Am I On Track?

[DHJac]

First off, hello to everyone on this great forum.  I recently found it and have been enjoying all of the knowledge shared on here.
 
I am 22 days into a fish in cycle and would like to know if you have any recommendations.  I know, I know, should have done fishless, but it has been about 12 yrs since I had a tank and that is how I set it up last time, so I thought it was the way to go.  Here are some details on the tank.
 
It is a 110g brackish tank with no live plants (will be 1.010 SG eventually) that currently has (2) mollies along with (4) molly fry (they were a surprise).  The fry are about 1.5 wks old and once I got the breeder net up, have been doing well.  The tank is currently at about 1.002 SG and will be taken up slowly once stocking starts to allow the fresh/marine bacteria change.
 
I have been testing the water with an API kit every day and while the ammonia level has been around 0.25 ppm, the nitrites have been 5.0+ ppm for about 6-7 days.  I have done three 10-15% water changes in the last 10 days but haven't seen much of a change in the levels.  Nitrates appear to be around 5-10 ppm.
 
The fish are all very active, feeding well and the mollies have been keeping any algae at bay so the tank looks pretty good.  My main concern is that I have read that during a fishless cycle, when the ammonia is that low and nitrites that high, you need to give the ammonia a kick to help the cycle.  That is not an option here, so should I just ride it out and see where the nitrites go or is there something else I could do to assist the cycle?
 
Thanks for any suggestions/input.
 
Dave
 

 
 

 

[HandFeeder]

"That is not an option here, so should I just ride it out and see where the nitrites go or is there something else I could do to assist the cycle?
 
Thanks for any suggestions/input."
 
I have used stability mid-cycle to complete the nitrifying [nitrite > nitrate] stage on a 25-gallon tank successfully (4wks pre-Stability +1 WK w/Stability=5 WK total)*.  I was trying to cycle with 3 small fish, doing daily water changes for 4 WKs prior to starting Stability. Part out of frustration, added confidence in having 4 WK-old biological filter being established already and also just following the instructions that instructs to fully stock and keep up the required dosage, I actually went out and way overstocked my tank. No signs of stress at all and very active throughout. I then purchased a 10-gallon tank to relieve overcrowding and used Stability to cycle the tank from start to finish successfully:
 
On the brand new 10-gallon tank I stocked it fully (w/ brand new Penguin 100 filter only/ No Purigen/ no bacteria seeding other than Stability) and started Stability with Matrix both in the filter and scattered in gravel. The tank successfully cycled in 2.5 weeks with minimal ammonia/ nitrate (longest) spike, with NO water changes and no algae bloom. (Dosed with Prime for 2-3 days Nitrite stage). Watching my tank cycle that quick with no water changes and stressed fish was pretty impressive.
 
I have stopped adding stability for 3 WKS, w/water changes , now without a hint of stress or any spikes in NH3 or  NO2-.
 
In conclusion from my experience I would estimate that the use of Stability drastically reduces the cycle time with minimal stress to fish with NO water changes, but I also recommend the use of Matrix (my 25 gallon has nitrate levels so low that I am starting to worry about dangerously low nitrate conditions, so I may have to remove some) and Prime or similar products.
 
*I also realized I had made a crucial error in not providing media in my filter for nitrifying bacteria growth in the first 4 weeks and added seachem Matrix as well as seachem Purigen at the same time I started Stability treatment on my 25 gallon; I also added a second filter (Penguin 100) at that time to achieve overfiltered conditions.
 
BTW I do not work for Seachem and you can most likely use a competing brand's products just as successfully, but I am a firm believer in this product from my experience, and I KNOW how frustrating it can be to cycle without bacterial seeding so why go though it? I read about this stuff before I started cycling but actually wanted to try it once and experience succeeding without seeding, but impatience and better logic got the better of me, and I'm so glad.

 

[Blondielovesfish]

Welcome to the forum.
You want to keep the nitrite as low as you can, so, you will need to do bigger water changes than just 10-15%. I know its a big tank but with the amount of nitrite, you should be doing at least 75% water changes DAILY until the nitrite levels are lower.
 
If you want assistance in your cycle, then you could add some mature filter media from a friends place or a nice LFS. 
Another option would be to get some Dr.Tim's One and Only or TetraSafe Start. I've heard good things about these products.
 
I'm not very sure of the stability as the post above is the only one that I've read about it working, but, with that said, I haven't read a lot of posts about the stability in general.
 
Nice tank as well!

 

[DHJac]

Thanks for the suggestions.  I forgot to add this in my OP but I did use Tetra Safe Start.  I've read some good things about Dr. Tim's but thought that was only for fishless cycling.  
 
HandFeeder, I have a friend that swears by Prime for all water changes but doesn't that lock up the available ammonia and nitrites, which would inhibit the cycle?

