Safe Start

[Poliwog]

I put Safestart in my 10 gallon and 5 gallon tanks 2 days ago to control consistently high ammonia levels that seem impervious to any amount of water changes, gravel vacuuming, etc. I'm pretty sure I knocked out my biofilter in my main tank when I treated for Ich. Anyway, as of now the Safestart has done diddly-squat. If anyone knows if there is a certain amount of time that the bacteria typically take to work I would like to know that. I'm just a newbie, but I'm trying to drink in as much info as possible. BTW, the 5 gallon 5 kuhli loach/3 ADF tank is at 1.0 ppm Ammonia (and holding), 0 nitrites, and 5 nitrates (and overstocked, I know, they used to be in the 10 G but I moved them while medicating for Ich, and I heard 2 loaches equals 1 inch of fish, so am I still overloading the 10G??), and the 10 G only has 3 rummynose tetras and my one remaining 2 month old platy fry, the ammonia is at between .25 and .5 ammonia, 0 nitrites and 5 nitrates. I have Java Moss and Java Ferns in the tank. I will post again if I see improvement. BTW, API Stress-Zyme DEFINITELY does not work.

 

[SWerner13]

Most people have bad results with any "bacteria additive" You just can't properly bottle live bacteria. However it will often speed up the cycle process as it still usually contains spores, but over all not worth the money. I know my store will usually sell "seeded" bio-balls for like a dollar or something, you could go to your store and ask if they will sell you a few well seeded bio-balls.

The store I work at tries to get us to sell stress zyme but I refuse. I suppose the idea behind using that for ich is that it would lower their stress levels and help thier immune system rise? I dunno. Honestly I would return both of those products if you still can.