As some of you know I'm trying to get a nitration cycle going in a large tank. I have been adding ammonia periodically keeping NH3 around 3 mg/l anxiously waiting for some kind of nitrite reading to show the nitrosomonas bacteria are cranking up. After a couple of weeks no nitrite reading yet. But it's early especially in 65 degree water.
Anyway, I was told in the publication I am using, the household ammonia I am adding should not have any "detergents." The one I have been adding however has a "surfactant" added. At the time I purchased the ammonia from the local grocery story I assumed a surfactant is not a detergent as I use a surfactant in my fish hauling water to prevent foamng. Unfortunately it looks like they may be one and the same, as I noticed in one of my catalogs, a test device for detergents in water has (surfactants) in parentheses.
Did I screw up? Do I need to drain and start over? Can I find ammonia somewhere that has nothing added to it?
I know I can email the author of the publication
Small Scale Aquaculture but I'm been asking enough question as it is. I don't want to wear out my welcome.
