Please Reply, Need Advice!

[abih2005]

Hi - just tested my ammonia and nitrites, after adding 2ml of ammonia at 9 last night its now 0.50 and 0.25 respectively - please - do I need to change my water cos it's been like this for two weeks now, not moving - I cleaned the filter in tank water to see if that would help, should I prune some of the plants to reduce decomposition producs?

 

[abih2005]

Just taken out 9l of water and replaced with fresh dechlorinated water, water is absolutely cloudly with rubbish now...

 

[Twinklecaz]

What did you clean the filter with? Don't add anymore Ammonia until it drops to 0. 2 weeks isn't bad, my Ammonia didn't drop till 0 the first time for 24 days.

and don't worry about the cloudiness, it doesn't matter at this point because all you're doing is conditioning the filter.

 

[Harlequins]

You seem to be doing fine,the ammonia is processing into nitrites,you don't need to do w/c on fishless cycle unless your ph crashes below 6.

You are early days into your cycle,and are doing good for 2 weeks Average cycle is 4-6 weeks.

It can be frustrating when it doesn't move,only add ammonia when it returns to zero,then dose again,keep checking every 24 hrs,once you get the zero's in 24 hrs,then test every 12 hrs...i hope this makes sense
Hopefully once your ammonia zeros at 12 hours,Your nitrite will keep going up until it spikes,then will start dropping and eventually will clear to zero.

What is your ph?

Have you put up a daily log of your readings for 12 & 24hr stage?

 

[abih2005]

I've been waiting for ammonia to drop for 2 weeks, the nitrites are dropping to nil but not ammonia, been fishless cycling for almost 5 weeks now after having had fish in. Been posting stuff and not getting replies. I was recommended to buy a waterhome 9v light cos mine broke and nobody has offered to explain how to attach it so I'm a little frustrated that the initial interest in a newbie has dwindled leaving me feeling a bit at sea!!

 

[Harlequins]

What kit are you testing the water with?

Have you tested your water straight from the tap?

Hmm seems strange that the nitrite is moving but not the ammonia...but ammonia is converting into nitrite has its returning to zero.

Did you add ammonia before it reached 0 each time?

Now this may set the cycle back a day,but it might be worth giving your substrate a good vac,has you've had fish in there before it might have something decomposing food in there causing more ammonia being produced.

There's more knowledgeable peeps than me on cycling,i'm sure they'll be able to help more.

Has regarding your light,i haven't a clue sorry,might be worth posting on the hardware section...

 

[abih2005]

I'm testing with API, will suck up more water this afternoon.

 

[Twinklecaz]

I offered to help you about the light, I said I'd ask my Dad (who's an electrician) for you but you didn't seem like you were that bothered.

He said that if it's a brand new light fitting then you might be best to get it down professionally, he said it'll need screwing in prob in some kind of way (he knows nothing about fish tanks though, just electrics).

 

[waterdrop]

What kit are you testing the water with?

Have you tested your water straight from the tap?

Hmm seems strange that the nitrite is moving but not the ammonia...but ammonia is converting into nitrite has its returning to zero.

Did you add ammonia before it reached 0 each time?

Now this may set the cycle back a day,but it might be worth giving your substrate a good vac,has you've had fish in there before it might have something decomposing food in there causing more ammonia being produced.

There's more knowledgeable peeps than me on cycling,i'm sure they'll be able to help more.

Has regarding your light,i haven't a clue sorry,might be worth posting on the hardware section...

Give yourself more credit Harlequins! I think you know your cycling information pretty well! And I really like your suggestion about debris in the gravel possibly adding to the ammonia more than we'd normally see since there were previously fish in the tank -- excellent suggestion and a good reason for Abi to go ahead with a few extra gravel-vac-water-changes (with recharge of ammonia afterwards of course.) When you've had fish before you are not starting from scratch with the filter and so the ammonia processing bacteria may be smaller than the nitrite processing colony and the fishless cycling process itself will not exhibit the usual feedback we are used to.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[Harlequins]

What kit are you testing the water with?

Have you tested your water straight from the tap?

Hmm seems strange that the nitrite is moving but not the ammonia...but ammonia is converting into nitrite has its returning to zero.

Did you add ammonia before it reached 0 each time?

Now this may set the cycle back a day,but it might be worth giving your substrate a good vac,has you've had fish in there before it might have something decomposing food in there causing more ammonia being produced.

There's more knowledgeable peeps than me on cycling,i'm sure they'll be able to help more.

Has regarding your light,i haven't a clue sorry,might be worth posting on the hardware section...

Give yourself more credit Harlequins! I think you know your cycling information pretty well! And I really like your suggestion about debris in the gravel possibly adding to the ammonia more than we'd normally see since there were previously fish in the tank -- excellent suggestion and a good reason for Abi to go ahead with a few extra gravel-vac-water-changes (with recharge of ammonia afterwards of course.) When you've had fish before you are not starting from scratch with the filter and so the ammonia processing bacteria may be smaller than the nitrite processing colony and the fishless cycling process itself will not exhibit the usual feedback we are used to.

~~waterdrop~~

Thanks WD
I've only been taught(and still learning) what i know from this fab forum

 

[abih2005]

Heya - will start taking out water and sucking up debris, it's gone cloudy with the amount of muck stirred up from the previous change.

Sorry if you got the impression I wasn't bnothered about the light, my plants are wilting big time so I am very very very bothered I think I remember someone saying something about a bracket so I will have to root about the search machine on this site.

 

[Assaye]

With light fittings you generally need to bit the bullet, get them and see how they work when you have them in your hands. Isn't the waterhome a clip-on light?

 

[abih2005]

It has a bracket - the width of the screw fixtures is wider than the fixtures I've got already on the lid of the tank. It's an aldi lid so a whole dimension of frustration!!

 

[waterdrop]

OK, so Abi, of your 3 active threads, I'm going to comment in this one. It sounds like you've performed a couple of gravel-clean-water-changes. Harlequins and I are hoping that this will remove some possible sources of ammonia (additional ammonia beyond what you are putting in for the fishless cycle.) If you have dying plants, they can be another additional source of ammonia directly and if any of their plant parts break down and fall in to the substrate, that is part of what keeps that gravel ammonia source going (and messing up the clear test feedback process of the fishless cycle. ie. understanding your test results)

When we add water changing in to the fishless cycling process, we have to be more careful about declaring to ourselves that the fishless cycle process has completed and we are finished - the water changing can sometimes fool us. The answer to that is to always wait more days and keep testing and logging results to see if the good zeros keep repeating! And of course, in fishless cycling we always re-dose our ammonia back up to 4-5ppm once per 24 hours if the ammonia went to zero ppm within the previous 24 hours.

If I remember your case correctly, we expect to be pretty far along the cycling process because their were fish in there before, right? So maybe we will be seeing good signs of the filter getting close to qualifying as a full biofilter.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[abih2005]

It has taken just shy of 24 hours to get ammonia and nitrites down to 0ppm after dosing it to 4ppm yesterday at 8am.