# Adding ADA aquasoil to cycled tank?



## Homer_Simpson (May 10, 2007)

You do incur some risk IMHO adding it. Keep in mind that some fish are more tolerant of slightly elevated ammonia levels than other fish, so the types of fish that you have will also come into play. You can minimize the risk as you mentioned by soaking it in water and draining the water several times before adding it to the tank. Another thing that you can do it to run an additional filter(an internal submersible filter with seeded sponge would work fine) with cycled media for a while after adding it(1-2 weeks). Also throw in additional floating plants. I have never had an issue with ammonia spikes in my 15 gallon high ADA AS II experimental tank, but that may be due the fact that I keep it jam packed with plants including lots of floating plants. If you use a water conditioner like Seachem Prime in your replacement water it is alleged to neutralize ammonia to a non-toxic form so that may help. Just double the amout of Seachem Prime in the water that you soak it in. 

Finally, it is said that ammonia is only toxic at higher temperatures and PH levels. Dataguru experimentally proved this and you can check out this link for more on that. The Aquasoil should cause a slight drop in PH and the temp is something you can keep an eye on.
http://www.dataguru.org/misc/aquarium/AmmoniaTox.html


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## imeridian (Jan 19, 2007)

Thanks for that ammonia toxicity link, HS. I hadn't seen that before.


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## Homer_Simpson (May 10, 2007)

imeridian said:


> Thanks for that ammonia toxicity link, HS. I hadn't seen that before.


You are welcome. I can only assume that Dataguru's findings are valid based on her extensive experimentation.


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## roybot73 (Dec 15, 2007)

I recently did this in my 60-P -- no problems whatsoever. I just gave it a quick (5-10 minute) soak to get the floaters and extra organic material out of it before I added it to the tank.


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## pthalobluebetta (Jul 24, 2008)

Homer_Simpson said:


> You do incur some risk IMHO adding it. Keep in mind that some fish are more tolerant of slightly elevated ammonia levels than other fish, so the types of fish that you have will also come into play. You can minimize the risk as you mentioned by soaking it in water and draining the water several times before adding it to the tank. Another thing that you can do it to run an additional filter(an internal submersible filter with seeded sponge would work fine) with cycled media for a while after adding it(1-2 weeks). Also throw in additional floating plants. I have never had an issue with ammonia spikes in my 15 gallon high ADA AS II experimental tank, but that may be due the fact that I keep it jam packed with plants including lots of floating plants. If you use a water conditioner like Seachem Prime in your replacement water it is alleged to neutralize ammonia to a non-toxic form so that may help. Just double the amout of Seachem Prime in the water that you soak it in.
> 
> Finally, it is said that ammonia is only toxic at higher temperatures and PH levels. Dataguru experimentally proved this and you can check out this link for more on that. The Aquasoil should cause a slight drop in PH and the temp is something you can keep an eye on.
> http://www.dataguru.org/misc/aquarium/AmmoniaTox.html


Great, thanks! I was actually just looking at that ammonia table over the weekend. I have some trace (<0.25) amounts that show up on my tests, but according to the charts, with my ph of 6.5-6.6 and 82 F temp, my toxicity is about 0.001. I'm also assuming that it doesn't matter that my ph drop is due to CO2 injection?

Both tanks are pretty well planted currently, although I rescaped the 30g recently a bit. Plenty of floaters from excess HC & Riccia & Anubias, to other stem plants I just haven't had the time to deal w/ the excess.

I'll try it and report back how it goes


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## JustOneMore21 (May 23, 2006)

Sound like you have a very established filter and biofilter and that you have a good amount of stem plants....so you should be fine. I added Aquasoil (alot too) to an established tank that was not even a year old. I had alot of stem plants and cycled filters and I had no ammonia issues. You should have no problems.


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