# 0 ammonia, 0 nitrite, 0 nitrate - What's Going On?!



## longgonedaddy (Dec 9, 2012)

Perhaps with the small bioload, your plants are taking all the ammonia and/or nitrate. 
I can't see your pics on your thread. Do you have a heavy plant load? 
What biomedia are you using?


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## PlantedRich (Jul 21, 2010)

The normal standard fishless cycle works by adding a known amount of ammonia. The one sure way to know that you have ammonia is by adding it. Otherwise you will still be guessing how much bacteria you have built up and you will not know if the tank is ready. 
A bottle of ammonia is so cheap that I would not want to go far to avoid using it.


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## theatermusic87 (Jun 22, 2014)

Dr tims has bottles of ammonia on Amazon for a couple dollars specially for cycling and aquarium.

That being said cherry shrimp have a very low bioload and if your tank can handle snails and a guppy without an increase in anything then I'd say your good to go. Even if you just get an increase in nitrate you're fine


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## FenderOffset238 (Apr 19, 2011)

longgonedaddy said:


> Perhaps with the small bioload, your plants are taking all the ammonia and/or nitrate.
> I can't see your pics on your thread. Do you have a heavy plant load?
> What biomedia are you using?


Yeah, that's odd. Not sure why they are gone.

My plant load is minimal. I have some micro sword, crpyt parva, and a few anubias petite with driftwood. nothing crazy, and certainly not fast growing...


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## longgonedaddy (Dec 9, 2012)

FenderOffset238 said:


> Yeah, that's odd. Not sure why they are gone.
> 
> My plant load is minimal. I have some micro sword, crpyt parva, and a few anubias petite with driftwood. nothing crazy, and certainly not fast growing...


But coupled with your minimal bioload, what you have may be using it all. 

You have have to resort to adding ammonia.


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