 

[TwoTankAmin]

Dr. Tims can be used any time practically. Here are the guidelines for which one to use for brackish:
 

I have a Brackish water tank – which bacteria is for me?
The choice of whether to use the Freshwater One & Only or the Saltwater One & Only bacteria in a brackish water tank depends upon the salinity (or specific gravity [S.G.]) of your water.
If your salinity is less than 10 ppt (1.007 S.G.) then use the freshwater formula.
If your salinity is greater than 10 ppt (1.007 S.G.) then use the saltwater formula.

 
I have a hard time re Stability. It contains no autotrophic bacteria, only spores for heterotrophs. I have read a whole lot of research on nitrification, but I can find very nothing relative to the use of heterotrophs for this job in aquariums. I have started to see some information out of China on this topic but in relation to waste water treatment. But given the Stability time-line, this research in coming long after the product went on the market.
 
I can find a lot of research that indicates Stability should not work long term for sure. So if anybody can come up with anything independent on this product or I would love to see it.
 
As for the report above about adding after 4 weeks and problems seemed gone by week 6, I would have expected that to happen without the addition of Stability, so I am dubious that it was the cause.
 
What I would not be surprised to see, in terms of a scientific study of tanks where heterotrophs were added but no live nitrifiers, is this. The heterotroph counts will drop and the counts for autrophs will be there and it is they that will actually be doing the nitrification work in the tank.
 
I have heard other anecdotal reports re Stability, but I can not find anything in the science to support it. I know that bacteria like those in Dr. Tims, Safe Start are patent protected. I know Fritz has patents on their products. So far I can not find any SeaChem Labs patents on the bacteria in Stability nor for the product itself.
 
What I do find in the literature is the use of heterotrophs to help process waste water where there are heavy loads of organic carbon. Such levels should not be present in healthy aquariums. I can not figure out why Stability should work in aquariums nor why the bacterial spores it contains will lead to heterotrophic nitrifying bacteria being present in tanks long term as the dominant nitrifiers.
 
I do not understand why Stability must be added for 7 consecutive days. That would imply that the bacteria must be dying off or there is some other problem with adding all that are needed all at once. It makes no sense to me.
 
Lastly, I can find out about bacterial starter products being used in aquaculture and by large public aquariums. I have never seen any references to these industries using Stability but I can find evidence for the use of several live nitrifying bacterial starters. They may exist, but They have to be well hidden.
 
In the absence of any published research showing heterotrophic nitrifiers are present in established aquariums in any numbers and with the failure of SeaChem to identify the bacteria combined with their intentionally misstating the facts about autotrophic nitrifiers by implication, I am hesitant to have any faith in or desire to use their product.
 
But if I ever wanted evidence that Stability does not seem to get a tank fully cycled in a week or less, as I know can be done with One and Only (I have done it), I would suggest you read this5 page  thread on the SeaChem site. http/www.seachem.com/support/forums/showthread.php?t=3734
 
This guy has a low fish load in a big tank, adds tons of stability day in and day out, and look at the results. He starts adding the product to the tank June 26 and keeps adding it. He posts this on July 15 he reports "Last night my ammonia was .5, nitrites off the charts again, and Nitrates 10ppm." Almost three weeks after he begins, nitrite is spiking. In a tank with proper live nitrifiers having been added only once, a full fish load should already have been safely swimming around the tank for a week or more by then. And that assumes one spent the first week beefing up the bacteria with an addition or two of ammonia before adding any fish and the allows another week for it to have taken twice as long for some reason..
 
When asked about doing water changes since he started, on July 2 he wrote "I have not done any water changes at all." So there is no chance he wasted the product out of the system. With live bacteria it is OK to do a water change after a few days if needed, which it should not be.
 
Everybody will have to decide for themselves if they believe Stability is a viable product or not. But I would welcome any sort of independent evidence that it might be.

 

[DHJac]

Woohoo.  I had my son help me check the water this weekend and after a couple days of 0 ppm ammonia and nitrate, it looks as though my cycle is complete with all the fish happy, healthy and accounted for.  Now comes the fun part, I get to add a couple of scats to start.  LFS just got a shipment in too so maybe next weekend we'll make a trip down and see which lucky guys get to move out of their cramped digs and into the new castle.
 
Thanks for all the advice.  A little sanity check every once in while always helps.
 
Dave

 

[toshapetriji]

Although it seems your cycle has completed be aware that your bacterial colony will not be as robust as a well established tank. You would do well to be careful of overloading your filter in the early days.
 
Congratulations though.

 

[DHJac]

I understand.  The plan is to add two fish next weekend and two more a couple of weeks after that.  Slow and steady wins the race when it comes to new tanks.