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bacterial colony or algae?

Ada amazonia creates a bunch of ammonia, I don't see people running around in a panic about it. At the start of my fishless cycle it took 11 days to even start processing ammonia. By day 21 all ammonia and nitrite gone in less than 12 hours. Is that a bad thing?
 
ceg4048 said:
2. I don't know how much you paid for your Nitroglycerine, but whatever you paid was too much. In the future, please realize that you can get billions of live bacteria for free by just going outside in your garden and digging up some dirt near any plant. In fact, dig up some weeds that you intend to throw away and take soil that it was removed from. The same bacteria in that soil are the ones in your tank. You do not need to spend money on lifeless, suspended animation, zombie bacteria sold for shocking and outrageous prices. None of that stuff helps your tank cycle any better than the dirt on the bottom of your shoes, OK?
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I thought the "zombie bacteria" was a top product :D. I was wrong. Thank you by the great explanation, Ceg.

ceg4048 said:
3. Diatoms often occur at tank startup. It can usually be attributable to the effects of too much light in an environment that is in it's infancy. The lighting should be reduced to 1 or at most two bulbs for now. You can also do a 3-4 day blackout preceded by and followed by huge water changes (huge means nearly 100%) Vacuum and clean the plant leaves and continue the 2X-3X water changes for the next couple of months.
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My tank is too large, so to cover it with a black plastic to do a blackout is a hard task. I'll do large water changes and I've already removed 2 light tubes :) . You meant to do 2X-3X huge water changes every week or during a couple of months? It's better I add some floating plants to reduce the light intensity even more or there isn't necessity? For now, the tank is lit by 2 tubes (60 w total).

ceg4048 said:
4. Stop adding ammonia as Darrel suggested. You are trying to cultivate a tank with living things and to keep it as clean an unpolluted as possible. Adding ammonia to your tank is like throwing sewage into your house. Please stop doing that. It doesn't help make your tank healthy, instead it causes problems such as what you are experiencing now. Some people get away with it because of other factors related to their tank and maintenance, but you are not getting away with it, so stop it.
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But I wasn't dosing any ammonia ;).

Ah, there ins't any problem if my tank receives indirect sunshine during the day and the lights bulbs turn on only during the night?

Thank you, guys.
 
Hi all,
darren636 said:
At the start of my fishless cycle it took 11 days to even start processing ammonia. By day 21 all ammonia and nitrite gone in less than 12 hours. Is that a bad thing?
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Honestly adding additional ammonia serves no useful purpose and can only be damaging. Just read Clive's post earlier in the thread.
ceg4048 said:
Ammonia is toxic to bacteria, even the bacteria that eat ammonia. Adding ammonia to your tank is like feeding a baby a drink of water from a fire hose. It's just too much. Adding ammonia kills more bacteria that it propogates. It especially is toxic to the bacteria that DO NOT eat ammonia. The problem is that there are many more of those that are just as important to the health of your tank as the ammonia eaters which are wiped out when you add too much ammonia to the tank.
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ceg4048 said:
Secondly, Nitrosomonas/Nitrobacter are in a class of organism s called "che·mo·au·to·trophs" which means that they are able to make their own food from different inorganic substances, like CO2, for example. Because there are varied substances that they can use, they are NOT dependent on only ammonia. They simply switch to a new source of nutrition when the primary nutrient is in short supply, Thirdly, there is always ammonia being produced in the tank. Any body of water will automatically develop bacterial colonies, even if there is nothing in it at the beginning. Residue, spores and precipitates from the air settle into the water and there develops a culture in the body of water whether we want to or not. Why do you think stagnant pools of water have an odor? The odor is produced by bacteria. Even better is if you plant your tank at startup with lots of plants. All the bits and pieces that fall of and decay results in small amounts of ammonia which build in concentration naturally and at a proper pace. If you didn't have any plants you could just toss in some flake food and let it go at that. whatever animals or vegetable matter dies in the water immediately produces ammonia, so in reality Nitrosomonas never runs out of ammonia. In 6-8 weeks the tank can be considered mature and stable. Fourthly, ammonia in the tank has to be converted to NO2/NO3 which, if there is a population of Nitrosomonas, will crash the Oxygen availability in the water. The bacteria require more Oxygen than ammonia, that's for sure. So sudden population rises ssuffocate the tank, which then kills bacteria because these guys are aerobic. When the tank goes into Oxygen debt those species we are trying to propagate fail at the expense of toxic anaerobic species, further deteriorating the health of the tank. People can't see that because they are measuring useless information like NO3 and they do not generally have tools to measure the things that really matter, like Oxygen or bacteria population demographics. So nobody needs to dump ammonia into their tank, which is actually counter productive. People all over The Matrix turn their tanks into toxic waste dump sites and they think they are doing the right thing. Later they have plant or fish problems that developed from these procedures but they do not trace the problems back to this practice of pollution.
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Cheers Darrel
 
