Cycle Update

[LionessN3cubs]

Counting from April 7th, Im on day 23 of cycling. Ammonia first dropped on Day 16 so roughly its been a week since my ammonia dropped the first time

Ammonia at 12 hours was between 1-2 ppm
Nitrite 5.0
Ammonia at 24 hours is between 0 and .25 (just a HINT of green)

Using the API color charts I've been trying to add the ammonia to 4.0 but I think Im getting a bit more..probably to 5 ppn so Im going to add a little less today and see what happens in 12 hours. There have been days that at 24 hours I was completely at 0 so I think the variance is coming from adding a bit too much ammonia sometimes. My eyes have a bit of a hard time with recognizing different shades of colors so this is a bit of a challenge for me. Heck The dodge car company calls the color of my van dodge blue but its GREEN to me LOL.

Just wanted to post and make sure all looks well with my cycle


Day 29.

5ml (4ppm) processed in 12 hours YAY FINALLY!!!!
Nitrite hard to tell the color for sure. Its either 1.0 0r 5.0...definately darker than the pinky one in between those 2. Yesterday was a 1.0 and the color is different than yesterday so Im thinking it has to be 5.0? I dunno....at least Im not dealing with a backlog of nitrite since water I did 2 water changes in a row recently.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

sounds like all is going according to plan lioness.

the colour charts are a bit awkward, we all suffer with the same thing so it's not just you at least!!

is your nitrite dropping at all yet?

 

[LionessN3cubs]

sounds like all is going according to plan lioness.

the colour charts are a bit awkward, we all suffer with the same thing so it's not just you at least!!

is your nitrite dropping at all yet?

no, it JUST got up to 5.0 yesterday..and a lovely pinkish purply shade it is too!

 

[Miss Wiggle]

cool, it'll come down with time. glad that this is all happening and working out now.

are the cubs and the hubby coping better with the wait now that you can at least see somethings happening?

 

[LionessN3cubs]

cool, it'll come down with time. glad that this is all happening and working out now.

are the cubs and the hubby coping better with the wait now that you can at least see somethings happening?

Yeah LOL now that they can see that things have changed inside the tubes...they're tickled. They're actually getting into helping me match the shades to the charts. Having the snails around has helped a bit too. They spend a good amount of time snail hunting LOL. I told them that once we're almost ready to buy fish, we're going to attempt to "catch" some of the snails and release them in the creek that isn't far away. My oldest cant wait for that

Just out of curiosity, how long did you cycling jobs take for the ammonia to start processing to 0 in 12 hours? Im not impatient anymore just curious

 

[Miss Wiggle]

lol, good to get them all nvolved though isn't it


we've only fishless cycled once (once you've got the mature media in one tank you can clone other tanks from it so don't need to repeat the process) it took about 6 weeks. was my other half doing it though so I dunno how long it took for ammonia to drop. I suspect I can find a thread on here about it though.......

 

[backtotropical]

Hi Lioness,

Glad to hear everything is going well with the cycle, cubs and pack leader.

Just out of curiosity, how long did you cycling jobs take for the ammonia to start processing to 0 in 12 hours? Im not impatient anymore just curious

The time taken depends on so many factors. I've heard of it taking only a few days, but also heard of it taking several weeks. Sit back and be patient and all will be well.

Regards

BTT

 

[Miss Wiggle]

theres a few details in this thread of how long the only fishless cycle we've ever done took http/www.fishforums.net/content/Members-...e-to-read-more/

 

[LionessN3cubs]

Okay, after 2 PH crashes in the last 24 hours I think Im back on track

90% water change this afternoon
(finished 2:30)

PH 7.6
KH 6-7 after 1 tsp baking soda added
Topped ammonia up with 5 mls ammonia
Nitrite 0 after water change

8 pm worry about PH prompted a testing spree

PH 7.6
KH not tested
Ammonia 1.0
Nitrite .50-1.0

hopefully this Ph holds long enough to finish the cycle! Nitrite part wont finish if I keep doing water changes every day

 

[LionessN3cubs]

Okay, after 2 PH crashes in the last 24 hours I think Im back on track

90% water change this afternoon
(finished 2:30)

PH 7.6
KH 6-7 after 1 tsp baking soda added
Topped ammonia up with 5 mls ammonia
Nitrite 0 after water change

8 pm worry about PH prompted a testing spree

PH 7.6
KH not tested
Ammonia 1.0
Nitrite .50-1.0

hopefully this Ph holds long enough to finish the cycle! Nitrite part wont finish if I keep doing water changes every day

Testing at roughly 10 hours after water change/ammonia top up to 4 ppm

Ammonia 1.0
Nitrite 1.0+
ph and kh both holding


WOW...what a difference already in the nitrites. It took me FOREVER to get the nitrite to start climbing and now Im already at 1.0 and one dose of ammonia hasn't even fully processed yet. Pretty cool to see the Abac's working so quickly

 

[LionessN3cubs]

Day 28 8:30 am about 18 hours after last ammonia add

Ammonia 0
Nitrite 1.0+
PH 7.6

adding 5 mls of ammonia

 

[waterdrop]

Lioness,

Watch the KH carefully. I just looked at my log and confirmed that my KH dropped from 6 to 5 in just 2 days, and this is on a 28G. Yours is smaller so the overall buffering capacity will be less and it will drop faster I think.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[LionessN3cubs]

Lioness,

Watch the KH carefully. I just looked at my log and confirmed that my KH dropped from 6 to 5 in just 2 days, and this is on a 28G. Yours is smaller so the overall buffering capacity will be less and it will drop faster I think.

