Hey guys, Andrew Esquivel here.
Today, I'm going to walk you through a very basic understanding of how to do a fishless
cycle for your fish tank.
Many years ago, it was very popular to use a hardy fish to help you cycle your fish tank,
but nowadays, it's really not even necessary.
Honestly, I think it's a lot better just to do it all manually.
In order to understand how we're able to do this without a fish, we got to understand
how the cycling process works.
Some of you who already know how this process works, just sit tight for a minute, going
to explain it in a very simplistic manner for those who might not know.
First off, your fish is in your aquarium, your fish pees and poos.
Well, this creates ammonia.
Ammonia buildup is not good for your little buddy, it's going to kill them if it gets
too concentrated.
We have a fish tank filter.
Now, your fish tank filter should be filled with something we call biological media.
All it is is a special type of material in which bacteria is able to grow on.
That bacteria is very important because we use two types of bacteria.
The first type of bacteria eats the ammonia and that gets rid of the ammonia, but because
bacteria is also a living thing, it creates waste as well.
More or less, we can just say that the bacteria is pooping or something.
We're left with a second type of waste, it converts ammonia to nitrite.
Now, we're stuck with a bunch of nitrite, which still isn't good, so we can do better.
There's a second bacteria that eats the nitrites and turns it into nitrates, which is the least
harmful of the three.
If you look on API's little master test kit chart here, you can get an idea of what might
be toxic in what doses to your fish.
Now, ammonia buildup of four parts per million to eight is definitely within the lethal zone,
but as you can see in the very end of the cycle here at the nitrate, it can build up
all the way to 20, 40 and what have you and still be in a range where it's not going to
kill your fish.
Anything more than that should be an indicator for you to do a water change.
That's just the basic concept here, is we're converting ammonia to nitrate and in between
that process is nitrite.
We got that basic idea, how do we go about doing this?
Well, the bacteria needs ammonia to eat in order for it to grow.
It is a living thing, it does need food.
Without a fish to create the ammonia, how do you go about doing that?
Well, it's not all that hard.
What you can do is go to any hardware store.
I went to Ace Hardware and got ammonium hydroxide which is just basically janitorial-strength
ammonia.
Now, this stuff is 10% ammonia by volume, the rest of it is basically water.
Keep in mind something about this stuff, this is a very, very strong concentrated chemical
like this.
To give you an idea just how strong we're talking about, let's go back to this little
chart.
As I was saying before, four parts per million of ammonia can easily kill a number of fish
that are not so hardy.
This stuff, depending on the concentration, can be anywhere from 10,000 to 30,000 parts
per million of ammonia.
That's right, 10 to 30,000.
You might think to yourself, "Well, I'm not sure I want to put that in there."
It's actually all relative.
You don't want to put a lot, and an easy way to keep track of how much you put in is an
eyedropper.
Now, I specifically use a glass eyedropper because, well, just like this plastic that
holds the ammonia, it's actually a special type of plastic because of the concentration
we're dealing with.
Be very careful.
Always do this in a ventilated area if you can.
I understand a lot of places where your fish tank is is probably not very ventilated.
In some cases, you may need to use a respirator just for your own health or at the very least,
be very quick about removing the cap out of the way, filling the eyedropper up and putting
the cap back on really quick.
Hold your breath, because this stuff will mess up your throat and your respiratory system
pretty easily.
Just be very careful when dealing with this type of chemical, it's very strong.
Moving away from that really quick, we've got an eyedropper's worth.
Now, like I said, it's all relative, how much media you have in your filter, how many gallons
your tank is, and a number of other things.
The point is this is the ammonia now.
We've got the ammonia directly from a bottle and we are going to put ammonia directly into
the tank.
I don't have this full of anything, but let's say it was, so we'd just squeeze and put a
few in.
In this tank, I can put an entire eyedropper's worth of ammonia and it will dilute to about
two to four parts per million of ammonia.
That's with a full eyedropper and a 20-gallon tank.
