Wierd Fishless Cycling 4-5days In..

[HasGills]

Ok.. started cycling my first tank 5 days ago. The tank is a 190L (50Gallon) with fine gravel substrate, 2 x medium size pieces of drift wood and 1 rock. I also have several plants ranging from Java Moss, Corkscrew Val, and 2 other that I dont know the name of..

I already had "Cycle" in the tank when I ready about "fishless cycling" being the best solution. So I purchased ammonia and set the ammonia levels to around 4ppm. PH when crazy from 7 - off the chart the first day.. Everything settled down fine for the next few days.. Yesterday Ammonia dropped to 2pmm, checked nitrite = 0, nitrate = 0 and PH back to 7..

Ok.. here is the strange part today I test the tank ammonia is still at 2ppm, nitrite= 0, but i have somewhere between 5-10ppm nitrate.. I ran the test a 2nd time to make sure i didnt screw up.. some result..

Is this normal? this is not how the articles describe the process.. Shouldnt I have nitrites before nitrates?

What should I do? start again? leave it and see what happens?

Cheers
HasGills

 

[scubadoo]

Your water will have nitrates in it straight from the tap.
Its usually a good idea to test your water straight from the tap so you know what you're starting with.
In some areas nitrates can be as high as 40 ppm in the tap.

Dont worry and keep going.

You can up your ammonia back to 4ppm and keep testing.


Also, you dont really need to be testing your nitrate levels until you've experienced a nitrite spike unless you want to.
And further, take the readings from your nitrate test with a little pinch of salt, they are notoriously unreliable - you can read about a test that was done on the PFK website where they compared different test kits to a proper lab analysis - I dont think any of the kits got the reading correct, but they did get the general trend.

 

[HasGills]

Hmm.. Before I began filling the tank I did a test on the tap water - results:
pH: 7.2, Nitrite 0, Nitrate 0, Gh 4 and Kh 3.
Added some tap water conditioner and "tropical" conditioner (increases gH and adds other minerals).

Ill see what happens over the next day or two.. If i continue to get nitrates readings and no nitrite ill empty the tank and start again..

 

[Cheffi]

Hmm.. Before I began filling the tank I did a test on the tap water - results:
pH: 7.2, Nitrite 0, Nitrate 0, Gh 4 and Kh 3.
Added some tap water conditioner and "tropical" conditioner (increases gH and adds other minerals).

Ill see what happens over the next day or two.. If i continue to get nitrates readings and no nitrite ill empty the tank and start again..

Hi I would guess that your initial test on nitrates did not give you the correct reading. I believe everyone has nitrates to some part in their tapwater. You need to concentrate on your ammonia and nitrite readings for now. At the end of the cycle your nitrates will probably we closer to off the scale.

 

[HasGills]

Your right.. I checked the tap water and it did register a small amount of nitrate..

The good news is today I have my first nitrite reading = 0.25ppm.. Im happy now as I know the cycle process is working.. Now ill relax and wait..

Cheers
HasGills

 

[Creature Seeker]

Think your meant to leave your tap water sitting for an hour before testing it.

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