Help Cycle Halted?

[freyathemermaid]

hey

i wonder if anyone knows what happened and what do i do next,

been fish less cycling for about 4 weeks

got the ammonia dropping from 4ppm to 0 in 12 - 24 hours which seemed good

nitrites got to 2 but didnt see a spike then dropped to 1ppm

nitrates when to 80

now amonnia not dropping over 48 hours

i've not done anything different or changed water

any ideas?

 

[waterdrop]

Hi there derby,

Is it possible you are just at the nitrite spike stage? rdd1952 says that it often takes about twice as long for the second type of good bacteria to be established (its still early here in north carolina so he may still be making his coffee ) .. so maybe you just have the bad luck of a slow cycle process. If that is the case, seems like you should simply continue along keeping the ammonia up to 4ppm and doing ammonia, nitrite and nitrate tests. Hopefully its not the case that your bacteria got killed off somehow.

Anyway, hopefully one of the cycling experts like rdd will be along soon to ask you more questions!
~~waterdrop~~

 

[backtotropical]

Hi there derby,

Is it possible you are just at the nitrite spike stage? rdd1952 says that it often takes about twice as long for the second type of good bacteria to be established (its still early here in north carolina so he may still be making his coffee ) .. so maybe you just have the bad luck of a slow cycle process. If that is the case, seems like you should simply continue along keeping the ammonia up to 4ppm and doing ammonia, nitrite and nitrate tests. Hopefully its not the case that your bacteria got killed off somehow.

Anyway, hopefully one of the cycling experts like rdd will be along soon to ask you more questions!
~~waterdrop~~

I don't think this will be the case. The nitrite spike will usually take around twice as long to be processed, but the ammonia processing shouldn't slow down during this time. The ammonia processing should be constant and therefore send the nitrite through the roof. The fact that the ammonia processing has slowed definitely indicates a problem.

What is your pH Freya? Whilst cycling the pH can tend to fluctuate a lot because of all the activity in the filter and all the ammonia in the tank. If it drops down below 6.0(ish), that can stall the cycle as the bacteria don't like it.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

i'm with back to tropical on this, the ammonia shouldn't slow down like that.

do check the ph and tell us, after you've tested do a big (75%) water change, this usually kick starts a stalled cycle

 

[waterdrop]

See, I told you the experts would be along in a bit! Now I'm interested to hear your pH too.

Question to BTT & Wig: Is pH then a good 2nd/3rd test to be doing along with NH3 (& NO2 as spike time nears and passes) so that you can see a trend like this developing?

Does it help to do one or the other of the hardness tests in addition to pH during these stages?

(assumption here is that we're all discussing the "Add and Wait" method, right?)

~~waterdrop~~

 

[Miss Wiggle]

See, I told you the experts would be along in a bit! Now I'm interested to hear your pH too.

Question to BTT & Wig: Is pH then a good 2nd/3rd test to be doing along with NH3 (& NO2 as spike time nears and passes) so that you can see a trend like this developing?

Does it help to do one or the other of the hardness tests in addition to pH during these stages?

(assumption here is that we're all discussing the "Add and Wait" method, right?)

~~waterdrop~~

yes, monitoring the pH while cycling is a v v v good idea. if the cycle stalls because of low pH and you don't notice for a day or two your bacteria could die off altogether and you have to start again. Not definiate but it is possible.

if pH drops below 7 i'd advise a big water change to bring it back up.

I don't think it's nescessary to monitor other hardness levels (there is always some benefit to monitoring anything purely to get a better understanding of the chemical make up of your water if nothing else) i don't think they inhibit bacteria growth in the same way as pH does. May be wrong though, i'm not that good with hardness

 

[backtotropical]

See, I told you the experts would be along in a bit! Now I'm interested to hear your pH too.

Question to BTT & Wig: Is pH then a good 2nd/3rd test to be doing along with NH3 (& NO2 as spike time nears and passes) so that you can see a trend like this developing?

Does it help to do one or the other of the hardness tests in addition to pH during these stages?

(assumption here is that we're all discussing the "Add and Wait" method, right?)

~~waterdrop~~

yes, monitoring the pH while cycling is a v v v good idea. if the cycle stalls because of low pH and you don't notice for a day or two your bacteria could die off altogether and you have to start again. Not definiate but it is possible.

if pH drops below 7 i'd advise a big water change to bring it back up.

I don't think it's nescessary to monitor other hardness levels (there is always some benefit to monitoring anything purely to get a better understanding of the chemical make up of your water if nothing else) i don't think they inhibit bacteria growth in the same way as pH does. May be wrong though, i'm not that good with hardness

I agree about monitoring pH. It can be the difference between a successful and an unsuccessful cycle.

Testing hardness isn't really required whilst cycling. Although that said, the kH of the water buffers the pH (keeps it stable, ie. anything added to the water is less likely to be able to change the pH) so water with a high kH is less likely to suffer a pH crash which could stall the cycle. You could test kH whilst cycling on this basis, but it's probably overkill unless you are having serious problems with the pH dropping.

If it was the case that the pH kept dropping because of a low kH, a simple handful of coral gravel should sort it out.

Cheers

BTT

 

[waterdrop]

I was remembering some distant thread about how hardness can effect the pH, so it was secondary to the matter at hand and probably unnecessary strictly for cycling. Hardness, though, seemed like a good thing to get a feel for in the newbie/new tank situation because of plants (assuming one wants to have live plants as well as fish.)

(well, my thinking that knowing hardness levels is helpful re plants is just another vague general impression from a newbie attempting to absorb a lot of planted tank articles and I still couldn't give a good reason for my impression... anyone?)

~~waterdrop~~

 

[Squid]

i'm with back to tropical on this, the ammonia shouldn't slow down like that.

do check the ph and tell us, after you've tested do a big (75%) water change, this usually kick starts a stalled cycle

I had this exact issue, and an 80% waterchange did the job for me.. The high nitrate levels (probably amongst other things) affected the KH, which crashed, and this caused the PH to drop dramatically too. This happened twice.

I found that after the water change, the ammonia munching crew picked up to where they used to be pretty quickly. It was more of a stalling that going in reverse..

Squid

 

[freyathemermaid]

thanks all for the quick feedback

i'll do a PH test tonight and go from there

cheers

FTM

 

[backtotropical]

Did you manage to get a pH reading yet?

 

[waterdrop]

we lost her, the fog moved down from Scotland to Derby

 

[freyathemermaid]

Hi fish fans

not lost just misplaced, busy day yesterday

tested PH

dropped to 6.6 i think cant remember off hand

did big water change

tested this morning PH up to 7 , ammonia dropped so looks like things are moving again

do i need to do another water change to get PH higher or wait to see if drops again?

Thanks again for your help, you guys/ girls are great


The other thing i probably should introduce myself to clear something up

i'm freya's dad, (Freya the mermaid was her favourite book when younger)

the tank was a Christmas presssie for her and her brother,

but i'm loving finding out more about this hobby and passing it on to them,

they cant wait to get some fish, but understand they must wait


cheers

FTM

 

[Miss Wiggle]

awww cute story freya's dad.... whats your real name?

you should monitor the pH daily, if it starts to drop again then do another water change

 

[backtotropical]

The other thing i probably should introduce myself to clear something up

i'm freya's dad, (Freya the mermaid was her favourite book when younger)

Sorry, i've been calling you Freya. Oops!