Review on 🐠 500 ml Seachem Stability Fish Tank Stabilizer - Freshwater & Marine Aquarium Use by Amber Vue

I typically use three Seachem products to get my nitrogen cycle going faster than waiting weeks or months for everything to go well. These products are ideal for removing chlorine/chloramine, ammonia, nitrite and nitrate. And AmGuard for fast blocking of ammonia to be less toxic. And finally stability for establishing and growing bacterial colonies. First, if possible, don't buy old or expired Stability bottles. Stability is only good if the contents of the bottle are fresh enough. In the case of stability, you should dose it into the aquarium, preferably near the filter media on which it will live. There's nothing wrong with overdosing on Stability a bit when you need an initial boost for resident bacteria. If you have more than one tank, you can remove the filter media from a properly installed tank and place it in a new tank to speed up the process even further. Stability will only work well if you have some ammonia and nitrite available for bacteria to consume. A clean aquarium with no ammonia and nitrites will not feed your bacteria. Have something in that tank produce at least some ammonia or your cycle will never start and the stability bacteria will just starve and die too. When you have multiple fish, they release ammonia in their waste. And food leftovers usually turn into ammonia. Don't start with too many fish as you will overload the nitrogen cycle with too much ammonia which is toxic. Stability bacteria can also consume ammonia that has been blocked by Prime or Amguard treatments. So you can safely use it with these products. Typically, you'll start with a high dose of Stability first, and dose the tank daily for several days until the cycle starts on its own. Once you know your cycle has started (test kits are very important for monitoring), you can use a dose of these about once a week to ensure your bacterial colony remains intact. This is good for keeping the good bacteria alive, but remember that at least some ammonia and nitrite must be produced for the bacteria to survive in stability. Infusing a pristine reservoir with Stability simply kills the bacteria that Stability provides. Stability bacteria convert ammonia to nitrite and nitrite to nitrate. Nitrates can be removed during regular water changes and most plants also use nitrates. This stuff will have a brief use once you open the sealed lid and expose the contents to the air. Therefore, an old open bottle of it can no longer have any effect. So buy something that you will use for a month or two and don't leave it sitting for months before using it. I use this product both as a starter cycle and for general maintenance of biological filter media. Sometimes I add it right after I have to discard foam or filter material just to encourage new bacteria on new media. Don't replace all of your biomedia at once. Move them in a checkerboard pattern when replacing them so you always have bacteria in some of your surroundings. The residents of the old media that you keep in the aquarium can hitchhike to the contents of the new media. But using "Stability" right after switching media can make it much faster. Even with stability, you need to be patient. Even stability cannot close the nitrogen cycle overnight. It takes days/weeks and multiple doses for the good bacteria to multiply fast enough to use up all your ammonia and then nitrite. Heavily planted plants can often remove remaining nitrates. However, still perform about 25% water changes weekly to ensure fresh water and depleted minerals are returned to your aquarium. Make sure your fresh water is free of chlorine, chloramine and hard metals. I use Prime for this.