Right Ammonia?

[tmoney7]

So i went to the store and bought ammonia the ingredients are ammonium hydroxide and surfactant

 

[Nordk]

I don't think so. It should only list ammonia and water, or ammonium hydroxide (2 different ways of saying the same thing). Some surfactants can be used as insecticides and biocides, so I wouldn't chance it.

 

[tmoney7]

I thought that might be the case, i guess i shall return it and see if they have any of the pure stuff if not does anyone know of stores in the US that might carry it, i got this stuff from WAL-MART

 

[Ninjouzata]

Go to Ace Hardware

 

[tmoney7]

OK i think there is one somewhere near me ill have to check, thanks!

 

[Ninjouzata]

OK i think there is one somewhere near me ill have to check, thanks!

Welcome! Hope you can find it, that's where I got mine and that's where I hear a lot of people getting theirs.

 

[tmoney7]

Yeah i found a couple and luckily both of them are only about 25 mins away...only if there could be one right in my back yard

 

[TwoTankAmin]

Here is the really strange thing here. In 2001 I did my first fishless cycle. Because I did not know any better, I used ammonia which contained surfactants. Over the next few years as I ramped up the number of tanks and then began setting up temporary summer tanks every year as well. An I cycled all of these using the same ammonia.
 
Moreover, I have needed to keep what I believed were empty tanks cycled or get a new one up. In all cases they were all well planted. So I would dose the very same ammonia. On three occasions, a week or two into the every few day ammonia dosing routine, I discovered newborn fry in the tank. The first were zebra danios, the next were Pseudomugil gertrudae and the last choprae danios. I believe in two case the eggs went into the tank on plants take from other tanks as those fish were never in the empty tanks. In the third, the eggs were left behind in a planted Q tank.
 
I never had problems using the ammonia with surfactants, but I did a few things I believe helped mitigate any potential effects. Number one is I did at least one 35% water change a week and I also ran carbon in a filter. Finally, when the cycle was done, I did another big water change, 75% or more. My best guess is I cycled somewhere between 60 and 70 tanks this way over the years. About few years ago I switched to using ammonium chloride.
 
One other thing was different about how I cycled. I did not use the dose and test method, rather I employed the method that it replaced- the drops per 10 gallons. This involved adding 5 or 6 drops of ammonia to the tank every day fer each10 gals of water. When nitrites showed up, the amount was lowered  to 3 or 4 drops per day. The tank was cycled when you could dose 5/6 drops per 10 gallons and get 0/0 the next day. This is a lower dosing method and my water changes and carbon may have reduced or eliminated the surfactants as an issue.
 
memebers should understand that I am not suggesting other people do what I have. I can not find any support for what I did from hobbyists or scientists. I know it worked, and that is enough for me. But I would hate for people to try if and have bad results. Continue to look for pure ammonia, it can't hurt. Or look to use ammonium chloride as well. If you want to try cycling with ammonia that contains surfactants, please do not blame me if it doesn't work out.

 

[tmoney7]

Yeah even though that sounds like it might work and it will save me some time i am still not going to try it just because i hate having to take the chance and have something go wrong like you said.  I am hopefully going to be able to go to the store and get some sometime soon but who knows what can happen .  But the filter i got which is a aqua clear HOB filter has a basket inside it which holds a sponge filter, a carbon filter, and then the filter which houses the bacteria so i do have carbon but like i said, don't really want to risk it .  But thank you for the info it made me fell a little better about buying the wrong stuff .

 

[coolie]

I think over there in the US, there Dr Tim's "one and only" and over here in the UK, we have 35% ammonia on eBay, so it's covered both sides of the fish pond!

 

[FreshwaterAfishianado]

If I remember correctly surfactants are only there to help with dissolving the ammonia in water, I could be wrong though.