At the start of my cycle nothing happened... The addition of ammonia MUST have cultured something beneficial in order to process 2 ppm ammonia within a handful of hours, and then to deal with the resulting nitrite too. I mean, at the start , there was no activity. Nothing. 10 days of nothing. So how can my actions be negative? Fish added at day 22, with more than enough filter bacteria to see 0-0 readings on my...ahem... Test kit. I would never advise fish in cycling. I've seen what happens when it goes wrong. And lets face it, beginners don't have the experience or knowledge to understand warning signs. One reason to use a test kit at least. Up the creek without a paddle is no fun. Especially if water changes are neglected- the fish in cycle really does become a torrent, and having a paddle is no help at all. Many become capsized and end up in the washing machine of death
 
darren636 said:
Ada amazonia creates a bunch of ammonia, I don't see people running around in a panic about it. At the start of my fishless cycle it took 11 days to even start processing ammonia. By day 21 all ammonia and nitrite gone in less than 12 hours. Is that a bad thing?
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No panic, but advice on the forum is the same for all new setups daily water changes week 1 every other day week 2 every third day week 3 twice week 4 this will surely deal with ammonia from new aquasoil.
 
tim said:
No panic, but advice on the forum is the same for all new setups daily water changes week 1 every other day week 2 every third day week 3 twice week 4 this will surely deal with ammonia from new aquasoil.
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Can I ask please, as I'm setting up two new tanks, one will be hi tech 130 litre, the other low tech 20 litre. Both will use florabase substrate. For the hi tech, planning to follow the daily for a week etc, but what volume do you do, all if it, half of it etc??

Low tech with florabase, planning to plant quite heavily from outset, what should I do regard setting this tank up and water changes etc? Same thing??

Cheers,
Rob
 
Rob P said:
Can I ask please, as I'm setting up two new tanks, one will be hi tech 130 litre, the other low tech 20 litre. Both will use florabase substrate. For the hi tech, planning to follow the daily for a week etc, but what volume do you do, all if it, half of it etc??

Low tech with florabase, planning to plant quite heavily from outset, what should I do regard setting this tank up and water changes etc? Same thing??

Cheers,
Rob
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Depends. If your filter is mature. If so, water changes will see ammonia quickly dispatched. If you are setting up with a new filter, the released ammonia will cycle it pretty quickly, although very high ammonia will still need diluting with a water change or two per week. Some soils release massive amounts of ammonia.
 
Rob P said:
Can I ask please, as I'm setting up two new tanks, one will be hi tech 130 litre, the other low tech 20 litre. Both will use florabase substrate. For the hi tech, planning to follow the daily for a week etc, but what volume do you do, all if it, half of it etc??

Low tech with florabase, planning to plant quite heavily from outset, what should I do regard setting this tank up and water changes etc? Same thing??

Cheers,
Rob
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Hi rob, I've found 50% of the tank volume with the frequency stated above good on start up even with low techs, you should be able to drop this to around 20% weekly as the tank matures, 50% weekly being the norm for high techs, though I've found I need to carry out two per week on my 3ft to keep algae in check.
 
ceg4048 said:
But so what? Rolymo added fish in 7 days and no ammonia was used My first ever aquarium. Juwel Rio 180l | UK Aquatic Plant Society

There is no benefit whatsoever.

Cheers,
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and your advice was to return the fish. His lfs sent him up a creek without a paddle.

Now then. In every other respect I would never disagree with you . But on cycling, particularly fish in cycling , I won't stand for it. I've seen it when it goes wrong. Disease, infections, death. Jumping, scraping and suffocation. . It makes my blood boil to hear fish in cycling recommended in shops etc. I've cycled 6 tanks in 3 years , and the only problems with fish health I have seen is when ' others' do not prepare their filter and the results are poisoning and floaters. That's not only a waste of money, but a waste of precious life too.
 
Correct, because it's always bad policy to get fish so soon. The point is that he kept them and the tank did well without any fatalities. Simply by doing water changes and by keeping the tank clean the tank matured in time. So all of that testing and adding ammonia prooves nothing, first of all because test kits tell you nothing. Therefore it's all an illusion.

Adding ammonia means that you are more likely to get into trouble. As I mentioned previously, you can get away with it but it is in effect pointless.

Cheers,
 
That's the problem, people tend not to know about performing very large water changes with new set-Ups or they don't care and let their 'hardy' fish suffer. here, on this forum, with so many people with knowledge and experience, people have the ability to keep on top of things like water changes, the average parent at the local garden centre has no clue, resulting in ' I've got 9 baby goldfish in a 15 litre tank, I think they're happy" . Anyway- happy trails.
 
Victor said:
My tank is too large, so to cover it with a black plastic to do a blackout is a hard task. I'll do large water changes and I've already removed 2 light tubes :) . You meant to do 2X-3X huge water changes every week or during a couple of months? It's better I add some floating plants to reduce the light intensity even more or there isn't necessity? For now, the tank is lit by 2 tubes (60 w total).
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That will be fine. Just keep the lights on for 8 hours or less per day. The water changes should be done 2X-3X per week for the next 6 weeks or so.

Cheers,
 
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