Nutrafin Cycle Seems To Work!

[ziggyboy]

Been trying to fishless cycle for the past 6 days. After reading a lot of articles online about products that claim to provide instant beneficial bacterial, I believed that most do not work at all. Yesterday I visited my LPS and one of the guys there talked me into getting Nutrafin Cycle. Now before you pass judgment on Cycle, listen to this.

I was told by the bloke that Nutrafin has changed their formula and that previously their product took about a week before the bacteria got 'active'...also that the bacterial count wasn't that much. The new formula he claims takes anywhere from a couple of hours to 48 hours. He also mentioned that this info was available online. Btw the box also says new formula.

So ok, I decided to take the risk and try it out.

When I got home I checked my ammonia at about 4 ppm and nitrite at 8 ppm. I definitely have my ammonia-eating bacteria in my tank but my nitrites haven't gone down yet. I put the recommended dosage of Cycle on my filter and lo and behold both my ammonia and nitrite levels are 0 ppm today (just checked 15 mins ago)! You could probably argue that I was close to cycling anyway since my nitrite was spiking but I'd like to believe that Cycle had a hand in it.

Here's proof that Cycle has changed their formula. In particular read 1, 2 and 4.

http/www.hagen.com/canada/english/aquati...ncentrated.html

 

[timmystood]

It's a good product, most stuff from hagen is. However, it certainly isn't a bactiera-containing product. All it simply does is add 'waste' to your tank to feed your bacteria you have in there. If you had loads of Ammonia and Nitrite in a tank containing fish then cycle would be useless.
It works on the fishless cycle because it speeds up the process of adding waste. The problem with fishless cycling is it adds no 'waste' unless you add ammonia etc. so in that respect cycle works. But 99.9% of the fishkeeping world doesn't do a fishless cycle so in that respect cycle is useless.

And btw - get some fish in there before the bacteria dies through lack of waste (i.e. food)

 

[ziggyboy]

Hehe, well I'll never really know. I also borrowed the spare filter of a friend from an established tank so that also sped things up. Either way it took me 6 days to cycle so I'm happy. I just put a pinch of ammonia to keep the bacteria alive. I'm off to a fish pet store in a bit!