Fishless Cycle

[Sanctuary80808]

Hello guys,
i am in the process of a fishless cycle on my 200 litre aquarium using household ammonia. The temp is 26C. When i began my cycle i added 5ppm of ammonia which dropped to 0ppm in about 2 days (i added quite a lot of bacteria from an established aquarium of mine) however my problem is that my nitrites have continued to rise to something like 20ppm and have showed no signs of dropping for the past week, despite me adding more bacteria from established aquarium. Has the cycle stalled or am i just being impatient (probably the latter)?
Thanks everyone!

forgot to mention that i am adding 2-3ppm of ammonia daily to keep the bacteria going. Should i add more/less ammonia or just be patient? Thanks!!

 

[fluttermoth]

What are your pH and nitrates?

A low pH (less than 6-6.5) and very high nitrates (over 80-100) can both stall cycles.

 

[Smells a bit fishy]

Really nitrates as low as that? I thought they had to be well off the scale for it to stall. Somewhere like 400-500ppm

 

[Sanctuary80808]

What are your pH and nitrates?

A low pH (less than 6-6.5) and very high nitrates (over 80-100) can both stall cycles.

my ph is quite high, somewhere around 7.5-8. My nitrates are around 100ppm, possibly more should i do a water change to bring down the nitrates?

 

[Smells a bit fishy]

It won't do any harm by doing a water change, a water change can certainly unstall a stalled cycle.