Stupid Mistake - input appreciated.

Regarding the product "Cycle". I was doing some research recently and came across this tidbit (Tom's Place archives, I think??). I am cutting and pasting directly from this site:

http://features.aaquaria.com/repository/cyclingammonia.shtml

What do you do when you have a great big bottle of Cycle? Experiment again. I poured pure Cycle into an open jar.

Tested pure cycle.
Ammonia 4-5ppm
Nitrite 0ppm
PH off the chart on the high side using the high range PH kit.That means 8.8 or higher.

I was unable to get a reading from Nitrate using pure Cycle.It turned the cherriest red I've ever seen after a second of mixing. I had to dillute 1ml of Cycle in 99 ml of nitrate free water to get the darn thing back on the chart.Tested at 20-40ppm so that translates to between 2000 and 4000 ppm of nitrate in pure Cycle. I guess it could be called concentrated nitrate.

That immediately brings to mind several technical questions. What the hecks all that nitrate added for? Why do we need to add that much nitrate to our tanks? Why is the PH so freaking high?

If live bacteria were in the bottle wouldn't they keel over dead from that extreme of a PH shock when added to the tank? I'm fairly certain why there's 4-5ppm ammonia present.Dead bacteria should rot and produce ammonia.Everything else does when it dies.
 
sorry if i mistook you. i didn't mean to imply you were a "know it all" either. it's been a long few days and i was a little frustrated i suppose. sorry.

agree with what's been posted so far that i read.

i don't quite get why you're getting spikes either, if your tank had time to become somewhat established the effects should be fairly minimal. that's probably why you aren't getting ammonia tho, the nitrite bacteria grow slower than the ammonia ones and you put a good dent in them i imagine. despite anything that's said to the contrary the filter is *the* optimal place for them to grow. in retrospect you should have run the filters in tandem for a couple of weeks, since you had the tank already established. too late now tho. :(

kveeti: i would have to wonder if that means the "shelf life" of that bottle was expired somehow. maybe they bottle the stuff with a ready food source and count on occasional agitation for oxygen. in time the food would be depleted, maybe causing the nitrates, then the bacteria die and cause the ammonia? don't ask me where the ph comes from tho, unless they do it purposely to counter the ph drop caused by "cycling". i know a super low ph will kill the bacteria also, i'm not sure about the threshold for super high.......... the end result tho, is no viable bacteria, if they start out with the right kind. so maybe if you got a "new" bottle fresh from the factory, it might also be a viable product....... :confused:

the bio-zyme "waste" type bacteria are dried and that causes them to be encapsulated? or they dry them after they are or something. it gives them a much better shelf life i imagine, just re-activate with water.

that article might be one of RTR's, he has several posted at tom's place. he also has one on bacteria i think and he has a good one on salt. most table salt *does* have anti-caking agents, but the amount is so minimal as to be negligable and the trace of iodine should actually be good for them. i'm an oddball with the aquarium salt, i have both types for my fish tank, but i tend to use the aq salt more because it's easier to tell the quantity when you aren't strictly measuring and for some reason seeing the "aq" in the name just sort of makes me feel better. it's hard to explain, but it's an old newbie holdout that never quite went away. not to mention it's sort of neat to watch the crystals melting on the bottom. :D
 
a little late chiming in, but i was sold some cycle at the the start-up of my 1st aquarium and it did absolutely nothing for me as far as cycling goes. how is your tank now? has it stabilized?
 
Hey Ewok! Don't worry about it. We all have those "rough" kind of days.

I've added the salt. I'm going to do a 10% water change later this afternoon. I'll keep you updated. Thanks for everyone's input.:cool:
 
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