's some kind of additive in it. The stuff you want will look just like water (but sure won't smell like water). Is there an ingredients list anywhere on it?

 

[D3m]

No theres no ingredients list on it, My friend on the mainland said he would send me some early next week so im defintely gonna get ammonia one way or the other its just I would've had the tank running a week by then. Could i stick some tap water in a bucket and test the ammonia that way to see if it weill work?
Also could I maybe stick some fish food in the tank to get the cycle started until the ammonia arrives?

 

[Corleone]

Sticking some food in will be fine until the ammonia arrives - just do a water change/gravel vac to get out the excess when you start adding ammonia so it doesn't get too high.

Unfortunately, you wouldn't be able to test the ammonia in a bucket like that. The wrong kind will test normally with an aquarium test kit, the additives are what cause problems, and the test kits don't check for them.

 

[D3m]

OK, I think i will forget about the cloudy ammonia and just wait it out for the right stuff. I have'nt actually bought a gravel vac yet but I noticed in another post someone said they stuck some food in a stocking i think i will give that a try. How many flakes would you put in for starters, and how often should I be testing the ammonia levels to make sure they dont go too high?

 

[OldMan47]

You will foul the water with fish food long before the ammonia levels get too high for a cycle to start. It won't take much to get things started because right now you have none and any ammonia will begin to increase the bacterial population.

 

[LauraFrog]

Is there an LFS or any other fishkeeper you can ask for some mature media before you go away? Cycled filter media will speed your cycle up a lot.

 

[waterdrop]

Yes good decision not to take chances with the old cloudy ammonia, would probably make much more of a mess than its worth, even if it were ok as just ammonia.

I agree with both the above posts. Only little bits of food are needed to get things started off and would probably be perfect for your situation of having to wait for some pure clear ammonia. Then, once you get it, the pure ammonia will still be much better for having control over your fishless cycling process. And the other comment is true too, if you can happen to luck upon some mature media, that almost always helps speed things up.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[D3m]

Thanks everyone here who made the effort and replied its very much appreciated. As of today my Sister in law had a day trip to the mainland and managed to find me some ammonia so Im off and running finally

Thanks again guys, im sure I will be on here again before too long with more silly questions for yah!!!