If you're running a smaller tank, you would definitely put less than that much in.
If you are running a larger tank and you have a lot more media, then yes, you'd probably
put more than that in.
Like I said, it's all relative, you'll have to play around with it because as I said,
there's different strengths of ammonium hydroxide, there's different sizes of tanks and there's
different types of filters and filter media and amount of filter media.
Now that we know how the cycle works, now that we know about the bacteria and how to
feed it without using a fish, let's talk about how to make the cycle faster.
There's a number of things you can do.
First off, I want to talk about the bacteria one more time because the reason I like Seachem
Stability more than things like Tetra SafeStart Plus-- Seriously, go on Seachem's website
and read up about this stuff, this stuff is awesome.
It's actually got five different types of bacteria, I believe.
The reason I say five is because for both the ammonia consumption and the nitrite consumption,
there is anaerobic and aerobic versions of each, which means there's a total of four
types of bacteria technically, and there's one more type of bacteria because this is
also good for saltwater tanks as well as freshwater.
There might be an extra component into that for things like saltwater tanks, but we're
talking about freshwater here.
Point is, take a look at Seachem's stuff.
I may have that number slightly off, it might be four, it might be five, don't quote me
on it, but I like that stuff because it works.
Seachem Stability does not grow as fast as Tetra SafeStart, but it is a way more hardy
bacteria.
I've actually made a video about it, you can look it up on my channel if you like.
I like it because that bacteria is much more sturdy and more resistant to some sort of
swings that might kill your bacteria.
Anywho, yes, there are bacteria supplements that you can use.
Because I have aerobic and anaerobic bacteria, I want to make sure I feed both of them properly.
I have an air bubbler to add oxygen into the water for the aerobic bacteria and the anaerobic
bacteria will be fine just being the way it is.
If you weren't adding any oxygen, the anaerobic bacteria would definitely be more abundant
than the anaerobic.
That's one thing to keep in mind if you're using Seachem Stability, have an air bubbler
just to try and add some more oxygen to the overall water system.
Number two, probably the more important thing to think about here is if you want to cycle
your tank fishless, faster, use a heater with an adjustable temperature setting.
I have an Aqueon Pro 100-watt heater.
Unfortunately, 100 watts really isn't enough for a 20-gallon because I'm trying to crank
up the heat as far as it can go.
Currently, it's 85.6 and yes, that wire leads all the way down here.
85.6 degrees, okay, that's not bad, that's hotter than you would keep most fish at.
That's the point, if you're doing a fishless cycle, you don't have to worry about the fish
because there's no fish in there, so you can crank up the heater as high as it can possibly
go.
The warmer the water, the faster the bacteria will grow.
I have that thing cranked up as high as it'll go.
You might ask yourself what's more efficient, a horizontal or a vertical, that's kind of
debatable.
Also placement-wise, where it should be.
I just stuck it in there, the Aqueon Pro series can go either way and there's enough water
flow going through.
I started out at like 60, 50 degrees [chuckles] because my water is well water and it's really
cold, but it bumped it up all the way past 85.
Anywho, heat makes bacteria grow faster.
Once you are ready to put your fish in, adjust the heater to make it go back down to the
temperature that is ideal for your little buddies.
Wait for that temperature to come down after your tank is cycled and bam, there you go,
the cycling is done a little bit quicker.
With that all being said, that is how you do a fishless cycling.
Like i said, it's just the basics.
We're not getting into anything like routine testing with a master test kit.
I guess the only one other piece of advice is, "Get a master test kit."
Those little strips that you get, those have been considered to be notoriously inaccurate,
so I definitely would not go for one of those.
Hopefully, this video was helpful.
If it is, give it a thumbs up, maybe consider subscribing, talking about it, sharing the
video a little bit.
Check out some of my other videos.
I got plenty of tutorials on other things.
Give me a comment.
Just do all the good stuff.
Just comment, rate, subscribe.
Show your friends.
Check out my other videos, I got plenty of them.
As always, I will see you next time.
Stay fishy.