Adding Pure Ammonia

[celaeno]

i'm selling all of my kribensis juveniles (around 40, 0.75-1" each) tomorrow. is it safe for the fish, to add just enough ammonia to the tank everyday to maintain the current bacteria levels?

i'm asking because the bioload of 40 little fish is still considerable and i plan on introducing 4 1.5" rosy barbs into my tank when my lfs has them, so i don't want a mini-cycle.

i plan on gradually adding ammonia to a 2.5 gallon bucket of tap water until i get a 1ppm reading, and then adding that amount of ammonia to the tank everyday.

however, i test for nitrates once a week and it reads ~15ppm, so does this mean that the fish right now produce ~2ppm of ammonia daily (tank is unplanted)? considering this, should i dose 2ppm of ammonia instead of 1ppm?

 

[Tokis-Phoenix]

No, don't add ammonia to the tank. If you add the new rosey barbs on the same day you get rid of the krib juveniles, the tank won't mini cycle- either way though, the chance of it mini cycling are slim with only 4 new rosey barb arivals as long as you have decent filtration in the tank. Adding ammonia to the tank everyday while fish are in it will just stress them out as the filter bacteria will not automatically process the ammonia, so they'll be swimming around in a tank full of ammonia everyday for a while, which is not good.