~~waterdrop~~

Thanks for the heads up water! I tested right after reading this and my kh did indeed drop from 6-5 as well.

So ...how low should I let it drop before adding more baking soda? I am SO close to finishing this cycle I dont want anything else to happen.

My readings this morning were

AMMONIA 0 (obviously since it was 0 last night and I dont add till morning)
NITRITES were a DEFINATE 1.0-which is interesting because yesterday I wasn't sure if it was 1.0 or 5.0 ...but the color I got today and the color I got yesterday are very definately NOT the same. I wonder what the equation is for ammonia=nitrite conversion? I'd love to know how much ammonia processed equals how much nitrite. Im tending to think that since my Nitrites were starting to drop when my PH crashed, that they were 5.0 and now 1.0 ..I must have SOME nitrite bacteria in there or they wouldnt have ever dropped right?
PH steady 7.6
KH 5

 

[waterdrop]

Lioness,

Watch the KH carefully. I just looked at my log and confirmed that my KH dropped from 6 to 5 in just 2 days, and this is on a 28G. Yours is smaller so the overall buffering capacity will be less and it will drop faster I think.

~~waterdrop~~

Thanks for the heads up water! I tested right after reading this and my kh did indeed drop from 6-5 as well.

So ...how low should I let it drop before adding more baking soda? I am SO close to finishing this cycle I dont want anything else to happen.

That's an interesting question! I've been asking myself that one, because a couple of times now I think I've let it get too close and the whole pH crash, water change, fishless delay syndrome happens. I guess I'm thinking it would be better to add more baking soda at, say KH=3 (or maybe KH=4 would be better?) so that pH wouldn't have already started its slide downwards. I'm really feeling lately like the whole process likes to be up there in the pH of mid 7's (7.4, 7.5 etc) a lot more than to be lower than that -- (I don't really know if its that or if they just love to come alive again after a water change for some other reason, lol) ........since mine dropped a whole German degree in two days, I'd say hit it with baking soda again on the morning that KH hits 4, which for you might be tomorrow! I wouldn't go overboard, but just add about what you did before or a little less, wait a while and see what it did to the KH and whether the pH is still holding high.

Your cycle and mine sound like they are practically in lock step now. I got Amm=0.25 and Nitrite=0.25 at 12 hours last night, so I waited to add 4ppm ammonia this morning, which I did at 7:45am or something. Unfortunately my 12-hour test will fall right in the middle of Oliver's baseball game tonight and I'll hopefully be watching him throw strikes, rather than testing water! I also tested this morning just because it was fun to see the clear yellow and clear sky blue and know that both my populations are indeed getting them down to zero, even if they are still a tiny bit slow doing it. The comeback from the broken tank has been luckily a lot faster than the initial one was prior to the disaster.

My readings this morning were

AMMONIA 0 (obviously since it was 0 last night and I dont add till morning)
NITRITES were a DEFINATE 1.0-which is interesting because yesterday I wasn't sure if it was 1.0 or 5.0 ...but the color I got today and the color I got yesterday are very definately NOT the same. I wonder what the equation is for ammonia=nitrite conversion? I'd love to know how much ammonia processed equals how much nitrite. Im tending to think that since my Nitrites were starting to drop when my PH crashed, that they were 5.0 and now 1.0 ..I must have SOME nitrite bacteria in there or they wouldnt have ever dropped right?
PH steady 7.6
KH 5

OK, remember, BTT tells us this all the time: The A-bacs take 1ppm of ammonia and put out 2.7ppm of nitrites from it. So 4ppm ammonia will create 10.8ppm of nitrite (over-range for most liquid nitrite tests, right?) ...If you have live plants you always have to remember they may be stealing away some of the ammonia, so you would see less of it get processed into nitrites. Now, what else can make it complicated? Well, there is the problem of the "non-linearity" of processing, as you have observed. You'll of course recall that time or times when you measured nearly every hour and told us how the ammonia stayed high for hours and then dropped very fast near the end. That "non-linearity" and the fact that most of us only take "snapshot" pictures with hours in-between can cause confusion. Plus, for any of the snapshots that show 5.0 nitrite, it could really be anything up above, right?

And yes, you can tell you have -some- N-bacs in there from very early on in fishless cycling because (unless live plants are messing with the numbers or you don't account for nitrates in your tap water) you can measure nitrates and see them creeping up (although that also gets into the controversy re the nitrate test giving readings for nitrites (don't ask.))

~~waterdrop~~

 

[Miss Wiggle]

wooo race to the finish for lioness and waterdrop!!

the whole gH, kH, pH thing baffles me you know, think i'm v lucky with my tap water tbh, pH is steady as anything at 7.4 even through fishless cycling, got 0 nitrate (pretty much unheard of in the UK) and it never fluctuates. I'm glad I've never had to go in depth with my understanding of hardness.

just glad both of you guys seem ot be getting a handle on this.

and yes waterdrop, i said after it happened i reckon the little bump is more a mini cycle than an actual cycle, takes much less time to get sorted.