Cycling Driving Me Crazy

[littleT]

Hi everybody
I have a new tank which is a 44 gallon and it has been set up for 18 days. I have 4 zebra danios in the tank. I have been checking it everyday for ammonia and nitrite. The ammonia has always been .025 and the nitrite has always been a slight pink color no reading. Well I noticed yesterday it had a small algae bloom and the water is clear. So I checked today for nitrates and it had no reading just a slight pink color and the ammonia was the same but the nitrites was clear this time. I thought when you saw nitrates that it has went through the cycle but I still have a ammonia reading of .025. Any ideas on what this weird tank is doing? The only thing I could find was it sounds like a mini cycle. Does that sound right? I haven't done any water changes at all and I haven't clean anything. I hope someone can help. Thanks for reading my post.

 

[xxBarneyxx]

Just sounds like it is still cycling. You will see NitrAtes go up over time but probably not a lot just yet. Your tank isn't fully cycled until the ammonia and nitrIte are zero and stay at zero.

If the NitrItes are clear then double check the ammonia reading. You should see your ammonia reading drop to zero before your nitrite does.

 

[littleT]

Hi xxbarneyxx
Thanks for the advice! The tank is back to is old readings they have been the same since I started cycling the tank except for that one time and maybe it was a false reading. It has been 20 days now and the ammonia is still at .025, nitrites slight pink color no reading. I still have the small algae bloom on one of the tubes and now I noticed some algae on the inside of the hoses in my rena xp2 filter. I guess it is algae they look green and they are spots. I have never seen algae on the inside of my other canister filter which is a Eheim. Do you know what causes this? Have you ever heard of this? I wish it would cycle all ready. I'm going to test the water out of the tap tomorrow and see if I get the same readings for ammonia and nitrites and see if they are different. By the way your fish tanks are beautiful!!! VERY NICE!!!