Cycling

[bhammer]

I have a 280 and was going to cycle using amonia. Your thoughts on this? Also, I understand you should keep it at 5 ppm until nitries rise. How much amonia is needed to bring up to 5 ppm? Documents just say 5 drops per 10 gal. What is a drop?

[Jared J]

I get 4 drops in 1mL.

[birddog486]

adding ammonia is an excellent way to have a fishless cycle. It's not really important trying to hit a certain number with one dose. you can make small additions to get you where you want to be over a couple hours.

5ppm is a good spot, I wouldn't go much above that, I've always started my cycles around 3ppm.

The best thing is once your happy with the initial concentration don't do anything with the tank, no more additions of ammonia, no water changes etc.

Once the ammonia is gone in 3-5 weeks test for nitrite, when that hits 0 in another couple weeks your ready to stock. you don't want to add ammonia while the nitrite converting bacteria are trying to establish, if you do the ammonia is really hard on them and it will make the cycle take longer.

If your not ready to stock the tank when the nitrite hits 0 you can add .5 ml to that size tank daily to continue to build your bio colonys

[bhammer]

Originally Posted by Jared J

I get 4 drops in 1mL.

Thanks.. That works out to be just a bit more than a half cup for my tank.

[bhammer]

Originally Posted by birddog486

adding ammonia is an excellent way to have a fishless cycle. It's not really important trying to hit a certain number with one dose. you can make small additions to get you where you want to be over a couple hours.

5ppm is a good spot, I wouldn't go much above that, I've always started my cycles around 3ppm.

The best thing is once your happy with the initial concentration don't do anything with the tank, no more additions of ammonia, no water changes etc.

Once the ammonia is gone in 3-5 weeks test for nitrite, when that hits 0 in another couple weeks your ready to stock. you don't want to add ammonia while the nitrite converting bacteria are trying to establish, if you do the ammonia is really hard on them and it will make the cycle take longer.

If your not ready to stock the tank when the nitrite hits 0 you can add .5 ml to that size tank daily to continue to build your bio colonys

Thanks... I am seeding with some LR and sand from my existing 115 so I am expecting a shorter cycle time.

Everything I have read is to keep adding Amonia until the nitrite is at about 5ppm and then move down to 2 drops per 10 until amonia and nitrites read 0.

[birddog486]

Originally Posted by bhammer

Thanks... I am seeding with some LR and sand from my existing 115 so I am expecting a shorter cycle time.

Everything I have read is to keep adding Amonia until the nitrite is at about 5ppm and then move down to 2 drops per 10 until amonia and nitrites read 0.

You can continue to add ammonia, but like I said it will make the cycle longer from my experience. I raise thousands of fish each year so I've setup quite a few tanks over the years. If you do continue to add ammonia you can expect up to an 8 week cycle from a virgin tank.

[ctripi]

I wouldn't cycle with ammonia. Your faking the nitrification cycle to believe there is a larger bioload than that which exists. Unless you add bioload the nitrifying bacteria will die off (ie mini cycle) to support the new lower nutrient level, hence the reason why this type of cycling takes longer. Dosing ammonia may harm the little bit of invertibrate life that might actually survive the initial addition. Just food for thought.

[chow]

I've used ammonia all the time and never had any problem. I went above the 5 ppm and the tubeworms, mushrooms, zoas, and ricordia are doing fine during the entire process.

[dwd5813]

i've cycled my last 3 aquariums this way and what i do, while it may prolong things, is add the initial dose to get to 3-5ppm and then sit back for a while, testing every couple days until i start to see it go down. from there i'll bump it back up into the initial range and start testing for nitrite as well. once there is a nitrite spike i lay off the ammonia and continue to test for ammonia and nitrite. once the nitrite starts going down and the ammonia zeroes out i'll test for all 3 and see where i'm at. at that point i'll bump the ammonia back up to 2-3 ppm and let that cycle through, testing all 3, until i have readings of 0, 0, and +, + being whatever the nitrate ends up at. then a water change schedule begins to rid the excess nitrate and once that's under control i'll start with livestock.

[bertoni]

If the ammonia is pure enough, it's fine. I think fish food is easier to use, since it's guaranteed not to have any detergent or fragrances. It'll work just as well. If the tank has live rock, there's not much point in either at the start.

[wooden_reefer]

Originally Posted by bhammer

I have a 280 and was going to cycle using amonia. Your thoughts on this? Also, I understand you should keep it at 5 ppm until nitries rise. How much amonia is needed to bring up to 5 ppm? Documents just say 5 drops per 10 gal. What is a drop?

A drop is about 0.05 cc. There are about 20 drops in a ml or cc of water.


You do not need to do extra work in keeping the ammonia level constant during cycling, if you are not concerned about saving any lives on any rock or other medium during cycling, This is a waste of test reagents. You can simply have a few pulses of ammonia during the cycle. I'd say 5ppm ammonia at days 1, 14, 21, and 28 will result in a very robust cycle. I would test for significant nitrite starting day 14, and for disappearance of nitrite starting day 28. A few as two nitrite tests can confirm a robust cycle if you are sure about the amount of ammonia you have added during the cycle.

[sfboarders]

Originally Posted by wooden_reefer

A drop is about 0.05 cc. There are about 20 drops in a ml or cc of water.


