Buying Ammonia in the UK

cloud

cloud

AC Members
Sep 15, 2004
319
0
0
50
London, UK
Hi all,

I'd like to do a fishless cycle on my new tank but the stupermarkets in my part of south london don't stock ammonia. is there a special place to buy it, or is it a banned substance over here? i've never heard of it as a product outside of my school chemistry labs until i got into fish keeping.
 
you dont need to use ammonia if you dont want to. You can use fish flakes, raw shrimp or dead fish to supply ammonia. Try getting a shot glass or something, fill it up half way with fish flakes and place it in the tank. As the flakes rot they release ammonia
 
i am in uk too and south london too
and didnt find the ammonia either so i started my cycle with fish they died and i then decided to use fish food to cycle the tank
and order some biospira too to finish the cycle because i am impatient

incidentally where abouts are you
 
Last edited:
cheers guys, i've got Bio-Spira on the way too, and even though i've seen rave reviews all over the web, I still don't want to use it with fish just in case. I'll do the shot glass thing with flakes and use the bio spira as a booster to see if i can speed things up.
russjet, i'm in clapham (where the tap water sucks!)
 
i was dubious but i continued adding food till it arrived
when it arrived i waited till 24 hours before i could possibly buy fish
then i tested water to confirm presence and level of ammonia and nitrite cant remeber what they were though sorry.
i then added the biospira full dose (i bought enough to double dose my tank)
tested the water the next day and had 0 on both ammonia and nitrite
i went shopping and bought my fish. added them and another dose of biospira as you cant overdose on it.

i have tested the water daily the ammonia has remained at 0 but the nitrite did have a reading of 0.25 for a few days but that has levelled out now.

the thing with bio spira is that it is designed to support the full bio load on a tank and if it is added without fish then not enough ammonia is present to feed it then it will die off.

and because we had to use fish food or equivalent then we are not using an exact figure if that makes sense.so it is hard to know if we are providing enough bacteria to support a full fishload eventually.

if when your biospira arrives it is cold to touch then there is a good chance at this time of year that it will work and i would and was brave and decided to go for it.

i was nervous when i got a nitrite reading and was all set to do a waterchange but asked the forum and the change was recommended if it went up to 0.5 it didnt.

so if you add fish at or close to the same time try to not change water for a week at least as this gives the bacteria a good chance to colonise.
 
Thanks Russjet. Having to delay my plans a little as I've decided to sell my filter and get a quieter one (hopefully before my Bio-Spira arrives) but I'll do it your way when I'm back on track.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
AquariaCentral.com
Top Bottom