TetraTetra 77965 SafeStart, 3.38 oz

I am typically not a fan of Tetra products as I've always looked at them as the Walmart of aquarium products. They're cheap in price but that is reflected in the quality of their products. This bacterial starter however is a whole different story.I was setting up a new 10 gallon breeding rack and decided to test some of the major starter cultures against each other and of course a control with no bacteria added. I tested Dr. Tim's one and only, Seachem, this product, and Nite-Out in addition to a control no bacteria in two tanks each.These were all fishless cycled using 2ppm ammonium chloride using a standard fishless cycle methodology (see Dr. Tim's website).The control tank took 6 weeks to fully cycle at 2ppm N. A tank was considered fully cycled when it could cycle 2ppm of ammonium chloride to Nitrates with 0 ppm ammonia or nitrite in 12 hours. The following are the results in days for time to cycle:TSS (this product) - 14 daysEcological Labs Nite-out - 16 daysSeachem Stability- 30 daysDr. Tim's One and Only - 42 daysA few notable things about TSS (Tetra safe start): It begins processing ammonia on a scale readable by a standard API ammonia test kit immediately (within 24 hours). Nitrite never peaks, at all. As a matter of fact I only had any Nitrite reading at 5 days using TSS and it was fainter than the lowest reading on the API test. All of the other products followed the standard ammonia peak ->nitrite peak -> cycled process.A note about Dr. Tims: Dr. Tim's was about 1 days behind TSS for the first 10 days and then crashed in both tanks and started the cycle over, slower. Remember, these tanks are all identical, same tank, same water, same substrate and quantity and same ammonium chloride. None of the other tanks had this happen. Dr. Tim's does recommend a basic water pH to cycle the fastest but I keep softwater fish. I'm not going to cycle all my tanks at a basic pH then drain them, switch to my normal soft reconstituted RO and then possibly have bacteria die from the huge parameter shift. I don't know if my lower pH caused the re-cycle or if it was just dumb luck that whatever happened only happened in the two Dr. Tim's tanks and none of the others.My conclusion, TSS is a surprisingly amazing product and I've used it since the test to cycle a number of other tanks with the same results. This is the only Tetra product I can recommend however, stay away from their foods which are loaded with grain fillers that fish can't digest.Final note, this "experiment" is not statistically testable due to the low number of replicates. I hope it helps inform but it shouldn't be taken as fact. Furthermore, these results were obtained in MY water and MY conditions, reconstituted RO, buffered substrate, pH 6.0, dgh 1, dkh 0. Before you get upset because I didn't find your favorite bacteria starter to be the best, keep in mind that bacteria cultures evolve rapidly and are likely adapted to the conditions the different manufacturers keep them in. I MAY have vastly different results cycling an African cichlid tank.

One of the best I have used and the cycle's an aquarium the fastest. Highly recommended.

Much cheaper than brick and mortar price.

Works great for fresh set up of your tank

To explain briefly, this product adds nitrates to your tank. You need nitrates to eat ammonia and nitrite in the nitrogen cycle, so that your tank can self sustain when your fish create waste. It's sharing its environment with waste, but with good filtration and establishment of the nitrogen cycle, your fish won't die or suffer ill effects. Before you use or buy this product, please go read the youtube reviews and tutorials. Ez's Aquarium on youtube has a great video called "how to cycle your tank with tetra safe start plus".Naturally, it would take 4-8 weeks to cycle a tank depending on what method you use to start producing ammonia, to form nitrite, to form nitrate in the end. With this product, no more than 2 weeks. I cycled a 5g nano tank with some plants covering almost half the tank, along with decaying food waste. I added this product a week into the cycle or on day 5 to a tank that had about 1ppm ammonia and some nitrite. A few hours later, I added my betta fish. Within 48 hrs the ammonia and nitrite levels dropped significantly. My nitrate levels were around 20-30ppm, so I did some water changes. On day 13 the tank was completely cycled with 0 for ammonia and nitrite. I used API's test kit to determine levels. My betta fish displayed no signs of discomfort or illness and was very active. I did not use janitorial ammonia either, although I do recommend having some ammonia levels in the tank before you start so the nitrate bacteria has food to eat and sustain its population.The only reason it wouldn't work is if whoever you buy from on amazon, got a bad batch. I purchased mine directly from Amazon LLC. These things do expire or don't work as well if stored improperly. And for that reason, keep a close eye on the tank and test at least once a day or every other day. Also, even though this isn't TSS PLUS, I believe this version works just as well as the TSS Plus version, which that one, just has more concentrated bacteria + brand marketing.DO NOT add any water recently treated with dechlornater, wait 48hrs after adding TSS.The cycle won't be fully complete in 48 hrs, but you can bet it will fully complete in about 2 weeks, rather than the 4-8weeks if you start from scratch. It only SHORTENS the time it takes. There's a lot of misconception that these don't work, but they do if it's a batch that hasn't expired. I paid about $6.78 for mine, but somehow price shot up to $11, you might find it cheaper at your local pet store so shop around since amazon prices fluctuate too much. With that in mind, you spend $$$ to set up a tank, but then cannot put any fish for it a month? Try it, it is definitely worth spending the price of a fish to cut cycling time down, and get started on finally enjoying the view of the tank.