I'm sorry, I forgot one important point... *all* you're trying to do
when you cycle a tank is produce appropriate bacterial cultures.
Ammonia is ammonia, and the bacteria won't know whether it (the ammonia)
came from fish detritis, rotting oysters or a household ammonia bottle.


- M
:-)

In article ,
says...
You're right about there being a whole bunch of conflicting information
about cycling tanks, so to help you answer the question I want to remind
you what "cycling" a tank means.

(Simple version)
1. Natural processes produce ammonia. Ammonia is lethally toxic to most
tank inhabitants.
2. One type of aerobic bacteria (nitrosoma) convert the ammonia to
nitrite. Nitrite is merely extremely toxic to tank inhabitants.
3. Another type of aerobic bacteria (nitrobacter) convert the nitrite to
nitrate. Nitrate is fairly safe (except for inverts). The formation of
nitrobacter is inhibited by ammonia... ie/ until your tank is out of the
first stage of the cycle, the third stage can't start.

4. (the last step) anaerobic bacteria convert nitrate to free nitrogen
gas.

Now, usually people only mean the first three steps when talking about
the nitrogen cycle (although, for it to be a cycle, it has to return to
nitrogen so that it can become ammonia again).

As you can see, to cycle your tank, you need to introduce a source of
ammonia so that appropriate bacterial cultures can form.

Living fish will produce ammonia. Ammonia is highly toxic and will kill
most tank inhabitants. Some very sturdy fish, like damsels, can
survive.

Dead oysters will produce ammonia as they rot. Dead oysters, as far as
I can tell, don't mind high ammonia levels.

Household ammonia is also a source of ammonia.
http://www.csupomona.edu/~jskoga/Aquariums/Ammonia.html

Now for the opinion part. In my opinion, cycling a tank with a living
organism is morbidly cruel. The ones that live still suffer
physiological damage. Imagine breathing poisonous, acidic fumes, and
surviving. Yes, I do feel strongly about this. :-)

HTH,
Marco

In article ,
says...
I'm getting *A LOT* of conflicting information on the cycling
process through my reading on the Internet and books. Some say "using
fish to cycle the tank is the old way", don't describe it at all, then
continue on describing the cycling process using chemicals. Others
say the chemical method is just an option.
I'd like to cycle the tank using fish, but I get conflicting

--
7y FW -- 33g & 55g
100 gallon reef-ready air tank. (Converting to reef)