You do not need to do extra work in keeping the ammonia level constant during cycling, if you are not concerned about saving any lives on any rock or other medium during cycling, This is a waste of test reagents. You can simply have a few pulses of ammonia during the cycle. I'd say 5ppm ammonia at days 1, 14, 21, and 28 will result in a very robust cycle. I would test for significant nitrite starting day 14, and for disappearance of nitrite starting day 28. A few as two nitrite tests can confirm a robust cycle if you are sure about the amount of ammonia you have added during the cycle.

What about if ammonia is at 8ppm + and nitrite is at 5ppm +. My nitrites have been like that for 2+ weeks already. Do you think that would be a robust cycle?

[wooden_reefer]

Originally Posted by ctripi

I wouldn't cycle with ammonia. Your faking the nitrification cycle to believe there is a larger bioload than that which exists. Unless you add bioload the nitrifying bacteria will die off (ie mini cycle) to support the new lower nutrient level, hence the reason why this type of cycling takes longer. Dosing ammonia may harm the little bit of invertibrate life that might actually survive the initial addition. Just food for thought.

You are not faking a nitrification cycle. It is the nitrification cycle. The intension of cycling is to process the ammonia excreted by livestock, but the use of excretion of livestock to cycle is foolish and totally obsolete.

It takes several weeks for nitrification bacteria to die from starvation, when there is no more ammonia and nitrite. There is a wide enough window of opportunity during which the nitrification bacteria will be at standby. At least three weeks after a cycle, may be twice that or longer.

The nitrification bacteria population will decrease, not increase, as you stock livestock after a robust cycle. This is far better, since livestock is never exposed to any ammonia at all, no mini-cycling at all ever. No amount of bioload can possibly produce even just 10% or less of the ammonia used in cycling (unless a large livestock dies and is not removed). Why is this faking or undesirable? It is very desirable. Having far excess nitrification bacteria at the early stage of a DT will not affect long term microbial balance.

You can also cycle using an ammonia source separately in a separate container and then add the cycled medium to any tank years after the cycle and any time to bump up nitrification. You can withdraw such medium gradually, in a few months.

There is no need and no reason to use excretion from livestock to cycle anymore.

If you are using recently collected LR to cycle, you may indeed want to monitor the ammonia level. You may not want to exceed a certain level, say 1 ppm, if you want to save some lives in LR. Even here, the ammonia is mostly from decay of animal protein. If there is little die-off and little ammonia generated, you may want to add an ammonia source.

[bhammer]

Originally Posted by ctripi

I wouldn't cycle with ammonia. Your faking the nitrification cycle to believe there is a larger bioload than that which exists. Unless you add bioload the nitrifying bacteria will die off (ie mini cycle) to support the new lower nutrient level, hence the reason why this type of cycling takes longer. Dosing ammonia may harm the little bit of invertibrate life that might actually survive the initial addition. Just food for thought.

What??? the last time I checked, ammonia is ammonia, so long as you get 100% without additives or perfumes. I started with a complete dead tank, nothing live at all. Just for grins I measured my nitrates and they are up to 1ppm. Yesterday night, I added some rock I had cooking in my existing 115 and about 4 cups of sand. Since I took some LR from the 115, I will be watching it a bit more close to make sure I don;t get any spikes.

The cycle time is the cycle time but I would love to see it shorter than the month based on the LR added. If not, oh well, I will use that as an excuse to go buy stuff after Christmas.

[wooden_reefer]

Originally Posted by sfboarders

What about if ammonia is at 8ppm + and nitrite is at 5ppm +. My nitrites have been like that for 2+ weeks already. Do you think that would be a robust cycle?

When your nitrite drops to zero, it will signify the completion of a robust cycle.

You do not need to ID the nitrite peak. You can stop frequent nitrite tests now and just wait until day 28 or so. It is high enough. In fact, if I detect just 0.5 ppm nitrite at any time, and by day 35 it has dropped to zero, and I know for sure I have added enough ammonia during the cycle, a robust cycle is confirmed.

[sfboarders]

Originally Posted by wooden_reefer

When your nitrite drops to zero, it will signify the completion of a robust cycle.

You do not need to ID the nitrite peak. You can stop frequent nitrite tests now and just wait until day 28 or so. It is high enough. In fact, if I detect just 0.5 ppm nitrite at any time, and by day 35 it has dropped to zero, and I know for sure I have added enough ammonia during the cycle, a robust cycle is confirmed.

Is it necessary for me to add another pulse of ammonia? I'm already +/-35 days of cycling and haven't noticed any nitrites going down. Ammonia went down about 2 weeks ago. I'll just wait another 1/1.5 weeks to check nitrite again.

BTW you should do a cycling questions and answers thread about cycling since you always bring up the same stuff.

[bertoni]

At least some ammonia products have surprised people by containing detergent or a fragrance, but they might not have read the label carefully. If the tank has true live rock, there's no need to cause an ammonia spike. I'd just wait for zero ammonia and then start feeding lightly.

[wooden_reefer]

Originally Posted by sfboarders

Is it necessary for me to add another pulse of ammonia? I'm already +/-35 days of cycling and haven't noticed any nitrites going down. Ammonia went down about 2 weeks ago. I'll just wait another 1/1.5 weeks to check nitrite again.

BTW you should do a cycling questions and answers thread about cycling since you always bring up the same stuff.

I'd say you do not need to add another pulse of ammonia, since 8 ppm has been tested.

Unless there is no viable Nitrobacter bacteria, your nitrite will drop in a couple of weeks.