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cycling fish tank smells

11K views 13 replies 6 participants last post by  brandonkr 
#1 ·
okay im fishless cycling my freshwater tank with fish food. my nitrites are barely starting to rise, so i must have an ammonia spike(my test strips dont have an ammonia tester). but anywho, my tank smells like dirty laundry. could it be the ammonia spike? or the fish food thats breaking down in it?
 
#2 ·
If your nitrites are "barely" starting to rise, then you should have ammonia as well, which could cause the smell. You can also buy pure ammonia and add that to your tank (very small amounts) to get the cycle going, it should go faster that way. There is a thread on here telling how to cycle with adding ammonia to your tank. good luck!
 
#7 ·
did you just mistype freshwater, or are you setting up a freshwater tank. just trying to figure out the smell. sometimes saltwater tanks can get a low tide smell, but i would not describe it as dirty laundry. though FW tanks can give off a woodsy smell, that i would think would be closer to the dirty laundry smell.

G~
 
#11 ·
hmm, I was just wondering, isn't cooking rock even more smelly than the smell of a cycling freshwater tank? I've cooked rock before and it smelled horrible.
 
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