Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

I don't know Yav, I see a lot of people on this forum that have cycled with Charlie Carp very successfully. Human urine isn't ammonia and takes a few days to break down into ammonia. I think I saw Rupe write some details on this recently can't remember exactly.

Amanda what you need is ammonia in your system. Charlie Carp provides it. In order to cycle you want the bacteria to start producing nitrites and then nitrates. So you will see an ammonia spike and then some time later a nitrite spike and then a while later you will have nitrates. Once the ammonia drops down to zero or near zero and stays there at a stable level and you have nitrates in the system your system is cycled. This means that the bacteria colony has grown to the size it needs to be to successfully process all of the ammonia your system produces.

Regards, Martin.

Good to see your water flowing, Amanda

Charlie! Tell the people about your name sake + Carp. There are doubters among us!

I assume fishless cycling? unfortunately I would have to look Charlie Carp up; I have always used urine or urea and seasol.
The levels to check are Ammonia, Nitrite and Nitrates. If you can add an ammonia source and the system clears it and the nitrites, and your nitrates go up (depending on your plant size) you are cycled.

Ok everybody is real quick on the keyboard today

We will discuss this another time Yavimaya (try reading my last post in another light)

ohhhh head.
im a bit slow.
yea i wasnt sure of the bottle caps, i just tried to list something that might be able to replace the very expensive K1, even if not nearly as good. I thought they would be neutral enough, but have never tried them.

Sleepes description of the cycling process is more accurate than martins, Amanda.
if you use charlie carp, you are going to have nitrates from day one, making it so much harder to know when you are actually cycled.

Hi Yav, the only problem you have is that Seasol does not contain ammonia and Charlie Carp does.

I am pretty certain of this although you can confirm for yourself here:

http://www.leisuregreencare.com.au/persistent/catalogue_files/products/seasol.pdf

It does contain some "Ammonia Nitrogen" which is not the same thing as far as I know but I am not a Chemist so I can't be certain.

This has also been discussed before here:
http://www.backyardaquaponics.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=13696&start=30

And the Great RupertofOZ confirms that Seasol does not contain ammonia here:
http://www.backyardaquaponics.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=413012

Regards, Martin.

What Martin said at the top of this page is spot on.
Try to keep amm around 2ppm or less.
Expect around 5 weeks cycling time.

Thanks Skeg.

The home page for Charlie Carp is here:
http://www.charliecarp.com/index.php
But I couldn't find a reference that stated the ammonia content.

Regards, Martin.

It's the urea that breaks down into ammonia in cc Martin. Unknown quantity hence starting with a small dose and working from there.

This is definitely worth a read:

Ammonia for fishless cycling

http://www.backyardaquaponics.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=1933&start=30

In fact the whole thread is worth a read as there are many interesting comments.

Regards, Martin.

To clarify...

Ammonia nitrogen is ammonia.. but the levels contained in Seasol...are miniscule compared to ammonia sources usually employed in/for cycling... even if you were to use an entire bottle...

For a comparison... you see in Steve's article quoted above... that a 25% solution of ammonia.... equates to 250,000 ppm....



In the Seasol analysis... ammonia nitrogen is listed as 156 mgm/kg.... which equates to 156 ppm....

Martin, i never said anything about seasol.

so all the nitrogen in charlie carp is bound by ammonia?

I see that now Yav but you said:



And in that discussion sleepe said people should rather use Seasol to cycle than Charlie Carp so I thought you supported his viewpoint.

I am sure Amanda is enjoying us making such a mess of her thread.

Haha...its brilliant, I am just sitting here, reading, and scratching my head youre all awesome.

I took the horizontal pipework out of the GBs and the flow has regulated

I have added a bit more Charlie Carp - will water test tomorrow and post the levels

Great news on the flow Amanda.