I'm on day 2 of cycling. Fishless pure Amonia cycle.
My question is do I add all my drops of Amonia at same time every day or should I break it up and do 1/3 in the morning 1/3 when I get home and 1/3 at bed time?
Thanks again for all the posters on here "wealth of Info"
Do you know what level (ppm), your ammonia is at now?
A common mistake, when doing an ammonia/fishless cycle is add to much ammonia and kill or stall the cycle.
I would bump the ammonia up to 3-4 ppm, and not add anymore ammonia, till the tank starts it's cycle process. If you take a reading, and notice that there has been a significant drop in ammonia, that is when it is time to start adding ammonia daily. This can take a couple weeks. The tank might just sit at 3-4 ppm for a while, then one day, yea, the ammonia is dropping.
I added ammonia a few times a day, during my fishless cycle. In theory, its better to have a constant supply of ammonia, to feed the cycle. If you do not have the time to do this, a once a day feeding will also work.
I set up everything yesterday morning early. By 11am I had added my 7 drops in a 15 gal tank. I then waited for 2 hrs and took a reading of 5ppm sweet. Then I took another reading before I went to bed say 10pm Amonia read .25 or less. So I added 2 drops and went to bed. I woke up and tested at 8am Amonia = 0, maybe .25. So I added 3 drops and tested again in 2 hrs still low at best. I added 4 more drops and 2 hrs later I read 5ppm again. I am going to do 2 hr tests to see how long my Amonia is lasting. I did add a squeez from my small sponge filter from my small established tank yesterday when I had the reading of 5ppm of Amonia.
Ok about 3pm or 4 hrs after I added my last 4 drops and or 28hrs into cycle- My readings are. Amonia .25ppm, Nitrite 0, Hardness 300, Clorine 0, Alk 160-170, ph 7.8, Nitrate 0. I added 3 drops Amonia and will check in 2 hrs or so.
Sounds like squeezing from the sponge filter, really helped move your cycle along.
You can keep doing things as you are. If you have cycled filter media that you can move over to the new tank, it should be enough bacteria to support a few small fish.
I kind of find it strange that your ammonia is dropping so readily yet you don't have a nitrite or nitrate reading yet. Are you using paper strips or a liquid test kit?
Strips- with liquid on the way in transit. It seems the tank has settled down .25 to .5 for Amonia and no readings yet of nitrite or nitrate 3.5 days into the cycle.
I added about 5 handfulls(1/2 small net worth) of old substrate since the sqeeze of the sponge. I only have 5lbs of established substrate in our 3gal Betta tank to pull from. I know I cant take it all so I may take a lil more but not much.
Thanks again
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Related Threads
?
?
?
?
?
Tropical Fish Keeping
597.8K posts
83.7K members
Since 2006
forum community dedicated to tropical fish owners and enthusiasts. Come join the discussion about species,breeding, health, behavior, aquariums, adopting, care, classifieds, and more! Open to fish, plants and reptiles living in freshwater or saltwater environments.