The frustrating search for ammonia...

[KingLover82]

Hubby and I are going to be starting up a 29 gallon soon and will be doing a fishless cycle. I think I have searched for ammonia on every major retailers website as well as the hardware stores in our area. We had an Ace Hardware at one time but it's now a Natural Grocer, so I can't complain. While searching Amazon I came across "Dr Tim's Aquatics Ammonium chloride for Aquarium". I have been stalking these and other forums for weeks and haven't seen this mentioned. We bought it and will be using it to start our cycle but did we waste our money? If anyone has any information about this I would appreciate it.

 

[jlk]

I am not personally familiar with it but I know people that have used it before successfully. Dr Tims is a well known brand in aquatics even if its not common on this forum. The only thing worth noting is that I believe it says to dose 1 drop/g but quite a few people found it took a bit more to bring their ammonia up to a decent concentration. So, start at at 1drop/g, wait 1/2hr and check your ammonia levels. If they are @4ppm, your good! If not, you will need to cautiously add tiny amounts, wait & retest until you hit @4ppm. Just keep track of the total amount your adding so you know how much is needed to bring your tank to 4ppm from zero.