I Read Nitrogen Cycle Page, But Some Follow Up Questions...

Hello!

I'm setting up my first aquarium. We only have room for a 10 gallon. I added thoroughly rinsed gravel and 2 plastic plants, and also planted some java fern. I have added tap water and treated with Top Fin water conditioner. The filter is running, but the heater is not on (yet). The temperature is sitting at around 70 degrees.

I'm getting ready to place an amazon order. I would like to do a fish-less cycle. I'm hoping to be ready to add fish before my daughters' birthday (obviously if it's not ready we will wait) July 11th.

I have put the Dr. Tim's ammonium chloride in my basket, The API freshwater test kit (that includes the quick start), and some liquid fertilizer for the java fern.

My question is, do I start adding the ammonium and quick start (bacteria) together, or should I start one before the other? Will this hurt the plants? Should I get TSS instead of quick start?

Is there a better way I can do this without fish (or access to an established aquarium)? I assume the plants came with some small amount of bacteria?

 

Hello and welcome to fishlore

I prefer TSS. But that’s just my opinion.

You can add them at the same time.

It will not harm java fern.

You don’t really need ferts for java fern, but if you want to you can...

I cycle using used filter media from my other tanks. Since this is your first tank, maybe you can get some from a LFS (local fish store)?

 

The guy at the fish store told me I didn't need anything for the java ferns, but my friend insisted he was wrong. Too late, I already ordered it...maybe I'll replace the plastic plants with some others if I can keep these alive haha.

 

HI & welcome to the forum, you've made a good start. When your stuff arrives first thing I'd do is run a full check on your water to get base line readings so you know where you're starting from, you might also want to test your tap water to see what that's like for ammonia, nitrites & nitrates & Ph so you know what you're putting into your tank. Next would be to add the BB starter. people have different opinions on these some feel they're a waste of money, others like me believe they help the cycle establish & people have differing views on which one is best, personally I use JBL Denitrol & have always had good results from it but I also do fish in cycling. The ammonia won't hurt your plants but they won't have had much if any BB on them, the BB colony lives mainly in the media in your filter & some in your substrate but not so much on plants or in the water column.

 

You’ve gotten some amazing answers! I agree that you can add both at the same time. If you don’t mind me asking, do you know what fish you’ll get? I only ask because I have seen time and time again people getting fish too big for their tank because the pet store workers told them It’d be OK I’m their tank.
If you ever want more easy plants in the future I recommend anubias, swords, and Marimo moss balls.

 

I haven't seen to many members here claim that QuickStart worked for them. I myself am a big fan of Tetra SafeStart. I've used it several times and was successful each time. To be honest, I've never used TSS with a fishless cycle, I've always used it with a fish in cycle and never lost a fish.

 

To be honest, I've never used TSS with a fishless cycle, I've always used it with a fish in cycle and never lost a fish.

Same same for me with Denitrol, works every time & no loses.

 

You’ve gotten some amazing answers! I agree that you can add both at the same time. If you don’t mind me asking, do you know what fish you’ll get? I only ask because I have seen time and time again people getting fish too big for their tank because the pet store workers told them It’d be OK I’m their tank.
If you ever want more easy plants in the future I recommend anubias, swords, and Marimo moss balls.

Thinking 5-6 male Guppies? But open to any other suggestions, especially any hardy combinations (that would have been a future question!)

 

Guppies would be cool. Make sure to get either all males or all females. With them, you could add some shrimp. Some aquarium favorites would be red cherry and gost shrimp. Armanos also are a typical favorite.

 

Thanks for all the advice and suggestions!!


I asked the guy at the local fish store for something to help me cycle my tank and he squeezed some dirty water out of the filter of a tank and said to dump it directly into my filter. But then another guy was throwing away some algae he scraped out of an empty tank (hadn’t had fish for a long time he said) and the guy said to throw some in the bag with the dirty filter water. Is this ok as a seed?? Or will my tank get taken over by algae?

 

The dirty filter water can, the algae may. But, I'd just use the BB from the filter water.

 

The dirty filter water can, the algae may. But, I'd just use the BB from the filter water.

It’s all in the same bag, can I just strain the algae out or?

 

Yep. Or throw it in. If you do grow alge, it’s the perfect food for shrimp or snails.

