Quote:
Originally Posted by Silock
Most fishless cycles advocate just using straight up ammonia. What's wrong with that, if the idea is just to grow the beneficial bacteria?
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Because there's no bacteria. Without the presence of some biological entity to "infect" the tank, the NH3 just sits there and does nothing. Ultimately, the bacteria has to come from the air, etc.. You have to be really patient with the ammonia method because it takes much longer than most other methods.
The other advantage of using fish is that, as you add them over time, your bacterial bed adjusts the population to support the bio-load of your tank. People that cycle with ammonia (or fish food or shrimp) often find that they have to re-cycle when they add fish because they didn't use enough to get a big enough biofilter to accomodate the number of fish they added.
Now the big advantage of pure ammonia over fish food or shrimp is that there's virtually zero chance of introducing Saprolegnia fungus.