Cycling Question

[hacket]

I have a question about the 10 gallon tank I have just recently set up. I'm familiar with having to cycle a fish tank to establish bacteria, but have never done it before (just read about it). I decided to do fish in cycling, because I really didn't have a choice, and have a single, small pleco in the tank.

The tank was set up 12 days ago, and I have been changing roughly 30 to 50 percent of the water daily, to control ammonia build up. I had an old set of outdated strip tests I was using, but I was getting suspicious when it showed everything established (Ammonia 0ppm, nitrite 0ppm, and nitrate at 20ppm). So today I went out and got the API master kit, and redid todays daily test. Results were ammonia- .25ppm, nitrite - 0ppm, and nitrate- 20ppm.

I expected some ammonia, and will be changing water in a bit. But I didn't expect any nitrate, as I thought this was the last stage of the cycle, and it's only been 12 days. Does this just mean I have all bacteria present, and just need to let them build up to higher levels? Am I looking at a short cycle here?

Thanks guys. Oh and I love this forum Been prowling for a few weeks now...

 

[Katch]

looks like you probably have some Nitrate in your tap water - I have 12.5ppm in mine. Next time you do a water change take a sample of your dechlorinated tap water and test it for nitrates and see what you have.

 

[hacket]

I just decided to test my dechlorinated tap water now and got the same reading - about 20ppm. So ya guess I have nitrates in my water. I also tested for ammonia, and found trace amounts. Probably .1 ppm.

Anyone think these may cause problems down the road?

 

[Katch]

shouldn't be an issue no; just watch the Nitrates and when they hit ~40ppm time for a water change

 

[OldMan47]

Given your water stats, I would set up a 50% water change today.

 

[waterdrop]

Right, totally common to find that kind of nitrate(NO3) level in your tap water. Also likely that your water authority uses chloramine as an antibacterial rather than just plain chlorine, because that would explain the trace ammonia in your tap water after conditioning. The conditioner separates the chloramine into chlorine and ammonia and it may be that trace separation ammonia you are seeing.

As OM says, the 0.25ppm ammonia level your API kit is showing you is the max of the little window of allowable ammonia we like to try and stay in during a fish-in cycling situation, so you indeed are due for an immediate water change so that you can go close to zero ppm and start the rise toward 0.25ppm again.

At 12 days, you are at best about 1/4th the way in to a typical fish-in cycle. You have only a fraction of the bacterial colony size you'll need to qualify your biofilter as having been cycled. The goal in fish-in cycling is to figure out the percentage and frequency of water changes needed to stay at or below 0.25ppm on both ammonia and nitrite(NO2) until you can be home again to do another water change.

~~waterdrop~~