FritzZyme 7 Freshwater Live Bacteria

[TCJeeper]

So I have had my newest tank for a month. When I filled it, I used FritzZyme 7 live bacteria for my cycle. I tested every other day for two weeks for Ammonia, Nitrites, etc. I never got a significant rise in anything.

So is FritzZyme 7 really that good?

 

[madmark285]

What was your source of ammonia? FritzZyme 7 and Dr. Tim's bottled ammonia worked very well for me. I added ammonia three times and it took ~10 days to cycle my tank.

Note: I never saw significant levels of nitrite which is expected, the FritzZyme established both bacterial colonies.

Edit: I should have said, you may not see significant levels of nitrite, the FritzZyme established both bacterial colonies.

 

[Essjay]

What was your source of ammonia?

I agree.

Is this a fishless cycle or a fish-in cycle?
If it's fishless, how much ammonia have you added?

 

[TCJeeper]

Fishless cycle, planted. Never added anything other than the FritzZyme. Should I be worried about something to come

 

[madmark285]

Fishless cycle, planted. Never added anything other than the FritzZyme. Should I be worried about something to come

The plants may be producing low levels of ammonia which the bacteria is quickly consuming. For myself, I struggle reading low levels with the API test kit. So your tank may be cycled for a very low bioload ie: a couple fish.

Personally, I like the ammonia in the bottle method. You can dose the tank to 2-4ppm and clearly read the high levels of ammonia with your test kit. Then in a few days, hopefully you can clearly read zero levels of ammonia. The point here, you don't need highly accurate readings from your test kit, you just want to see it go from high to zero readings. I believe you should not go over 4 ppm but you should verify that.

By dosing your tank with ammonia multiple times, your tank should be able to support a much higher initial bioload and you should have a very high confidence level that your tank is cycled.

Dr. Tim highly recommend the ammonia in the bottle method. Of course Dr. Tim wants to sell you a bottle of ammonia for $9.99. But why wait a couple months to naturally cycle your tank when you can do it in a couple weeks?

Mark

 

[Essjay]

3 ppm is more ammonia than a tankful of fish will make so you don't need to go higher than that.

We've had people reporting ammonia and/or nitrite showing up after fish are put in the tank with Dr Tim's method. But we have had no reports of this happening with the fishless cycling method on here.



If you have enough fast growing plants, you don't need to do a fishless cycle. The plants will take up ammonia. But it is safer to add fish a few at a time and check ammonia/nitrite for several days to make sure they stay at zero before the next batch of fish are bought.