Heard that these things work better for tiny tanx than big ones.

I'm gonna buy a 100 gallon tank, and I got this question: If it doesn't cheat the whole N2 cycle, can it (plus water changes) at least make fish survive during the cycle?

The only one I have used is Seachem Stability. I used on a 20 gallon tank with about eight very small community fish and it seemed to do the job. However, I'm not sure how well it would work on a very large aquarium if you were trying to cycle it with larger fish.

I'm afraid that I'm non-the wiser if I read the product description. If the nitrifying bacteria that you find in your biological filter need oxygen and a surface to live on then I am at a loss how they can keep them alive inside a bottle that may sit on a shop shelf for a year. I suspect that the bacteria actually the free swimming variety that will consume ammonia in the actual tank water. So they are actually doing their job whilst your biological filter is maturing. I believe it's a mistake to think that these products actually cycle your tank for you within a week

in most lfs, beneficial bacteria is always available. and it helps to expedite
cycling the tank... normally, those who bought fish first before learning needs
this stuff to save the poor fishes....

I'm not looking to cycle da tank with it. I'm just looking to make fish survive during the REAL cycle. Cuz I just don't have time to wait for a big tank to cycle, and we got a huge competition in our family. Everyone takes great pride for the pet they have. They all have birds, and I'm trying to bring the hobby to my family. They don't know about the N2 cycle or anything about fish. If they see I've spend all the money on a big tank and left it empty for a couple of weex, I'm considered the loser.

I need a quick show piece!

OFL wrote:


Like Penn i have used it on a small tank a long time ago. it worked fine and cycled the tank in 3 days. i wasn't sure you can still buy the stuff now. haven't seen it for a long time,

The shop use to have a machine that stored the stuff inside. when you buy the amount you needed they put it into a plastic bag. looked like frog spawn. it wasn't cheap and to do a large tank would be expensive unless price has dropped now.?

I used the Stress Zyme to help cycle my 90 gallon tank and I don't think it really helped that much...still had goldfish die during the cycling process and it didn't really cheat the cycle.

On the other hand my ammonia topped off at only 1.0 before it fell back to 0 and I cycled my tank in about 2.5 weeks so maybe it gave it a little boost but definitely didn't instantly cycle my tank like the bottle kind of implied it would.

So, fish still die even if I use the thing and do water changes?

There will never be a instant cycle. a proper cycled tank takes 6 wks for a reason, there is NO cheating. its always best to see the cycle process through.

instant cycles dont really work. So no no way to cheat it. Using stress zyme mught help a little bit, but you will still have togo through the process. Try a fishless cycle with pure ammonia!

here is a link to an ammonia calculator

www.fishforums.net/aquarium-calculator.htm

based off of a 100 us gal tank, and using 9.5% ammonia solution and needing at least a reading of 5ppm of ammonia, you need to add 19.92ml of pure ammonia. The % of ammonia wil be printed on the label, so you can use the calculator to change the amount if this wasnt what you needed. This shuld raise your ammonia to 5 ppm.

Be sure to have a great deal of bio media and spongelike mechnical filtration to capture good bacteria once it begins to multiply.

Test your water daily until it is 1 ppm. This means it has began the process of breaking down ammonia into nitrite

add the same amount of ammonia back to the tank once this happens and test for nitrite, not ammonia now.

Once the levels have lowered, keep a small amount of ammonia in your tank while nitrites are establishing and now nitrates should be establishing in your bio media in large quantities. Once you get reading of 0 and a nitrate reading you can add fish. But if you dont add right away, you must keep adding ammonia to keep the good bacteria alive. Remember, nitrates feed off of nitrites and without ammonia converting into nitrites, you have no cycle and the good bacteria will die.

do a large water change, about 75% to get nitrates down below 20ppm, and ammonia and nitrites to 0.

This shoudl shorten your cyclying process. Dont add fish yet, its inhumane and wrong. It will lower thier lifespan substantially if you cycle with them in there and damages internal organs.

you can always get established tank water from somewhere, and poor directly onto the filters, as this may also help just a tad, but that also needs to be disease free, so good luck with that.

if doen right, you can have a great cycled tank within 3 weeks or so. Cuts it right in half.

Good luck!

being straight forward in telling us you want an instant cycled tank for a family
pride, i will give you one good tip. if your tank is ready and with water already,
check at your LFS or request from them if you can buy the filter media of their
established tank, put it in your filter pump and run the system... you will have
instant cycled tank. all you need is to monitor the water parameters with your
oscar in the tank. this is an honest cheating in cycling the tank.

just make sure that the media you get from the LFS will not get dry or idle
for more than an hour, otherwise beneficial bacteria will die too.

I used bacteria in a bottle when i had new tank syndrome.
Daily waterchanges, prime and bacteria did the job but i still lost 10% of my fish.
And like the others posted, it was a small 3 foot tank.

Alright. I think I'd do it with some zebra danios, and when it's over, make them for oscars. Thanx, everyone.