Mid-Cycle And Confused - Please Advise

Meep

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Hi, Think i've gone wrong really hoping someone can please advise me.
 
Added first ammount and it took ten days to drop down.
Day10 - Added same full amount of ammonia
Day 12 - Ammonia had dropped to 0.50ppm and Nitrite was 5ppm (or over) with Nitrate showing.
 
I was reading about snack feeding and got confused (was thinking it as two full ammonia then wait for the levels to drop and snack feed) think I've messed up by not adding ammonia at this point?  So will the cycling continue if I add full ammonia today - day14 or have I killed the process?
 
 
 
 
Hi there, no you haven't messed anything up at all.
 
So i'm right in thinking you have added two full amounts of ammonia to get approx 3ppm Ammonia? and it has now dropped down to 0.5PPM.. You're on the right track.
 
You're now waiting for Nitrite to drop.
 
When you get two 0ppm readings of Ammonia in a row.. Use the calculator on this site to work out 1/3 of the amount (or simply just divide full amount by 3!!! Lol
 
Do this till you see Nitrite drop to 0ppm..
 
Hope this helps and makes sense...
 
THANK YOU thats a big relief.
I just re-read the faq and had gotten myself tangled up and worried.
 
Yes I've added the full amount twice.  So I am waiting for 0ppm and to snack feed.
 
The other thing that confused me (many years since I did any science) is the two consequative readings needed.  If I test today and get 0ppm and don't add ammonia then doesn't that guarentee that my next ammonia reading would have to be 0ppm also?
 
So once started I just keep with the 'snack feeding' and watch for the Nitrite to drop.  That's a big help.
 
I'm no science expert but I believe by the end, when the cycle is complete, the processing of Ammonia is constant so in a sense never shows. The bacteria process it through the Nitrogen Cycle. So in answer to your question - i believe yes that's right, you wont see any ammonia after a 0 reading if no more is added.
I think its more of a time indicator as to when to add more ammonia. Adding too much could stall the cycle.. So in TTA's article, he uses it as a timescale.
 
 
When the nitrites come down to 0ppm and you move to the next stage (adding full dose again) you will start to see the full cycle in all it's wonder processing 3ppm of Ammonia without any worries!
 
Thanks - its good to know I'm on track, I got rather over excited the first time the ammonia levels dropped.
 
Meep said:
Thanks - its good to know I'm on track, I got rather over excited the first time the ammonia levels dropped.
 
Yes I got exactly the same way too. However, the Bitrite dropping takes a lot longer than the ammonia. The bacteria take longer to multiply and establish I believe.
 
Stay patient and dont worry if there are periods of very little change. It happens and is the norm. Have you raised the temperature of the water slightly too? Quote:
 
"Besides the ammonia or nitrite, the bacteria need oxygen and inorganic carbon as well as a proper temperature. While they can survive from just above freezing to about 42C (108 F), they do best between about 75F and 85F. Lastly, the ammonia converting bacteria do not function as well the lower the pH gets. If your pH drops under 7.0, they start to slow their activity markedly and under 6.5, they slow dramatically and by about 6.0 they will appear to stop completely."
 
 
During cycle I had mine up at 83 degrees F. Mine took 4 weeks 3 days i think to cycle fully.
 
The last dose is just a "to make sure" dose.  Your bacteria should be so well established, that when you dose the 3ppm ammonia, by the next day it should have processed every bit of it.
 
For most first or second time cyclers the most common cause if problems is from nitrites going to high. This happens because too much ammonia is going in. People either add too much or too often or even both. And the tank appears to handle this ammonia. But it is what one cannot see that us going to cause the cycle to stall or even crash- high nitrite.
 
Most filks are using API kits or ones which read the same scale but which top out anywhere from 5 ppm to 10 ppm. The problem is that the level on such tests where nitrite is a real problem would be just over 16 ppm. Allowing for test kit error etc i like to back tat red line down to 15 ppm. But how can you know if you are near 15 ppm if you kits doesnt go over 5 or 10? There are ways to due diluted testing, but this makes things more complicated for new fish keepers.
 
