Does This Sound Right To You?

[JoshH]

Hey guys! On day 17 of my fishless cycle now, been adding ammonia up to 4ppm roughly at 24 hr intervals as its always 0 ammonia at this time! The Nitrite is still off the scale. I just checked now 12 hours after adding ammonia and its down to 0...does this sound right if its still in the nitrite spike?

I'm using the API liquid test kit and ph is around 7.5

Cheers

 

[waterdrop]

Well, that just sounds like a normal observation someone would get along the way while doing a fishless cycle. It sounds like you at least have the chance that its proceeding very quickly and nicely compared to most. Did you get hold of some mature media?

If I'm reading your sentence correctly, it sounds like you observed just ammonia having dropped to zero in 12 hours while the nitrite reading is still at the max the test can give you at 12 hours? That's pretty common, it that's what you observed. The N-Bac development is much, much slower than the A-Bac development. Sometimes the A-Bac development will even backtrack some in the coming period while you wait for nitrites to drop.

If you meant that -both- ammonia and nitrite suddenly dropped to zero in twelve hours then of course that's even better, and you would then just keep adding to 5ppm ammonia at the 24 hour time block and taking readings at the 12 and 24 hour marks. If you get several 12 hour drops to zero then you could go ahead and start your "qualifying" week to see if it can keep it up or if it will suffer a setback.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[JoshH]

Hey waterdrop, cheers for the detailed reply!

Yeah I found it hard to word all that properly lol, its just the ammonia dropping to zero @ 12 hours right now, the nitrite remains off the chart, just waiting for it to drop =] Hopefully it will be soon, I had only 1 sq inch or so of mature media to add from an existing tank, but it certainly seems to have helped even just the little bit! Is it best to stick to adding at 24hr intervals right?

There's a fair bit to get my head around as this is my first fishless cycle!

Thanks again

 

[OldMan47]

Yes, you are right to keep adding ammonia at 24 hours Josh. If you want to monitor the nitrite drop easier, it is OK to do a huge water change to get the reading on scale so that you can see if it is progressing. If you do that, make sure you only add dechlorinated water and top back up with ammonia after.

 

[JoshH]

Cheers oldman47, dont think I'll need to now mind, tested the tank around 14hrs after I last added Ammonia and it looks like nitrite is reading @ 2ppm, will check again at 24hr mark later *fingers crossed*

 

[waterdrop]

Glad to hear how well its going. Perfect example of how one only needs a square inch or so of mature media to do the trick! After all, A million beneficial bacteria would just be a spec!

~~waterdrop~~