How do you cycle a tank without using fish?

Question

To cycle a new tank (say 5-10 gallon), is there a good way to do it without using fish?

It is a freshwater tank. I'm not sure i'll have access to an established tank.

Answer 1

Letting a tank run with nothing in it will NOT develop the bacteria. In the wild, and in established tanks, there are nitrifying bacteria that break down toxic ammonia from fish waste and excess food into less toxic nitrates. In a brand new tank, these bacteria don't exist, no matte how long you run the tank for.
There are a few methods. Do you have access to an established tank? These bacteria live in the gravel and in the filter cartridge, so if you can get some from another tank, you can put the bacteria right into your tank (don't let the gravel or filter cartridge dry out). If you do this, in a day or two, your tank will beready for fish.
Another way is to get Bio-Spira. It is the actual live bacteria in a little pouch, and your tank will instantly be ready for fish.http://fishstoretn.com/bio_spira.html

Other methods, which include putting a source of ammonia in the tank and letting the bacteria build up on its own take 2 to 6 weeks before your tank is ready. If you rush that, any fish you buy may die, so try one of the instant methods I mentioned above (bio-spira or gravel from another tank)

Answer 2

Okay im glad you are doing a fishless cycle :) You can find pure ammonia at a grocery store in the cleaning isle. It should say clear ammonia and it should contain any perfumes. It must be pure ammonia. If you can't find it, try searching for it at a hardware store such as Lowes or Home depot. Make sure you also buy ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, and ph tests! Now to answer your questions: *How do I add ammonia myself to help it cycle? Add a few drops or how ever many you need until you have 4-5 ppm. Dont go over 5 ppm. Wait one week and check ammonia level. If it went down, then that is good. This means some bacteria has developed. Add ammonia again to keep it stable around 3 ppm cuz the bacteria feeds off of it. Wait a week or two and check for nitrites. You will see a nitrite peak and then eventually the nitrite does down as well. Once ammonia and nitrite are at 0 ppm, do a water change (50 %) *Do I need to do water changes weekly, or should I do none at all? When you cycle without fish, no water changes are needed until the end of the cycle. When ammonia and nitrite are 0, do a 50% water change and add treated water with dechlorinator. Now you can add the fish. Dont add too many at a time though. Start off with 3 fish. The wait another week and add 2 or 3 more fish. *Also what do I do about the Ph? If it starts to drop, should I just let it until it cycles, or should I do something about it? Dont worry about the ph level during the cycle because it does not matter. The only time you should check ph is at the end of the cycle. After you did the 50 % water change, check ph. It should be at a normal level. This is all the detailed advice i have for you. Good luck. I hope this is the best answer please :)

Answer 3

You can NOT just leave it running with no source of ammonia. The bacteria need ammonia to feed off of. Get a bottle of pure ammonia(check the label) from a hardware store or walmart. Get a test kit (I use API master test kit) and add ammonia and test until you get it to 3 PPM. Monitor that level and keep the ammonia between 3-8 PPM, if it goes above 8, do a water change to get it down. In 2-4 weeks you will start to see nitrites and ammonia will go away. Keep dosing ammonia the same amount and keep the nitrites below 8 PPM. About 4-6 weeks after the start of cycling you will start to see nitrates. Once you have 10-20 PPM nitrates and 0 PPM nitrites and ammonia your cycle will be complete.

Answer 4

it depends on whether its a salt water tank or fresh water..
for a fresh water tank, u need at least 30% of your water to come from an established tank ( a tank w/ fish, snails, plants, etc.) that way all of your beneficial bacteria are present.

for a saltwater tank, u need the same (30% cycled water) from an established tank. also for a marine tank u need some pieces of live rock and a scoop of seeded sand. this will make sure that all the right bacteria has been introduced into the tank and it will ensure that the nitrogen cycle is at the proper state when you begin to add fish..hope this works for ya..ive got 6 aquariums in my house, so i know this from experience..good luck

Answer 5

Fishless cycling involves using household ammonia and borrowed good bacteria to initiate the cycle, without any aquatic pets in the aquarium. There should be no ingredients in the bottle of ammonia that is used for cycling, except ammonia, and/or ammonium hydroxide, and/or water. It should contain no perfumes, no coloration products, and no surfactants. The liquid should appear clear, and when you shake the bottle, there should be no fizzing or bubbling. I used HomeBest Clear Ammonia, which I purchased at a Magruder’s Grocery Store. You may not know the exact ratio of ammonia to water, in the bottle, because frequently the bottles do not have this information on the label. Not to worry. If the ingredients consist only of those listed above, you have the right stuff.

The second thing you will need to initiate a fishless cycle is some seed bacteria. If you already have a healthy, cycled aquarium then that is the best place to steal some good seed bacteria from. If you do not have a healthy cycled aquarium, you may need to get some seed bacteria from someone who has a healthy cycled aquarium, or from your Local Fish Store. What you need is some gravel or substrate from a healthy aquarium (about as much as will fit into a plastic sandwich Ziploc type bag). It is also good to get some filter pinchings from the pouch in a hang-on-the-back filter, or filter floss or filter sponge or squeezings from a filter sponge, and some water, both from the same aquarium you got the gravel from.

