Fish Food Cycling

[girl_interrupted]

Ok, ok, I was told to run over the person who mentioned/suggested cycling a fish tank with fish food. And in another thread, saw someone recommending it. So I ask you now, whats the deal with cycling a tank with fish food? do many of you do it? What are the pro's and con's oh monster fish keepers of the board. Thanks

 

[Deaths Sting]

waste of fish food if u ask me, fish food should be for the fish...

im using pure ammonia to cycle my tank.

big jug of ammonia cost $2 at the hardware store. last u along time...

with fish food u have to wait for it to decompose into ammonia. also, on top of that depending on the size of thank and what fish food it is u may need a lot!

big waste of money and time considering u can get a huge jug of ammonia for $2

 

[Knowdafish]

Fish food wouldn't work. How would it create ammonia?

 

[Deaths Sting]

Fish food wouldn't work. How would it create ammonia?

that's the problem... lol u would need a lot of it and it would have to be something like frozen krill or bloodworm..

Ive heard of people using flake food... but when i think about it, it doesn't seem to be very logical. i suppose with a vast amount of flake food; a bit of ammonia would be produced from its decomposition. again, u would need a lot to get a little, plus u have to wait for it to decompose.

waste of time and money..

its retarded IMO..

 

[hybridtheoryd16]

Fish food wouldn't work. How would it create ammonia?

Decaying food, plants, detris, fish, shrimp, etc, etc

All create ammonia as they decay.

Cycling a tank with fish food is 1950's technology. They used to set up a new tank and put a few table spoons of flakes in the tank, and wait a month and then add a few fish a month until they were stocked.

Using is a bottled cycler like SAFE START by aqua safe is the newest way to successfully cycle a tank in record time. At the cost of around 20 bucks for every 75g of tank.

Or a cheaper route is liquid ammonia for 2 bucks and some cycled media. It usually takes 2 weeks with a fishless cycle on a 4ppm daily ammonia bio load.

 

[Toby_H]

I think cycling with "fish food" is a misconception of cycling a tank using something like a chunk of shrimp... which is an old school method for cycling salt water tanks...

Like HybridTheory suggests, it's an outdated concept... and in my opinion is a misapplication of this outdated concept...

But yes it will work... you just spend many times more money in fish food than you would have in pure ammonia... and you have to wait an extra week or two for the fish food to break down than if you were to use pure ammonia...

 

[Deaths Sting]

Decaying food, plants, detris, fish, shrimp, etc, etc

All create ammonia as they decay.

Cycling a tank with fish food is 1950's technology. They used to set up a new tank and put a few table spoons of flakes in the tank, and wait a month and then add a few fish a month until they were stocked.

Using is a bottled cycler like SAFE START by aqua safe is the newest way to successfully cycle a tank in record time. At the cost of around 20 bucks for every 75g of tank.

Or a cheaper route is liquid ammonia for 2 bucks and some cycled media. It usually takes 2 weeks with a fishless cycle on a 4ppm daily ammonia bio load.

+1

my point exactly.

i failed to mention in the beginning that im using my filter sponges from my eheim 2028 to help seed my new tank. I'm also using Seachem stability.

 

[scorp]

No, it won't work!

Adding fish food as well as adding ammonia will have the exact opposite effect of what you want to achieve: The cycling takes longer.

Without bacteria to start with, the whole process takes longer thanks to the added extra "waste".

Sadly, I only have the calculations on a German homepage, but here you go:

http://www.deters-ing.de/Wasser/Einlauffutter.htm

Maybe you can use the tables to read, the x-axis shows days. The tables are as follows:

1. normal cycling

2. added ammonium

3. half the amount of ammonium added

4. added nitrite

5. added nitrite and 10 times more bacteria

He also mentions that for 4. and 5. you need extra ammonium added to the tank. Which brings us to the conclusion that without nitrite, no desired nitrobacter can grow, which are needed for proper cycling.

Hope this helps understand a bit.

Just a little disclaimer: These are all theoretical and mathematical calculations, but make sense if you think about them.

Cheers

 

[Deaths Sting]

No, it won't work!

Adding fish food as well as adding ammonia will have the exact opposite effect of what you want to achieve: The cycling takes longer.

Without bacteria to start with, the whole process takes longer thanks to the added extra "waste".

Sadly, I only have the calculations on a German homepage, but here you go:

http://www.deters-ing.de/Wasser/Einlauffutter.htm

Maybe you can use the tables to read, the x-axis shows days. The tables are as follows:

1. normal cycling

2. added ammonium

3. half the amount of ammonium added

4. added nitrite

5. added nitrite and 10 times more bacteria

He also mentions that for 4. and 5. you need extra ammonium added to the tank. Which brings us to the conclusion that without nitrite, no desired nitrobacter can grow, which are needed for proper cycling.

Hope this helps understand a bit.

Just a little disclaimer: These are all theoretical and mathematical calculations, but make sense if you think about them.

Cheers

are u saying using pure ammonia wont cycle ur tank?

if so.. that is false.. i know many people of have successfully cycled their tanks with pure ammonia.

i myself am almost completed my cycle with pure ammonia..i already have 5ppm of nitrite and a tinny bit of nitrate. i started on the 17th

in the future please share information with a source all of us can understand, their are only a small few who can read and understand German here at MFK.

thank u

 

[Knowdafish]

I don't think he is saying pure ammonia won't cycle a tank. Going by the link and the charts (which he accurately explained which is which in English) pure ammonia takes longer.