conflicting information

barrymoore

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what to do what to do?? the information i was given was to first bring the waters ammonia levels upto 5ppm on day 1, useing ammonia which in this instance is 9%. That took 70 drops to do in my 85 ltr tank. On the second day and subsiquent days to do the same until that I had a nitrite spike, and then to lower the ammonia amounts to half in this case it would be 35 drops. Until the ammonia and nitrite levels drop to 0 and then just before adding the fish do a 70% water change. This should take about 12 - 14 days.
then since i have heard that i should bring the ammonia up to 5ppm but then not to add any more until the amonia falls to 0 this will take about 2 weeks. Anyone know what i should do??
 
Either would work fine. With the seccond you'd only be able to add a few fish in the end as the ammonia you are adding is less. In both cases, do a large water change before adding fish to make sure you don't have excessive nitrAtes.
 
the first method will work. It's the method I have used.

I'm not convinced that the second one will work, although I stand to be corrected by those that have done it. I would have thought the ammonia would drop before two weeks and not feed enough bacteria to make it worthwile?
 
That's true - you could only add a few fish at first, as I said, because there is very lttle ammonia near the end to support the bacteria so only a few of the beneficial bacteria that change ammonia will be alive while there will be plenty of those that convert nitrite to nitrate.

I was just wandering actualy, are you sure that second suggestion didn't include adding some more ammonia once the cycle appears to have completed?
 
I'm too sleepy to properly consider the second option so I cant work out what effect it would have. I'd recommend the first one though, it's works, I've tried it.

Edited for ridiculously poor spelling
 
so every day i add another 70 drops with no water changes and wait for the nitrite to spike and then reduce by half. Is that right ? and then carry on until the levels are 0 and then a 70% water change. Many thanks for the input. this is a great site
 
Yep. But you may want to do a larger water change if your nitrAtes are realy high.
 

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