Si's Fishless Cycle

[JoshuaA]

Lol... don't you have measures?

Lol... Why do you need measures like that when you use a spoon to eat with?

It makes it sounds like a eating spoon is a swiss army knife, measuring and feeding capabilities.

 

[PDSimon]

a tablespoon measure is a bit different to normal spoons!

its an exact amount... for cooking, bicarb in the aqurium etc

you might like this link My link

check out the fish at the top..never seen them before

 

[Twinklecaz]

Joshua, my tank's 60L and I dosed just over a tablespoon. It didn't wack it up that much, just enough to about 7.6 (yeah from 6.something - I forget exactly)

 

[JoshuaA]

Joshua, my tank's 60L and I dosed just over a tablespoon. It didn't wack it up that much, just enough to about 7.6 (yeah from 6.something - I forget exactly)

6.8 > 7.8 with 3/4 of a table spoon, that was the end result!I hope adding the Ammonia doesn't cause the pH to be like 9 or something haha.

 

[Twinklecaz]

Nah shouldn't have thought so.

 

[PDSimon]

Ammonia never affected my pH directly

 

[JoshuaA]

Ammonia never affected my pH directly

Harder water than us then! If we put the Ammonia in the pH went from around 7.4 - 8.4 within an hour or so and then didn't go down until a high concentration of Nitrites was present.

Currently seeding my own ceramic media in my girlfriends filter for my upcoming Betta tank, hopefully I can kick it into a cycle pretty fast by the time I get everything sorted. Just need to pick up a few bits an pieces here and there!

 

[PDSimon]

My nitrites this morning were 0.5 after 12 and a half hours. They were between 0.5 and 1 after 13 and a half hours yesterday so some improvement.

 

[PDSimon]

once again no change... nitrite 0.5ppm 12 hours after dosing.

18 days just waiting for these nitrites to go down (not including nitrite spike)

 

[kaivalagi]

Soooooo close PDSimon....

Currently seeding my own ceramic media in my girlfriends filter for my upcoming Betta tank, hopefully I can kick it into a cycle pretty fast by the time I get everything sorted. Just need to pick up a few bits an pieces here and there!

On the question of seeding, I had both pads from a Fluval U3 internal filter running for months in an external filter (originally seeded this filter with them), when I put them into the internal filter again for my roma 125 which was newly stocked I was 100% stable in 3 days...twice daily water changes over 3 days to ensure the fish were okay and bingo Fingers crossed for you!

 

[PDSimon]

Still not in my qualifation week though...

I never thought i'd go over 60 days!

 

[Twinklecaz]

Neither did I! Day 63 I'm on now

 

[kaivalagi]

I still haven't done a fishless cycle and probably never will now I have 3 matured filters running... I initially did a fish-in with danios (none died with regular water changes)

It must be extreeeeemly frustrating for you guys, I am still waiting eagerly to see a progressing tank journal PDSimon!

 

[Liverbird36]

Still not in my qualifation week though...

I never thought i'd go over 60 days!

Hang on in there !!! You're so nearly there !!!

 

[JoshuaA]

Hey Kal!

Well my girlfriends tank had been going for a good 2 months with that filter in now so the bacterial colony + donated mature media was quite large (large enough a small portion wouldn't harm it). I had placed the ceramics in her filter for about a week, now I have removed the ceramics I placed in with noticeable bacteria gunk on and took a small snippet of the mature media. Placed the cermaics and mature filter wool into my filter and have it running and starting a fishless cycle. I'm hoping that even a snippet as small as I took will be enough to "seed".

It's turned out good for my girlfriend though she got 0.0 on her readings! So I add more ceramic media into her filter to keep permanently,I was modifying my stingray 15 to take ceramic so I had more than I needed! Also I think my stingray is a little too big for my 38litre tank haha. I'm building a planted betta tank you see!

Edit: Also her Poly/Carbon inserts seem to house a hell of a lot of bacteria!