Fritz Turbo Start 700 Freshwater (4 oz)

Let me preface this review by saying that I have never used a product and ran to write a review SO quickly. Before this, I have used Seachem Stability, API Quick Start, and Microbe-Lift Nite-Out + Special blend. They did not seem to help during the nitrite phase of the cycle, which I ended up stuck on for more than 30 full days of not for this product. I had crazy nitrites that were measuring over 10ppm (I have a liquid kit as well I use to confirm the tests in detail, the strips are for quick & easy reads). I hadadded quick start at the beginning of the cycle, with no affect. Then I tried adding Seachem stability daily. Nothing for three weeks. Then for a week I switched to microbe-lift Nite-Out. STILL NOTHING, nitrite levels off the charts and I was panicking doing water changes daily at this point with little to no effect. After doing more research and doubting bottled bacteria products even work, I read on a forum that Fritzzyme Turbostart 700 is a bottled bacteria product that is refrigerated and therefore preserves the bacteria through shipping. I decided to buy a bottle to try it out for myself. The package arrived with ice packs inside. They were melted but the bottle wasn't warm, so that meant all was good. I popped it in the fridge for a few hours before use. I added double the dose to my tank. I included pictures of my water tests below. The first test shows how the levels were before I used Fritzzyme. The second picture shows the water test after a few hours. Nitrates and nitrites clearly gone down by a LOT. The last image shows the water test the next morning, after about 24 hours. WOW! This stuff is GOOD. No more nitrites, trace nitrates, no ammonia. Cycle completed after just one time of using this. Miracle in a bottle. I am currently using it on another tank with the same issue and the levels are going down already too. Moral of the story: Don't bother with any bacteria products that aren't refrigerated. This stuff is the REAL DEAL.

I wish I would have gotten this on time, it would have saved me so much stress and hard work. I ordered this mid November with a shipment of fish scheduled for the end of the month. The shipment was a bit unexpected but I had been waiting for these particular fish to come on the market and I didn't want to lose my chance. The fish needed a quarantine tank and I used a bunch of media from my other established tanks to avoid massive water changes and lots of work on my part. Despite all of that I wanted to play things as safe as I could so I sprang for this. Well for whatever reason the ship date on my Turbo Start order kept getting moved and I had to cancel the order twice as amazon was advertising a ship date weeks ahead of the final date they kept giving me. To my ire the Turbo Start didn't arrive until the first week in December, a full three days after the fish arrived and two days after it was scheduled to show up. I was stuck trying to make do with Fluval (didn't have enough phosphates in the water to kick start their bacteria strains) and seachem (hardly made a dent). Those were such a waste, I think I spent around 50 on those products alone. In the end I was throwing those products away because of the massive water changes I was having to do. Once the Turbo Start finally arrived, I was hesitant to use it as it was shipped during a cold snap and almost certainly froze in shipping. Not only that but it was shipped via USPS and got put in the mail box which I don't check every day. Day time temps where well above 60's in the mailbox and froze again over night. After all the work I was having to put into the quarantine tanks my heart broke. The directions say not to freeze the product and it sat in my mailbox over night twice. After another few days of fighting high nitrites (ammonia is way easier to remove with big water changes) I decided to try this, it was either going to work and I wouldn't have to do as big a water change or it wasn't going to work and I was going to end up dumping it with water changes anyway. I really had nothing to loose. I added this to my tank and eight hours later I tested my water and BOOM! nitrites were somewhere between .05pmm and .1ppm!! Not perfect but much less stressful! With the addition of salt, I was greeted by active happy hungry fish. I did spend some time checking the fish after adding the damaged Turbo Start. Fritz recommends not to let the product freeze but I couldn't find any information on their site or anywhere else on what would happen if a damaged product was used. So with some new water on stand by, I added Turbo Start and checked in on the fish every 15 min to half hour and they seamed fine. After a long night of worrying I went to bed. Next morning fish were fine and the water was great! I still don't know if using Turbo start after it had been out of refrigeration and completely froze was a good idea, it smelled like a rotting animal when I opened the bottle (not the surfer smell some people describe), but it worked and I am esthetic! Now that my water is down to .05ppm nitrites I can back off water changes until the ammonia or nitrites rise again and then I will hopefully only have to do small water changes and add a smaller amount of Turbo Start so as not to back slide the establishing bacteria colonies. I highly recommend this product, highly don't recommend not having it on hand before you need it, and defiantly don't recommend in fish cycling. Yes there are the YouTubers who say, "Look! I just set up my tank! In goes Fritz, everything is fine!!". Even if you know what you are doing, in tank cycling is a risk and a time sink. You have to be willing to check on your fish and test your water through out the day and change it at a moment's notice! Don't do it folks, even if you are like, "I got time to do water changes 3x a day!! I have vacation time and am going to do a stay-cation keeping an eye on my new fish!!" Just don't do it... Despite the fish being better off I still have to monitor of fungal infection as result of these last few stressful days. Also don't trust that this product will be fine if it freezes, yeah it worked for me but I won't be rolling that dice twice. Don't bother with others products, this might look expensive but compared to the dosing direction on other products, a little bit of this goes a loooonnngg way and its the only one out of four products from two different companies that worked and helped fix my almost disastrous nitrite levels.

I've been in the hobby for decades and remember when something like this was snake oil. I've used other brands recently that work well, but this is the real deal if you want to seed your aquarium quickly. I've used this per the directions on 2 10 gallons, a 55, and 125. And in ever case there was no bloom or any other issues or bad tests for the usual. It's only cloudy for a short while which is understandable. And it only stinks if you smell it. My only issue is shipping could be quicker being that this has a short life. So it's not something you can buy and put under your tank when needed. I believe it's shelf life is 6 month when refrigerated. At least according to AI. GREAT STUFF. AND MADE IN USA!!!!!

The bottled arrived warm and I live in Florida so I worried it wouldn’t be effective and even requested a return. I placed it in the fridge in the mean time but after a couple weeks I hadn’t gotten a chance to take it to UPS and I was getting desperate trying to cycle my tank so I decided to use it even though it arrived warm. WOW! I was able to cycle my tank after just two weeks, after trying about three or four other brands of bottled bacteria and being unsuccessful. I dosed my tank with ammonia as I didn’t have any fish in there, and yeah, it worked like a charm! Sooo glad I didn’t return it in the end 😅 I added my fish after testing my tank consistently for a month and everything is running smoothly. Highly highly recommend this product!

At first I bought the non turbo, which wasn't enough for my fat fish with their fat bioloads. Then I ordered this (4oz) for my 50 gallon. It came in packaged SUPER well with an ice pack, and was still cold even though my mailman left it without alerting me, so it sat outside for a long while. I poured the whole bottle into my tank, and boooy it was stinky and clouded everything up, but the paper it comes with warns you about that. Well, I tested after one day and one night and THE TANK IS ALREADY CYCLED! Even faster than I ever expected. Testing 0 ammonia, 0 nitrites, and just a little nitrates (I have plants). I missed the nitrite spike it was over so fast (good thing I dosed prime last night anyway). I'm shocked at how fast it worked, even faster than the fastest estimates on the paper. I can only assume the normal version bacteria I put in last week had started to establish, and this kicked it into high gear or something? Or maybe it's just that good. All in all, great product and a total lifesaver. Would highly recommend.