You will also need a testing kit for ammonia, nitrites, and nitrates.

During a fishless cycle, the water should not be changed until the cycle is complete, and you are getting zero ammonia and zero nitrite readings. The only exception to this would be if you accidentally add too much ammonia during the process. If you accidentally do this, you will see either ammonia or nitrites off the charts at 6-8 ppm, and they won’t come down without a water change. So if this happens, do a 50% water change, and start the fishless cycle process over again. Or, if you know the error you made that caused you to add too much ammonia, calculate the number of drops you should be adding, and add that amount, according to the recipe, which follows, in the next paragraph.

To perform a fishless cycle, add 95% of the seed gravel or other substrate from the healthy aquarium to the gravel or other substrate in your new aquarium. Then take the remaining 5% of the seed substrate material, and put it into a new nylon stocking, which you have pre-washed, in cold tap water. Then cut most of the stocking off, so you have a little stocking pouch, full of seed substrate material. Then tie the pouch closed, or seal it somehow, so you have a closed pouch of seed substrate material. If you are using a hang-on-the-back filter, drop this pouch of seed substrate material into the filter. Make sure the pouch does not stop water flow through the filter entirely. Then, add some filter material pinchings or squeezings into the water in the filter and into the water in the aquarium.

Next, you will add ammonia. You will need to put the ammonia into a clean dropper bottle, if it didn’t come in one. Label that dropper bottle immediately, with the word “AMMONIA” in capital letters. Simply add drops of ammonia until your ammonia reading goes up to 5.0 ppm, which is very high. It took me about 30 minutes of adding ammonia and then testing for ammonia and then adding drops and then testing for ammonia until I got the 5.0 ppm ammonia reading. Keep track of the total number of drops it took for you to get the desired 5.0 reading. After the first day in which you add ammonia, you should test for ammonia and nitrites every day. Then, every day, after testing for ammonia and nitrite, add the same number of drops of ammonia until you see a nitrite reading. On the first day that you actually see a nitrite reading, add half the number of drops of ammonia that you added on the first day, and keep adding that amount every day until you test and have zero ammonia and zero nitrites. At that point, you will need to do a massive water change.

I did a 99% water change, and I still had to do a few more partial water changes the same day, to get rid of the high nitrates in the tank. A fishless cycle uses much more ammonia then would normally develop with other methods, and therefore the leftover nitrates can be quite high. My nitrate reading was 160 ppm when I was done with my first fishless aquarium cycle. Don’t add any pets to the aquarium until your nitrate reading is 10 ppm or less. You can do multiple water changes in the same day, until the desired nitrate reading of 10 or less is achieved. This works because the good bacteria is in the substrate, and in the filter, and remains after the water change. When you have zero ammonia, zero nitrites, and 10 or less nitrates, your aquarium is fully cycled, and ready to house your aquatic pets.

It took me three and a half weeks to accomplish my first fishless cycle. But someone who follows the above recipe, and uses all the tips to speed up the cycling process would probably be able to get it done in 2 weeks.

This is the tips to follow....
1. Run the aquarium at a high temperature, up in the low to mid eighties, Fahrenheit. Only do this if you have no pets in the aquarium which need lower temperatures. The higher temperature leads to faster cycling.

2. Keep the tank only about 50-65% full. This creates a waterfall effect as the water leaves the filter, and when the water from the filter hits the surface of the aquarium water, there is a great deal of water turbulence, exposing more water to more air more quickly, and leading to increased oxygenation, and thus, faster cycling.

3. Keep the aquarium light on 24 hours per day during cycling. Only do this if you have no pets in the aquarium which need less light, or which need darkness. The increased light leads to faster cycling.

4. Use as many air stones and air pumps as you have access to, which will fit in the aquarium. Keep them all running all the time. This leads to increased oxygenation, which leads to faster cycling. Only do this if you have no pets in the aquarium which need calm, or still water.

5. Keep the filter running the entire time the aquarium is undergoing the cycling process. This increases water flow, and insures that good bacteria build up in the filter material, both of which lead to faster cycling.

I will tell you right now that I have a bias toward fishless cycling. I prefer it, and at the end of the section on fishless cycling, I will tell you the reasons why I prefer it.

You will know when your aquarium has fully cycled, because you will have seen an ammonia spike and a nitrite spike, and you will have zero ammonia, and zero nitrites.

Answer 6

Here is a great thread on using Bio Spira to cycle a tank without fish.

http://www.aquaria.info/index.php?name=PNphpBB2&file=viewtopic&t=7372

Answer 7

You just have to leave it running for a few weeks, good bacterias will grow on their own and the water will be well filtered.