Fishy or fishless?

[ade]

Just out of interest to try and gauge which method peeps are currently favouring. Not asking for the ethics, whys and wherefores, I think they've been covered on other posts, just wanted to take a straw poll. (Guess who was bored!)

 

[ade]

Pretty interesting results so far - 9 out of 10 prefer Whiskas, sorry, I mean 9 out of 10 prefer fishless.

 

[Phase2]

Fishless for at least a week....then little by little building up the stock ...I run everything with a new tank...filters pumps lights....but no fish to start with....works for me.

 

[Kossy]

Well fishless because its a personal thing to me and I don't belive in puting fish through poison etc...

 

[SneakBetta]

I think mollies are good for cycling with

 

[KnuckleHead]

Ive always done the fishy way with danios.

 

[yhbae]

Fishy method worked for me. Few platies and lots of java moss and fern - took about 1 month. Both ammonia and nitrates stayed around or below 0.5ppm throughout the whole cycling period. Didn't loose any fish and they are healthy right now happily spawning every month or so.

(Well, the real reason was that I figured it would be a harder task for me to explain to my little girls why the tank is going to be left empty for the next couple of weeks... Overall, it couldn't have worked out better.)

 

[Gunnie]

My first tank was started up with danios. Then I found forums on the net. All future tanks for me are bio spira all the way baby!

 

[mrV]

Here is something to think about for people who think that fishy-thing works.

**
Hobbiest has 150 liters tank, hobbiest puts couple fishes into that tank. Ammonia level increases, after that nitrite level. After that nitrate starts to increase. (Fishes suffered from ammonia/nitrite.)

Then happy hobbiest thinks that "Hey, my tank is cycled. Im going to buy more fishes" This happy hobbiest come home with plenty of fishes. Hobbiest puts those fishes into that tank, which hobbiest thought to be cycled.

Then happy hobbiest feed fishes and realizes something is wrong. Because hobbiest has some tests, hobbiest does those tests. Then happy hobbiest notices that there is some nitrite and thinks "What's wrong!? I cycled it with couple fishes already..."
**

So what was wrong?

 

[Sinuhe]

I'm doing the fishy cycle, but slowly. I know well enough not to add a ton of fish at once when I think the cycle is finished. I'm currently cycling a 33 gallon/ 128 liter tank with 2 Zebra Danios and lots of live plants. It's been going on for 2 weeks now, and still no detectable ammonia. I'm going to add a bit more fish in a week or two, trying to slowly raise the bioload enough to actually start the cycle. I