 

All you need is Prime and water changes if you want to do fish-in, never lost a fish during the cycling process with Prime. the bacteria in bottles is ineffective and people think it works because their tank cycled in X weeks or days but in reality their tank simply just cycled

 

Water doesn’t hold bacteria, neither does algae. They live on surfaces in the tank, about 99% being on your filter media. Additionally, please don’t add that water to your tank, you don’t know what diseases may be living in it. Even if you had a little bit of bacteria that fell into the bag, they’ll all be dead within 24 hours of having no ammonia. I work at a LFS and I would never put media from the stores tanks anywhere near my tanks. The safer option would be to get it from someone you know has healthy fish.

 

Thanks for all the advice and suggestions!!


I asked the guy at the local fish store for something to help me cycle my tank and he squeezed some dirty water out of the filter of a tank and said to dump it directly into my filter. But then another guy was throwing away some algae he scraped out of an empty tank (hadn’t had fish for a long time he said) and the guy said to throw some in the bag with the dirty filter water. Is this ok as a seed?? Or will my tank get taken over by algae?

No, I wouldn't put anything like that in your tank, there won't be much if any BB in it & you don't know what nasties it could be putting in your tank, that's why when introducing fish you net them out of the bag they come in & throw the water in the bag away, never empty it into your tank even if it's a QT.

The dirty filter water can, the algae may. But, I'd just use the BB from the filter water.

You should NEVER put water, used filter media or anything else in your tank from a source you can't trust (i.e. not your own) especially from a LFS / LPS, you don't know what diseases or pests you could be putting in your tank with it that's why QT are used & why fish etc. should be netted from the bag into the tank & the water they come in discarded.

 

Wonderful. I already dumped it in. Now what do I do? Take everything out and start over?

 

Wonderful. I already dumped it in. Now what do I do? Take everything out and start over?

I wouldnt stress about it, you can add some flake food as an ammonia source until you get yours and the test kit.

 

I wouldnt stress about it, you can add some flake food as an ammonia source until you get yours and the test kit.

Ok thanks! I’ll just hope there wasn’t anything too sinister in there.

 

The idea with adding Beneficial Bacteria from a bottle with the fish in the tank is that the fish will be a ready source of ammonia for the bacteria as soon as you add it in. If there are no fish or other ammonia source, the bacteria will starve (in as little as a couple of days as I understand it, they live very short, fast lives)

When I did my fishless cycle, I added beneficial bacteria (in the form of Dr Tim's One and Only) and used pure ammonia to feed them. I chose to use Stress Coat+ to treat my water while I was cycling, specifically because it does NOT neutralize ammonia, nitrites or nitrates. I wanted to feed my bacteria and get accurate readings out of my test kit. It took about 28 days for me, but you might have faster luck.

Now that my cycle is well established and my fish are doing great, I use Seachem Prime as my water conditioner.

 

The idea with adding Beneficial Bacteria from a bottle with the fish in the tank is that the fish will be a ready source of ammonia for the bacteria as soon as you add it in. If there are no fish or other ammonia source, the bacteria will starve (in as little as a couple of days as I understand it, they live very short, fast lives)

When I did my fishless cycle, I added beneficial bacteria (in the form of Dr Tim's One and Only) and used pure ammonia to feed them. I chose to use Stress Coat+ to treat my water while I was cycling, specifically because it does NOT neutralize ammonia, nitrites or nitrates. I wanted to feed my bacteria and get accurate readings out of my test kit. It took about 28 days for me, but you might have faster luck.

Now that my cycle is well established and my fish are doing great, I use Seachem Prime as my water conditioner.

That makes sense. My ammonia is coming in the mail tomorrow so I guess whatever I've added will probably be dead by then, so I'll try to get it to cycle with the bottled bacteria

 

Just remember there are 2 sets of bacteria at work.
1 eats ammonia(NH3) and makes nitrite.(NO2)
2 eats nitrite and makes nitrate.(NO3)

The chemicals are INDICATORS of the bacteria, they are not the bacteria themselves.

You may not see nitrate readings for a while. That's OK. Once you start reading nitrate (NO3) that means bacteria #2 is starting to thrive. When both sets have matured to the point where it takes them only 1 day to process ammonia (NH3) all they way into Nitrate (NO3) you are safe to add fish, and should never see high ammonia readings. I've had my goldfish in over a month now and have read zeros on NH3 and NO2 on every test!


