55 gallon cycle advice?

[Mr.Oscar]

Day 1
Ammonia-5-6 ppm
I only added some crushed up flake food and cranked up the heat searching for pure ammonia everything has surfacents or lemon

 

[Mr.Oscar]

Day 2 was ammonia 5ppm

 

[Mr.Oscar]

Day 3 ammonia 3ppm

 

[Mr.Oscar]

When can or should I add more ammonia

 

[Galligak]

When the ammonia gets around 1ppm.

 

[Mr.Oscar]

Ok then should I do another 5 teaspoons and what if it does not go down 2 1 ppm

 

[Galligak]

Oh it will. That's part of the nitrogen cycle. By any chance do you have any pure ammonia? If so use that instead. If not try to get the ammonia around 4ppm and wait until it goes down again...

 

[Mr.Oscar]

I have ammonia I said in my cycling help article I shook the bottle and read ingredients no bubbles or fizzing so I pretty sure its pure thank god for dollar tree o was looking for pure ammonia for a while went to home depot ask mart k mart drugstores dollar tree the only one that had pure ammonia

 

[HAVAMAL]

Pee in it LOL!!!!!

 

[Galligak]

That'd be great to use. It'd give you a better guess. Make sure that the ammonia doesn't go under 1 ppm.

 

[Mr.Oscar]

But how much should I use first time I put 5 tesspoons its a 55 and how many days does it usually take o yeah my tank temp is 86

 

[Galligak]

It all really depends on the tank... I had mine done in 12 days but mine had a semi-cycled filter media. I'm guessing within the week it'll go down the week. Just keep testing

 

[Mr.Oscar]

I have a tetra 380 its a carbon filter they any good

 

[Galligak]

I've never had one but I've heard some good things about tetras so I'm guessing that it's a good one.

 

[zparticle]

I just hit day 40 with my 55 and it has started to finish the cycling process.

If you are interested in seeing my log you can find it here.

 

[Galligak]

That thread will give you a rough estimate for the cycling process, it's a decently long time but it's worth it! Or there's always the option of doing a fish in cycle too2

 

[Batt4Christ]

Took just Unser 1 week for my new project 55g to cycle. Then again, I moved the long-established filter over from my other tank (kind of cheated, I guess).

 

[Mr.Oscar]

Hopefully it only takes a week or 2 weird thing is when I got my dempsey I didn't have an established cycles tank and he survived and is still thriving

 

[zparticle]

Took just Unser 1 week for my new project 55g to cycle. Then again, I moved the long-established filter over from my other tank (kind of cheated, I guess).

Yeah, using established filter media will help in a big way. I had a really loaded sponge filter when I was cycling my 20g and it was done 3 days after I added the BB loaded sponge.

Every tank is different, some take shorter times some longer.

 

[zparticle]

Hopefully it only takes a week or 2 weird thing is when I got my dempsey I didn't have an established cycles tank and he survived and is still thriving

There is nothing that states you must do a fishless cycle. It simply comes down to how much trouble you want to go through and what you are willing to put your fish through. If you keep the water parameters in good ranges you don't even have to try to cycle. But you have to pay attention or you will kill your fish, most likely.