As a result, I designed the method now in place here to prevent this. The amounts and timings for ammonia additions, when followed, make it impossible for one to have nitrite issues even when they might be off the scale of one;s test kit. One of the methods intended to prevent such problems is the need for 2 consecutive 0 ammonia readings. At that point of your cycle it means somewhere between 2 and 3 days must pass before the ammonia is added. That is that much more time that the nitrite colonies have to reproduce and grow which means they are converting nitrite during that time and at an increasing rate. The two consecutive 0 readings are another form of safety net in terms of preventing issues,
 
The thing that many folks do not know about is how hardy the bacteria are when they establish in their bio-film. The can go without ammonia for some time without suffereing. But, in those cases where there might be some loss of the ammonia bacs because the nitrite ones are dragging, the final additions near the end of the cycle done at 3 ppm levels will very rapidly get the ammonia bacteria up to full strength again. We are talking a day or two at the most.
 
The hardest parts of the cycle are the earlier ones. That is because the rate at which a colony expands accelerates as it progresses, it takes much longer for the 1st ppm of 3 to be processed than it does for the last ppm. The reasons is simple, there are many more bacteria to consume that last ppm than there were the first ppm. That is why the first 3 ppm addition takes longer to drop to 0 than the second one and the end of cycle additions drop even faster with it finally taking 24 hours or less to hit 0.
 
The nice part of all this is the bio-chemistry involved. If one could add ammonia but have it 100% converted to nitrite for which there was not a single bacteria present to handle, exactly how much nitrite than can make. 1 ppm of ammonia will become 2.55 ppm of nitrite (on API type kits), so adding 3 ppm of ammonia can only create a maximum of 7.65 ppm. Given there are two ammonia doses to 3 ppm, that might make a max of 15.3 ppm of nitrite. But because the second addition can not be made unless some nitrites are present and at a level easy to detect, there odds are very good there some processing capacity for nitrite at work. This means there is almost no chance that nitrite can reach danger levels that one cannot see when the snack dose is added. Think of it as a bridge between the second 3 ppm addition and the next one that happens near the final days of the cycle. And that is why I used the term snack. it is to insure the ammonia bacs do not go overly long without any ammonia. However, it also means the snack addition will not create a nitrite problem.
 
The real challenge in creating a cycling regimen that will pretty much work for anybody using it is that no two tanks are exactly alike. Different tap water, different tank contents, different mistakes folks may make all factor into it. So the method has some tolerances built into it which are there to prevent the serious type problems one used to see on the site when ammonia dosing was done at much higher levels and usually more often.
 
I hope this has made things a bit clearer and easier to understand.
 
ADW1988 said:
 
During cycle I had mine up at 83 degrees F. Mine took 4 weeks 3 days i think to cycle fully.
 
I've got mine at 28C - I'll up the temp a bit, thanks.
 
TwoTankAmin said:
The thing that many folks do not know about is how hardy the bacteria are when they establish in their bio-film.
 
I hope this has made things a bit clearer and easier to understand.
I certainly didn't! I was thinking the bacteria would need a constant presence of ammonia - thats very good to know.
 
YES - Thats very informative and helpful, thank you for taking the time to explain so thouraghly and for your original instruction post which is the clearest explanation I've found - the confusion is largely down to me being a total noobie and anxious to do this right ;)
ech0o said:
The last dose is just a "to make sure" dose.  Your bacteria should be so well established, that when you dose the 3ppm ammonia, by the next day it should have processed every bit of it.
..And then Fishies - I'm looking forward to that :D
Its an interesting process and doing the tests/waiting is a big eye opener to what the fish deal with through the more common fish-in cycle.
 
Well the fish have it worse. When we do a fishless cycle we control exactly how much ammonia is going into the tank and when. When using fish you have no real control except for the number and size of the fish. The problem is we can add 3 ppm of ammonia for the bacteria but at that level many fish would be in trouble.
 
TwoTankAmin said:
Well the fish have it worse. When we do a fishless cycle we control exactly how much ammonia is going into the tank and when. When using fish you have no real control except for the number and size of the fish. The problem is we can add 3 ppm of ammonia for the bacteria but at that level many fish would be in trouble.
I'm relieved I decided to check online before buying a tank, this is the first place I learnt about the fishless cycle and the alternatives sound cruel.
 

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