Calab

I was wondering... when cycling your tank with ammonia, is it OK to have plants in the tank, or will the cycle harm them at all?

Butterfly

I imagine the plants would suck up the ammonia before it had a change to do its job.
Carol

pepetj

Hi Calab:
I always go for planted fishless cycling. It works perfectly at least in lo-tech set ups (my experience).
I use the method of adding Xdrops of Ammonia solution until getting a 5ppm reading, changing to 1/2Xdrops once the nitrite spike begins in order to better control the ammount of ammonia being added, keeping the lights on 24/7, at least until the nitrite spike begins.
Using this method it took me 11 days to cycle a 10gal (filter for 30gal, 2 airstones, moderate to heavily planted), 13 days to cycle the 5.5gal (filter for 10gal, 1 airstone, mildly planted), and the 29gal is in its 11th day and the nitrite began going down yesterday (filter for 50gal, 1 airstone, heavily planted).
Keep in mind I live in the Caribbean, so I use no heaters. If you plan to increase your tank temperature to speed up the cycle above 86F, I don't know if the plants would take it (water temperature during cycling was in the 82-86F range with lights on 24/7, but dropped to 80F at night with the lights off).
Hope this info is useful for you.

Pepe
Santo Domingo

lalynya

I allways thought that the plants help the cycle so the plants should be fine

sirdarksol

Plants provide extra growing space for the nitrifying bacteria. They do suck up some of the extra ammonia, and so could potentially slow the cycle's progression by a bit, but not much.

lalynya

so that sounds mixed to me..does that mean plants are a good thing or a bad thing for the cycle?

griffin

i would tend to say that plants are good for a tank, but not necessarily a cycle. however, if you put enough plants in your tank, you'll get a silent cycle, where you won't see any nitrate/nitrite/ammonia levels because the plants are taking them up as nutrients. you can still put fish in a planted tank without the normal cycle and be fine since the plants will take up the ammonia as a nutrient.

goggles

good theory but is that ealy a risk you would like to take and is it good advise, if it doesn't work the fish will die.

griffin

i would agree with you except for the fact that the plant needs to uptake the nitrates/nitrites/ammonia to survive. it will work if you have healthy plants and don't suddenly add a bunch of fish. a few at a time should be fine with healthy plants.

goggles

i still think that a fishless cycle would always be the better option.

GuppyTeacher

Add the plants by all means. The plants will already have the bacteria on the surface of the plant and will help speed up the cycle. If you want a good book to read check out Diana Walstads book "The ecology of the planted aquarium. It is a comprehensive look to building and maintaining a low tech aquarium. I now have 3 planted aquariums and the plants look wonderful and they are overall very low maintenaince tanks.

sirdarksol

My take on plants has always been that I add them. If it slows down the cycle a bit, so be it. I'd rather have them colonized by nitrifying bacteria ahead of time.