I remember the NO2 and NO3 this way:
Too(2) Trite (she's too trite~!)
Trés = trate

 

I’m wondering if I should just dump and rinse everything and start over. I put the ammonia in as per the directions on the bottle and it was 2ppm. 0 nitrates 0 nitrites. This is complicated by the fact that you can’t buy any decent bottles of B.B. anywhere in Canada that I can find. Certainly not TSS. So I just bought some marine land brand at the pet store to try it. I tested again 24 hours later and now the ammonia is 5ppm! Still 0 on the others. Now what do I do?! My tank is full of ammonia and no bacteria (I assume what I bought was garbage since it wasn’t even refrigerated).

 

I don’t even use bacterial starters. They’re trash honestly, 99% of them at least. You’ll still cycle. You just have to wait, it may take a month or two. Don’t mess with your filter, just wait.

 

I don’t even use bacterial starters. They’re trash honestly, 99% of them at least. You’ll still cycle. You just have to wait, it may take a month or two. Don’t mess with your filter, just wait.

How often should I even test?

 

Well, I can tell you that it’ll take around a week for nitrites to show up, maybe longer. As often as you want. Also, your ammonia went from 2 to 5 without you adding more?

 

Well, I can tell you that it’ll take around a week for nitrites to show up, maybe longer. As often as you want. Also, your anmonia went from 2 to 5 without you adding more?

Yeah! And there are no fish.

 

That’s odd. I’d get it down to 2.

 

Do I just change out most of the water?

 

Nope. 50%.

 

I have to respectfully disagree with AquaticJ in that all bacteria additives are junk. I have used Tetra SafeStart successfully several times in the past. Also many people have had good experiances with Dr Tim's One&Only, BioSpira, NiteOut and Stability. But there are some that do not work.

Note that not all bacteria additives need to be refrigerated, I know for a fact that Tetra SafeStart, Dr Tim's One&Only and Stability do not require refrigeration.

 

That’s why I included “99% of them” yeah TSS does seem to shorten the time a bit. Though I’m still a bit skeptical because I’ve cycled without TSS in a shorter amount of time than using it.

 

A lot of the bottled bacteria mixtures we get in Canada come premixed with “bacteria food” aka ammonia. Doing a water change now would remove the minimal amounts of bacteria the mixture actually contained.

Personally I haven’t found any of the “bacteria starters” available to us Canadians effective. For my first tank after a tear-down, I typically just do fish in with prime and something like nutrafin cycle. It supplements the B.B. until your colony establishes well but doesn’t actually cycle the tank. Afterwards I just plop in a sponge filter if I know I’ll be setting up/cycling another tank and then you’re good to go

Edit: we can’t get our hands on TSS but seachem stability should be available at speciality fish pet stores or on amazon

 

Part of the complication of people's opinions of whether or not beneficial bacteria are useful, is the fact that most types of BB do not have a date on the bottle. It is *entirely possible* that you bought a bottle that's been sitting on a shelf too long/got hot/got cold and all the bacteria are dead. Those little guys can be kind of delicate! I used Tetra Safe Start to begin my fishless cycle and it sort of.. worked... after a couple of weeks I got a bottle of Dr Tim's from Amazon and it started showing Nitrites almost right away. My Dr. Tim's One and Only has a "best by" date on it (I got a second bottle just in case and have it in the fridge).

 

Part of the complication of people's opinions of whether or not beneficial bacteria are useful, is the fact that most types of BB do not have a date on the bottle. It is *entirely possible* that you bought a bottle that's been sitting on a shelf too long/got hot/got cold and all the bacteria are dead. Those little guys can be kind of delicate! I used Tetra Safe Start to begin my fishless cycle and it sort of.. worked... after a couple of weeks I got a bottle of Dr Tim's from Amazon and it started showing Nitrites almost right away. My Dr. Tim's One and Only has a "best by" date on it (I got a second bottle just in case and have it in the fridge).

Yeah! It’s so hard to know how it’s been stored! I see dr Tim’s is available on amazon for me, if I don’t see any nitrites in a few days I’ll order it and try. I was really hoping to have things up and running by my daughters’ birthday (July 11) so they could get their fish but really they don’t know the difference!

I retested the ammonia and it was 2ppm. I think I did something wrong last time so I didn’t change any water. Still no nitrites!