Doing a Tank cycle with shrimp/prawns??

[angel84]

I am currently doing a fishless cycle using 4 tiger prawns. It has been running for 1 day now my readings are Ammonia 4 to 5, Nitrite 0.5 and I havent bothered to do nitrate yet.

Does anyone have any experience of doing a cycle using prawns or shrimp? I was just wondering how long it too for the ammonia to be broken down?I'm not going for a quick fix or anything I was just looking for sugestions on how to help the tank out if It was wrong?

Also I looked at my filter sponge and its dirty as hell (i mean really dirty) is this normal for the cycle because my water went really cloudy but i was told that it was because of the decomposing tiger prawns but it has started to clear up!!

any info on using shrimp/prawns for the cycle will be useful because I keep getting conflicting views on it and As i'm new I dont want to risk a fish's life until I have done all the research (no point in doing a job if its not done right).

If you can give me a hand out with this I would be grateful!!! Also if any one has a timeline for this type of cycle it would be great because I cant find one anywhere!!!!

Thanks

Louise

 

[angel84]

Also if any one wants to know it a 14 gallon tank. Dont know if that will help anyone but if you can help it will be great!

Thanks

Louise

 

[newland]

I'm not sure on the time it will take as i'm about to do the same thing with my tanks.

Instead of putting the prawns in the tank i've put them in a seperate container and will add just the water from the container to hopefully stop all that mess.

Did you add anything in the tank such as gravel/plants from an established tank as this would speed things up.

Things seam to be moving along fairly quickly for you as after 1 day you have nitrites in your tank.

Bumping up the temp speeds things up but don't do this if you have plants.

 

[whizingdonkey]

I've recently started a cycle with prawns. Sounds like your going fine! Took me 6 days before i had a postive nitrite reading. Remember not to build up to much ammonia in the tank tho! Large amounts can hamper the growth of the bactria, 4-5ppm like you have is fine. Just remove the prawns and put them back when the ammonia readings lower. It may be 2-3 weeks before the nitrites build up then go down, but they will!

 

[angel84]

So should I remove the prawns now because someone told me to keep them in during the whole cycle so the bacteria always have something to feed on and will multiply quicker if there is a constant supply? I am going to do a reading tonight and it it is still rising I will take them out for sure but if you can elobrate on how long the prawns should stay that would be really great!!!

Thank you all so much for reply and any help is great!!

Louise

 

[whizingdonkey]

If your ammonia reading is 4-5pmm you can take them out. But those levels are not really high. I'd take em out, its true that the bactiera need something to feed on but taking the prawns out won't take out the ammonia thats in the tank already. I took prawns out 3-4 days ago with ammonia readng of 4ppm and its still that now! just keep an eye on them. Remeber if there is ammonia in the water the bacteria have a food source, whether the prawns are in there or not!

 

[rdd1952]

If your adding pure ammonia, there isn't any benefit to having any shrimp or prawns in the tank. I would actually think they would slow the cycling process since they are adding more ammonia daily whereas in a normal fishless cycle, after you add ammonia at the start to raise your level to 4 to 6, you don't add ammonia again until the level drops back to close to zero. At that point, the ammonia eating bacteria is present and you are only adding ammonia then to keep the bacteria fed while the nitrite bacteria form.

 

[angel84]

I'm gonna take the prawns out then and i'll let you know how it all goes. also to answer the question i'm just using prawns as I couldnt get a hold of pure ammonia.

thanks for all your help!!

Louise

 

[rdd1952]

If you can't get ammonia, you can use fish food. It just takes a little longer to get the ammonia readin since the food has to decay before it turns to ammonia. But since you have ammonia already, you should be fine. You will just need to add more ammonia after it finally drops to keep feeding the bacteria while the nitrite spike takes place.