Cycling Question

[timmystood]

OK, so i'm cycling my second tank.
To help boost the process I added a small amount of gravel from my mature tank. (No! I don't want to just clone - I like fishless cycling!)
So, 2 days ago I tested for Ammonia and nothing else - it was in the middle of the scale so I figured it was on it's way up to it's spike -- the tank had only been set up for 6 days then, so an Ammoia spike made sense.
Anyways, just now, I tested for Ammonia + NitrIte and the Ammonia is still middle of the scale but the NitrIte is the highest it can be! This doesn't make sense.
The tanks be set up just over a week and already the NitrIte is really high, if it was spiking then it means that the Ammonia must have spiked in like 2 days after the tank was set up!

My source of Ammonia is simply fish food and food tablets decomposing at the bottom of the tank.

What's going on?!!!

Thanks...

 

[timmystood]

bump

 

[Undawada]

When you added the gravel from the mature tank, you brought a very large amount of bacteria over with it. Millions of bacteria can fit on a square inch of any surface, and they cover every surface in your mature tank.

With a true fishless cycle with no seeding whatsoever, you rely on culturing the bacteria that naturally live in water and in the air, which is a much much smaller amount.

I'm not surprised at all that your tank started the nitrite cycle within 2 days. Keep checking, just to be sure, and if the cycle progesses normally, just be happy you will be done sooner than you thought!

Also check the expiry of your test kits, just in case.

 

[timmystood]

But I really didn't use hardly any mature gravel. Only a few grams.
Oh wait - I did also squeeze the mature filter sponge into the new tank - that most likely helped too...

Thanks - I'll keep checking.

 

[Undawada]

Yep, the water likely helped too. I don't think you appreciate how many bacteria can live on even a single piece of gravel.

As you know, bacteria multiply exponentially. It is estimated that, with food and good living conditions, bacteria will double every 30 minutes.

Even a fairly small population to start will greatly increase the rate of growth.

 

[fishing4exotics]

Looks like you are on your way to a quick cycle Keep us posted on the progress of your cycle.

 

[Durbkat]

What you just did was clone that tank. All you do with cloning is add some filter media from established tank (which you did) and you add some gravel (which you did) so you just cloned your tank and possibly adding the fish food is making the ammonia and nitrite go up because of the polutation in the tank.