Tried Something New...instant Cycle

[ambrose]

Hello,

I started my 29 Gal again, it was a heavily planted tank for quite a while and broke it down over the summer before leaving for college. I have had a 10 Gal running for a few months with 3 platties and 6 neon tetras that have been moved to the 29 Gal.

I filled the tank about 5 days ago with only the filter and heater running along with some carefully cleaned, boiled and vinegar tested rocks (to do tests to see if the rocks i chose changed the water at all, they have not) so today i introduced my fish along with a new product...Smart Start, i was told by LFS that it actually works, he said it was the only cycle aid that he endorses and uses himself.

i will let you all know how it works, i am curious myself to see if it does what it says

has anyone used this or a similar product?

Tank during rock testing

Smart Start (guaranteed instant cycle)

Tank now with a few fake plants until i can get live ones

-Rob

 

[LiamGoodaire]

Will be following third topic, struggle to see now it will work because how have they kept the bacteria alive......

 

[Squidward]

Yup, once you add the "bacteria in a bottle" you need to add fish a day or so later to provide the source of ammonia to keep the bacteria in the filter going.

If you don't, you will be back at square one and may as well not have bothered.

 

[rocknurworld2006]

ithink it will just be like things such as cycle stress zyme etc.
which imo waste of money.
if anything soll bactinettes are the best but harder to source and not cheap..
in any tank it still has to go through the nitragen cycle.
keep an eye on your water stats very closely and let us know what they are showing while using this

 

[raptorrex]

Hello,

I started my 29 Gal again, it was a heavily planted tank for quite a while and broke it down over the summer before leaving for college. I have had a 10 Gal running for a few months with 3 platties and 6 neon tetras that have been moved to the 29 Gal.

I filled the tank about 5 days ago with only the filter and heater running along with some carefully cleaned, boiled and vinegar tested rocks (to do tests to see if the rocks i chose changed the water at all, they have not) so today i introduced my fish along with a new product...Smart Start, i was told by LFS that it actually works, he said it was the only cycle aid that he endorses and uses himself.

i will let you all know how it works, i am curious myself to see if it does what it says

has anyone used this or a similar product?

Tank during rock testing

Smart Start (guaranteed instant cycle)

Tank now with a few fake plants until i can get live ones

-Rob

Don't waste your money. they dont/cant work, just more fishkeeping "snake oil".

as for adding fish just after you use it? what a daft thing to do. you should keep adding ammonia and ensure its claim is true. which it will not be, anyway.

if you have used it, can i council you carry on with a normal fishless cycle, doing all the check you normally would, untill you water stats are correct for adding fish. dont ever believe what written on the bottle. there is no legal requirement for these statements to be true.

 

[KittyKat]

...and ensure its claim is true. which it will not be, anyway.

Actually, recently a number of fish-less cycles which were carried out after the addition of cycle aids were 1-2 weeks shorter than is usual for a fish-less cycle, with ammonia starting to drop within days of starting the cycle.. there is actually a small chance that they may be starting to do *something*.

But definitely +1 to doing a proper fish-less cycle even if you use it.

 

[raptorrex]

...and ensure its claim is true. which it will not be, anyway.

Actually, recently a number of fish-less cycles which were carried out after the addition of cycle aids were 1-2 weeks shorter than is usual for a fish-less cycle, with ammonia starting to drop within days of starting the cycle.. there is actually a small chance that they may be starting to do *something*.

i wont argue with you on this. but it will need to be, 95-100% effective, even to say it might work. currently, they get nowhere near that level of success. even 50%-50% is no more than dumb luck. i fully understand people wish for an instant cycle, who wouldn't? currently there is no more than "say so" to back it up. as we all should know, the most unreliable evidence is empirical, and thats all these products have ATM.

 

[ambrose]

i guess i should've mentioned that i first found out about this product over the summer at a LFS's Midnight Madness sale....by far the biggest aquarium enthusiast gathering i have been to...they have raffles and give away door prizes to every guest and sales up to 80% on all livestock (great deals for my reef tank), this is where i received a sample that treated ten gallons...which i used on my 10 Gal..and NO ammonia or nitrite spike at all!!!!

this is the reason i bought the smart start...

 

[Mikaila31]

Transferring mature media and keeping planted tanks is the only reliable way to instant "cycle" or technically just skip the whole idea of a bacterial derived cycle.

As far as this thread, all I can say is make sure you have a good bucket ready. While there might be a select few cycling products that sometimes work, none are as helpful as a bottle of Prime. Most people here disagree with using supposed "cycle starters", but the bigger issue here is that you plan to add live fish before verifying that this product actually works.

Someone else already pointed out how do you keep a aerobic bacteria alive in a bottle? Even if a product is tried once and works, there is no guarantee that your new bottle will if it has been stored improperly or is simply old.

 

[This Old Spouse]

If you use filter media from a cycled tank, isn't that immediate?

 

[Mikaila31]

If you use filter media from a cycled tank, isn't that immediate?

yeah that would fall under transferring mature media. It is however a more complicated process then it first appears to be. If you take too much media from a cycled aquarium you will get a minicycle. If you add to many fish to your new "instantly cycled" tank you can get a mini cycle. Fairly easy with common sense though. A mature 10 gallon can't really help "instantly cycle" a 55 gallon, though it would help speed up a fishless cycle. A mature 55gallon though should be able to instantly cycle two 10 gallon tanks for full stocking w/o a problem.

 

[ace61502]

If you use filter media from a cycled tank, isn't that immediate?

I think the main problem is that there is no guarantee there will be ANY live bacteria in a bottle sitting on a shelf. What has been feeding it to keep it alive?

 

[trianglekitty]

Disclaimer- I am very new to the fish keeping hobby and still learning. I'm just relating my own experience, not suggesting that all people will get the same results.

I had a great deal of trouble with a fish-in cycle on a 20 gallon tank. The "fish in" part of it was by necessity- I ended up rescuing fish from someone who planned to flush them and needed a place to keep them. I was able to keep the ammonia and nitrites down with daily water changes and the fish did well, but I couldn't seem to get the tank to actually cycle or even show signs of it at the 8 week month.

I was using stress coat to treat my tap water, but people here suggested switching to Prime. The same day I added my first dose of Prime I threw in a entire bottle of Tetra's version of a bacteria tank starter. By the next day I had my first signs of nitrates. A week later my ammonia and nitrites are at 0 and my nitrates are at 20-40. Previously I always had a .25 reading on ammonia because that's what comes out of my tap. I have no idea which product was responsible for this dramatic response. I repeated this process with my previously uncycled hospital tank with the same result, but again I don't know which product did it. Keep in mind also that neither of these tanks were brand new and probably had some level of bacteria already established.

Also note that I got the Tetra bacteria starter from a aquarium store that keeps them in the fridge and puts expiration stickers on them. This might make a difference in ensuring there were live bacteria in it.