Cycling status

[Southern Fist]

Hi, I just tested my water.
i have 2.0 ppm of ammonia, zero nitrite and 40 ppm of nitrates.
I would have thought at this point there would be some nitrites?
My ph is low at 6.0 and I’ve just added baking soda.

I’m doing a fish less cycle.
I added ammonia several days ago.

nothing in the tank except a whole bunch of plants.

Is this normal? I suppose I’m overdue for a water change!
Ridley

 

[kwi]

Don't do water changes while cycling, you remove nitrites everytime and you need them to go up.
It can take 3 or 4 weeks for nitrites to appear, just be patient.

 

[Southern Fist]

Don't do water changes while cycling, you remove nitrites everytime and you need them to go up.
It can take 3 or 4 weeks for nitrites to appear, just be patient.

Thank you! So it’s possible to have nitrates without nitrites?

 

[kwi]

Yes, you could have nitrates in your source water.

 

[Essjay]

Test your tap water for nitrate and subtract that from the tank reading.

 

[Southern Fist]

Test your tap water for nitrate and subtract that from the tank reading.

0 ppm nitrates in the tap water.
I put a dirty filter from my neighbor in the tank last weekend. Maybe that filter had a bunch of nitrite consumers but no ammonia consumers? I also added the seachem stability for about 5 days last week.

 

[Essjay]

Hypothetical scenario:
The dirty filter from your neighbour contained both ammonia and nitrite eaters in the correct proportion, just not enough of them. Because there are not enough of them, the ammonia eaters only convert a small amount of ammonia to nitrite. But because the bacteria are in the right proportion, there are enough nitrite eaters to eat all the nitrite as soon as the ammonia eaters make it. So nitrite never shows up in a test but nitrate is being made.
Each 1 ppm ammonia is turned into 2.7 ppm nitrite then into 3.6 ppm nitrate so nitrate goes up a lot faster than ammonia goes down.

Has the ammonia level changed or has it remained the same since you started the cycle?

 

[Southern Fist]

Hypothetical scenario:
The dirty filter from your neighbour contained both ammonia and nitrite eaters in the correct proportion, just not enough of them. Because there are not enough of them, the ammonia eaters only convert a small amount of ammonia to nitrite. But because the bacteria are in the right proportion, there are enough nitrite eaters to eat all the nitrite as soon as the ammonia eaters make it. So nitrite never shows up in a test but nitrate is being made.
Each 1 ppm ammonia is turned into 2.7 ppm nitrite then into 3.6 ppm nitrate so nitrate goes up a lot faster than ammonia goes down.

Has the ammonia level changed or has it remained the same since you started the cycle?

I think the ammonia has been reducing slowly after doses. I haven’t been keeping that close of an eye on it, but am going to start now. Thanks for your help everyone!

 

[ITViking]

Hypothetical scenario:
The dirty filter from your neighbour contained both ammonia and nitrite eaters in the correct proportion, just not enough of them. Because there are not enough of them, the ammonia eaters only convert a small amount of ammonia to nitrite. But because the bacteria are in the right proportion, there are enough nitrite eaters to eat all the nitrite as soon as the ammonia eaters make it. So nitrite never shows up in a test but nitrate is being made.
Each 1 ppm ammonia is turned into 2.7 ppm nitrite then into 3.6 ppm nitrate so nitrate goes up a lot faster than ammonia goes down.

Has the ammonia level changed or has it remained the same since you started the cycle?

Sounds like they added some.

I added ammonia several days ago.

Could be the plants are absorbing the ammonia, and nitrites are being consumed as quickly as produced?

 

[Essjay]

Plants will take up ammonia, through there was still 2 ppm in the tank in the first post. The fact that nitrate is a lot higher than tap water means it must have come from somewhere in the tank and it is usually made by bacteria from ammonia via nitrite.


However, a thought has occurred to me - are you adding any plant fertiliser which contains nitrate?

 

[Southern Fist]

Plants will take up ammonia, through there was still 2 ppm in the tank in the first post. The fact that nitrate is a lot higher than tap water means it must have come from somewhere in the tank and it is usually made by bacteria from ammonia via nitrite.


However, a thought has occurred to me - are you adding any plant fertiliser which contains nitrate?

Yes I’m adding equilibrium, kno3 and kh2po4.

 

[Essjay]

kno3

If you are adding potassium nitrate that's why your nitrate is high even though you've not had any nitrite. You are adding it to the tank as plant fertiliser.

 

[Southern Fist]

If you are adding potassium nitrate that's why your nitrate is high even though you've not had any nitrite. You are adding it to the tank as plant fertiliser.

Well, I probably should have figured that out on my Own! Thanks! I’m getting nitrite readings now. Ammonia is dropping pretty fast after dosing as well.