Fishless Cycle Question

[112092]

Hey guys,

Just another question on my Fishless cycling. I have taken my water parameter readings today and they are

Ammonia = 1ppm
Nitrite: .25-.5ppm
Nitrate: 10mg/L

I did a 20% water change yesterday (on a 50 litre approx tank).

I am wondering if this is going ok because it seems that my Nitrite is dropping quicker then my Ammonia! the Nitrite has dropped from 1 to .25-.5ppm overnight. The ammonia has been dropping at about .25ppm per night. And seeing as i did a water change yesterday the nitrate should have increased a lot over night.

I have a planted tank and i was wondering if this would affect the cycling process.

thanks!!

 

[rdd1952]

Plants can use the ammonia in it's original form so that it isn't converted. That is one reason a lot of people say you can heavily plant a tank and add fish right away. How long has it been since you first added ammonia? Are there any ammonia, nitrite or nitrate in your tap water? What is the pH of your tank water? There's really no reason to do water changes during a fishless cycle unless it's because your pH drops and the cycle stalls or if your nitrite and nitrate are off the chart high and you just want to get them down so you can see what is happening.

 

[112092]

Plants can use the ammonia in it's original form so that it isn't converted. That is one reason a lot of people say you can heavily plant a tank and add fish right away. How long has it been since you first added ammonia? Are there any ammonia, nitrite or nitrate in your tap water? What is the pH of your tank water? There's really no reason to do water changes during a fishless cycle unless it's because your pH drops and the cycle stalls or if your nitrite and nitrate are off the chart high and you just want to get them down so you can see what is happening.

I live in Australia so i can't get ammonia, instead i used fish food. I crumbled the fish food up before i added it hopeing it would speed up the process of producing ammonia. I have low PH tap water - about 6.5 so i have had to do a few water changes as my water tends to drop to PH 6 and below if i don't.

Ive been cycling for about 8 days now.

Im not sure whether i have nitrites in my tap water or not but i doubt it because when i first filled the tank and tested the water it didnt register either nitrites or nitrates.

cheers!!

 

[rdd1952]

Using flakes make it a little more dodgy when cycling as it's hard to regulate how much ammonia you are adding. It also tends to take a little longer as the flakes first have to be broken down into ammonia. You might want to try adding a larger amount in a stocking or bag (to keep hings cleaner in the tank) so they can break down a little faster and you won't have to add them as often.

I think part of the reason you are seeing the ammonia drop slower than the nitrite is that there is ammonia still being produced from the flakes and maybe that is happening faster than the ammonia is converted to nitrite.

 

[112092]

Using flakes make it a little more dodgy when cycling as it's hard to regulate how much ammonia you are adding. It also tends to take a little longer as the flakes first have to be broken down into ammonia. You might want to try adding a larger amount in a stocking or bag (to keep hings cleaner in the tank) so they can break down a little faster and you won't have to add them as often.

I think part of the reason you are seeing the ammonia drop slower than the nitrite is that there is ammonia still being produced from the flakes and maybe that is happening faster than the ammonia is converted to nitrite.

ahhhh k.

so it has already produced the right bacteria but just in a very small amount? i was thinking perhaps it had cycled and it was going through another mini cycle as more ammonia is produced as the flake breaks down. Which could possibly be creating an ammonia spike because their isnt enough bacteria yet to turn it into nitrites/nitrates?

 

[112092]

Hey guys,

my readings for today are:

Ammonia = .5ppm
Nitrite = .25 ppm
Nitrate = 5-.75mg/L

My nitrates have dropped without a water change...could this be to due with plant life?
Am i nearly cycled?

thanks for your help.

 

[waterdrop]

hello again Yellow Cichlid Guy lol,

It sounds like your fishless cycle is about 8 or 9 days in progress now? Although a few have reported their NO2 spike after only a few days it seems like the majority here have to wait several weeks for that first spike. In my case it took 21 days and then only seemed to happen after a water change (with ammonia recharge.) Also your route is more difficult - you are using fish food instead of pure ammonia, which is reported to make the course of the test readings more difficult to interpret. Finally, on top of that, it sounds like you have lots of live plants, which also changes how to read and interpret the testing progress. Everything I've read seems to say that plants can soak up some of the ammonia and some of the nitrates(NO3) but that activity can vary quite a bit (perhaps sometimes due to light and growth variations.)

This doesn't mean you won't achieve your disired result perhaps faster than the rest of us but is just the simple observation that your test results are probably hard to interpret! I'm not sure you ever reported your tap water measurements here, or the percentage of substrate covered by plants, both of which could be data the experts could use.

regards, waterdrop

 

[112092]

Thanks waterdrop!

Ive got some new stats for today

Ammonia = .5ppm
Nitrite = 0ppm
Nitrates = 10-15mg/L

I have a problem though, there is some brown algae which is looking a bit like a spider web wrapped around one of my plants. another looked like it was dieing at the extremeties so i trimmed it back pretty severly and all the dead limbs are gone.

is there any way to prevent this? anyone else had this problem?

cheers

 

[112092]

lol i figured why it was covered in algae looking stuff;

it was dead! lol i took it out and the rest of the plants seem healthy enough

should i be worried or is losing the occasional plant normal?

 

[waterdrop]

The brown algae is reported to be totaly normal and expected during fishless cycling, in fact it can probably be considered a good sign that things are going ok.

Good luck on your live plants. Maybe it will just be that one plant. Plants are a whole different big branch of the hobby and I encourage you to begin reading the excellent articles over in the planted forum. One of the first things to do is calculate your watts per gallon of light and see what the possibilities are for getting a little more light if needed (often more is needed just to bring you up to what is considered "low light/low tech" by these folks, lol!)

~~waterdrop~~

 

[OldMan47]

One of the reasons that people plant lots of different plants is so that the ones that work in your setup will prosper and the ones that don't won't leave an empty tank. The decaying plant was doing something for you. It was acting just like the fish food and raising your ammonia levels. No harm done but after you are done cycling the tank, be aware that decaying plant leaves can put a burden on your bacterial population that they are not ready for. The plants do absorb some of the nitrogen that is produced in the tank, after all it is plant food. This makes it more difficult to interpret your water readings because the plants can be the reason that something has changed rather than the bacteria. If you have enough plants and few enough fish, you will never establish a nitrogen cycling bacterial colony. It also would cause no harm because the plants themselves would be taking care of the small fish load. The trouble with that kind of setup is that you are totally dependent on how well your plants grow. If they slow down you get an ammonia spike and fish start to die.

 

[112092]

One of the reasons that people plant lots of different plants is so that the ones that work in your setup will prosper and the ones that don't won't leave an empty tank. The decaying plant was doing something for you. It was acting just like the fish food and raising your ammonia levels. No harm done but after you are done cycling the tank, be aware that decaying plant leaves can put a burden on your bacterial population that they are not ready for. The plants do absorb some of the nitrogen that is produced in the tank, after all it is plant food. This makes it more difficult to interpret your water readings because the plants can be the reason that something has changed rather than the bacteria. If you have enough plants and few enough fish, you will never establish a nitrogen cycling bacterial colony. It also would cause no harm because the plants themselves would be taking care of the small fish load. The trouble with that kind of setup is that you are totally dependent on how well your plants grow. If they slow down you get an ammonia spike and fish start to die.

That would explain a lot

over the past 24 hours the Ammonia has dropped to about .5ppm and nitrites to 0 a nitrates to about 5-10mg/L.

I was wondering how the nitrates would have been produced if the nitrites are not present. However, from what you have said i could assume that the plants are reducing the concentration of nitrites and nitrates in my tank.

Cheers!!