Fishless Cycle...How many drops of ammonia?

[houndour]

Hi,

I know there is a sticky, I have printed out the "cycling without fish" bit and it says 4-5 drops per 10 gallons.

Is this UK gallons or US gallons? I'm in the UK and my tank is 29gallons. Also should I allow for displacement? So measure for say 26 gallons?

Thanks,
Sam

 

[freddyk]

There are different methods, this is one I know that works:

Count out enough drops to get the ammonia to 4ppm. Add this amount daily. When you observe the nitrite spike, cut this number down to half.

 

[houndour]

thanks!

 

[rykitten]

Yes I agree with FreddyK. Different brands of ammonia have different concentrations of ammonium hydroxide so there's no definite formula. Just add enough to reach 3-5ppm. And do this slowly, you don't want to add too much.

 

[stephend]

Using Boots Household Ammonia (9.5% W/W), it took 170 drops to get my 190 litre tank to 5ppm.

Stephen.

 

[nonot8946]

You don't need to add that amount per day, you want to add enough to keep it at 4ppm per day. You probably won't have to add any for at least a few days after the initial dose.

For example: if 20 drops gets you to 4PPM, you test one week later and are still at 3PPM, then only add 5 drops at that time.