Fishless cycling

As a moderately accomplished fish keeper I was aware of the necessity of cycling an aquarium before placing fish in it, but only heard of a couple of different ways to do it: either with fish (not a great way) or fishless. The fishless way I knew about had me putting fish food in the tank until it rotted. This would produce ammonia that would end up kicking off the populating of the tank with the beneficial bacteria that that need to be developed in the artificial tank environment. These bacteria would produce nitrites that would then be consumed by other bacteria that would then produce nitrates. The nitrates would then either be eliminated by water changes or consumed by live plants.

I had a decent time cycling the ten-gallon tank that my son received for his birthday as it took from July 13 until August 14 to accomplish. Instead of adding fish food to rot I added pure ammonia from a bottle to start the cycle. The only hiccup I had in the process was adding a tablespoon of ammonia to the tank after a water change. That was a bad thing as it overwhelmed the exisiting biological filter and forced another mini-cycle that delyed the main cycling. Note to self: Don't do that.

So the tank is cycled (0 ammonia and 0 nitrites) and currently has two anumbias, a java fern, and some improving (?) elodea. Now for fish. I think we are going to go out later this week and score some glowlight tetras or mountain minnows. We'll see which ones he wants.