Karawr - Fishless Cycle

[BIG BAD BARRY]

You dont have any readings for nitrite or ph?


You can re-dose at 0.25.

If your nitrite is still 5ppm
Try a 100% gravel vac water change.
Make sure the water is as close to the temp (29c) when you add it back and dechlorinate it.

Re-dose ammonia 2-3ppm and continue testing.


Do you have an open tank? Are you topping off due to evaporation?
How often are you doing this?

 

[karawr]

I'll do nitrite/pH reading today.

Yes my tank is open. I don't top it up very often because I want a low water level to create more agitation + oxygen... Maybe once every 2 weeks?

Edit:

pH 7.4 - It's dropped!
Nitrite 0.25 - FINALLY!
Ammonia 0ppm - yusss, took long enough for it to get there lol.

I wasn't doing nitrite tests cause I wanna conserve these tests... very expensive in Canada like $40 bucks. I knew it would take awhile to drop so was only gonna do a nitrite test every couple of days. This is such a happy surprise.

 

[BIG BAD BARRY]

Just keep an eye on your ph.
Your ph and nitrite will last The only thing to bear in mind is the shelf life of each of the testing liquids. Once opened they have a limited effective shelf life and each one is different. There is a post somewhere on the forum giving exact details. I think it is linked to the printed number on the bottles.

Doing a water change is still an option to you at this stage and you may need to do one anyway if your ph starts slipping.

The thing you have to bear in mind about evaporation is that it leaves the minerals behind. So if you water is hard and you keeping adding without changing the water then the water in the tank gets harder and vice versa. Should not be an issue at the moment and when you have fish in there you will be changing the water regularly so i would not worry.

 

[karawr]

I'll do a water change this weekend just in case. Nitrite's gone up:
Nitrite 1.0ppm
Ammonia 2.0ppm

 

[waterdrop]

This fishless cycle looks to be coming along fine. It's fine for the ammonia level to sit at zero ppm the better part of a day as long as it then gets re-dosed once the 24-hour mark rolls around. Dosing at a fairly fixed hour of the day helps a lot with interpretation of the final levels you record, they then are more comparable to each other (ie. more likely due to what the bacteria are doing rather than just a reflection of your random dosing timings.)

This looks to be good timing with the end of your exams. Now you can focus on your timing and testing a tad more and that will be more helpful nearer the end of the fishless cycle when the process needs it more anyway.

By getting the dose more up to 4ppm concentration, you will ensure that a larger pair of more robust colonies (both the ammonia oxidizing bacteria (A-Bacs) and the nitrite oxidizing bacteria (N-Bacs)) will be present when the artificial ammonia dosing is removed at the end of fishless cycling. Its important for the colonies to be very robust at that point regardless of the initial stocking level of the fish.

Besides getting the dosing level up there at 4 or even 5ppm, the other major thing that ensures robust colonies is that you test that they can drop that ammonia concentration to zero ppm within 12 hours instead of 24 hours. It's a big difference and once it first does it at 12 hours then we like to watch it "qualify" by repeating that for a week. This makes for a rock-solid transition to fish.

Good luck and keep up the good log. Nice that BBB has got you doing that. Watch out for pH crashes (down to low 6's is a crash.)

~~waterdrop~~

 

[karawr]

Does that mean I'm supposed to be dosing 4ppm now? I thought I was still in the 2~3ppm stage because my nitrite has yet to drop to zero.

pH is still 7.4.... but I did a 50% water change yesterday anyways. If I see it dropping more I'll do a 90%...
Redosed ammonia 2ppm and nitrite is still 1ppm.

 

[BIG BAD BARRY]

I think Waterdrop was preparing you for the next phase.
Hopefully the water change will give it a kick.

 

[waterdrop]

Partial water changes have little meaning in fishless cycling (the partial water change is all about controlling the amount of change to fish.) If one bothers to get out the equipment and change water during a fishless cycle it might as well be total so that you get a little more of the trace minerals in there and perhaps make a bigger change to pH.

Dosing amount is a very subtle tweak, not something that has much effect unless done over a significant period of time, so as long as one understands not to dose up at 8ppm things will be ok in the long run. We don't want the business of tweaking it down to 2-3ppm to start to sound like a necessity, it's just a tweak we hope will keep the overall nitrogen lower over the long middle phase. An extra water change or two later on would probably easily accomplish the same thing.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[karawr]

Nitrate is 5.0ppm. Shouldn't I have more at this stage?

Nitrite still hasn't dropped to zero... pH is stable.

 

[karawr]

I'm assuming this is taking so bloody long because I can't get my temp up. I bought a fluval m100 (good for 30gals) and it's 100W. I don't know anything about heaters but figured it would be good since mine is 20g. Well I have it up to 30C on the dial but I'm only getting readings of like 22C.

 

[eaglesaquarium]

I'm assuming this is taking so bloody long because I can't get my temp up. I bought a fluval m100 (good for 30gals) and it's 100W. I don't know anything about heaters but figured it would be good since mine is 20g. Well I have it up to 30C on the dial but I'm only getting readings of like 22C.

How is the water flow? Could it be that the water isn't circulating very far and is heating unevenly? What does the temp read right next to the heater? Could the heater be busted?


I am just throwing things out there...

Is this the heater you bought? Fluval M I hope not, because this is the one I just ordered (but 200W)!

 

[karawr]

I'm assuming this is taking so bloody long because I can't get my temp up. I bought a fluval m100 (good for 30gals) and it's 100W. I don't know anything about heaters but figured it would be good since mine is 20g. Well I have it up to 30C on the dial but I'm only getting readings of like 22C.

How is the water flow? Could it be that the water isn't circulating very far and is heating unevenly? What does the temp read right next to the heater? Could the heater be busted?


I am just throwing things out there...

Is this the heater you bought? Fluval M I hope not, because this is the one I just ordered (but 200W)!

Yep that's the heater I bought... Fluval M series.

Water flow is good I think. I keep water levels low for lots of agitation... I really hope the heater's not busted. I bought it a month ago. I just did a reading right next to it, not that much different. I think I'm going to message fluval. After all, 3 year warranty.

 

[eaglesaquarium]

I'm assuming this is taking so bloody long because I can't get my temp up. I bought a fluval m100 (good for 30gals) and it's 100W. I don't know anything about heaters but figured it would be good since mine is 20g. Well I have it up to 30C on the dial but I'm only getting readings of like 22C.

How is the water flow? Could it be that the water isn't circulating very far and is heating unevenly? What does the temp read right next to the heater? Could the heater be busted?


I am just throwing things out there...

Is this the heater you bought? Fluval M I hope not, because this is the one I just ordered (but 200W)!

Yep that's the heater I bought... Fluval M series.

Water flow is good I think. I keep water levels low for lots of agitation... I really hope the heater's not busted. I bought it a month ago. I just did a reading right next to it, not that much different. I think I'm going to message fluval. After all, 3 year warranty.

My heater is due to arrive tomorrow... I really hope that this is just an anomaly and not the norm with those heaters. I'd be ticked if I had a problem with mine. (Probably about the same as you are!)

 

[karawr]

I decided I'm going to return my Fluval M100 heater tomorrow and maybe get another brand.

Contacted Fluval they said to either put it on a slant or return it. Slanting it didn't work, so...

 

[Gelt]

sorry to hear the M series not working out for you, i have the M150 and its no problem..they are very sensitive but good heaters as a whole, mine is set to 24.2C , i now only get fluctuations of .2 degrees either side.

what new heater are you getting?

G