Fishless Cycling Problems

[tunerhead24]

Hi everyone. I'm at week 3 day 3 in my fishless cycling and for some reason I can't get the ammonia levels to reach 4-5 ppm! With the ammonia brand I'm using I measured 1/2 ml of ammonia will give me exacly 4 ppm per gallon, (correct me if I'm wrong) 27.5 ml will give me 4 ppm ammonia reading in a 55 gallon tank. So far the ammonia readings I'm getting are .5-1 ppm, I did seed the tank on week 2 but my nitrate levels stay at 0 ppm. I did a water test last night and the readings are

Ammonia .5-1 ppm

Nitrite 0 ppm

Nitrate 0 ppm

Thanks,
Manny

 

[OldMan47]

If the .5 ml value is right for 4 ppm, then the 27.5 ml number is also right. What does the 27.5 ml give you an hour after you first add it?
Do you have a lot of plants or very fast growing plants in the tank? If you do, they will eat some or all of your ammonia and make it hard to tell how the nitrite eating bacteria are doing.

 

[tunerhead24]

The ammonia levels don't change at all. And I have nothing in the tank but a heater and an air pump.

 

[tunerhead24]

Hey everyone I figured out why the ammonia levels never changed. The ammonia levels where way too high for the API test kit so i did a 100% water change but didn't change the water in the filter, after everything was set up again iI let the water cycle for about half an hour. I then checked my ammonia levels again and got 5 ppm !! Damn I'm really excited!! lol

 

[OldMan47]

It sounds like you are now on day 1 of your cycle then. The extreme concentration will have prevented any bacterial growth.

 

[Inchworm]

Hi tunerhead24

I see you live somewhere in Queens. If you can come out to Suffolk to pick it up, I can give you some mature filter floss to get you started. Send me a PM.

What kind of fish did you plan to have?

 

[tunerhead24]

Unfortunatly I am back to day one but I really want to take my time on this tank, when I first got my 20 gallon I didn't know anything about fishless cycling and I lost a bunch of fish. Inchworm Im planning on moving all my fish from my 20 gallon tank to the new 55 gallon. Right now I have 4 clown loach, 2 ballon mollies, 1 dalmation mollie, 1 dwarf guorami and 1 betta. Thank you for offering bacteria I do aprectiate it but I'm gonna try to reseed from my 20 gallon filter, hopefully it will work this time. Thanks again.