Ammonia not going down as fast as it used to

[TissueTenant]

I tested the tap water that sat for 24 hours and the results were basically the same, other than half the hardness indicator turned a bit orange, so it might be somewhere between 0-25ppm?
I ordered some Gh+ stuff since there was none at my LFS, so hopefully that should help!

 

[TissueTenant]

Just checked again, ammonia is still at 2ppm Hasn't gone down at all in nearly a week now...

 

[TwoTankAmin]

Well it may be time to throw up your hands and do a reset.

Do as big a water change as you can. Refill the tank and if you can find dechlor that does not claim to detox ammonia, use that. Wait for the Equilibrium to arrive. You do not need a lot. But you can test to see what you added using the GH kit. Then test you tank for KH and pH and all three nitrogen compounds and record them.

Not add ammonia to produce 3 ppm and begin to test at 24 hour intervals and record and report all your numbers here. The key to understanding cycling is that it is a process that should follow a specific course. That is, it goes step by step. When things go offtrack knowing all the info on readings and other parameters like temp/GH/KH/pH makes it possible to see where things went off track and, usually, why.

It is easy to see that a cycle is stalled but figuring out why requires having all the data that led up to it. The single greatest cause of stalling a cycle is too much nitrite. The problem is that the concentration of this on an API style test kit is 16.4 ppm. But most hobby kits do not go anywhere near that number. This means one has to do diluted testing. For new to the hobby folks this should be avoided.

So, the fishless cycling method on this site was designed such that, if followed to the letter, it is impossible to produce too much nitrite and diluted testing is never needed.

Doing a reset is one way out of a problem whose cause we cannot determine to the extent we can fix the problem easily. A reset backs things up some but it also allows us to get a better understanding of where things really stand. The reset does not kill any bacteria established thus far.

 

[TissueTenant]

Okay! I did a roughly 60-70% water change just now, then added a half dose of ammonia so we'll see where it goes up to in a while once the water has moved around a bit I guess. I've been following these instructions:

Simplified Fishless Cycling Instructions

So the main sticky for Fishless cycling is great but it suffers a little from information overload and that makes it hard for some to follow the instructions. I thought I would have a go at a "condensed" version. This is in no way meant to replace the original instructions but just act as a...

www.fishforums.net

And got to the point where I was waiting for ammonia to fall before adding the snack dose, which is where it got stuck. Hopefully this helps things along! Gh+ and API test kit should be here in a couple more days, though. I'll update with testing numbers along the way!

 

[Essjay]

That is the simplified version of TwoTankAmin's method. His article goes into more detail than the one you have been following, which was written as a summary of TTA's article.

 

[TissueTenant]

Master test kit came today! I tested and got
pH: 6.4 (yikes)
Ammonia: 3ppm
Nitrite: 0ppm
Nitrate: 5ppm

So I guess low pH is going to be a bit of a problem? I did that big water change yesterday, but it's been almost 24 hours so I'm not sure if it's testing low because it hasn't sat long enough, or if it's really that bad haha.

 

[seangee]

Master test kit came today! I tested and got
pH: 6.4 (yikes)
Ammonia: 3ppm
Nitrite: 0ppm
Nitrate: 5ppm

So I guess low pH is going to be a bit of a problem? I did that big water change yesterday, but it's been almost 24 hours so I'm not sure if it's testing low because it hasn't sat long enough, or if it's really that bad haha.

SInce you are planning to keep soft water fish this is really not a problem.
If your pH is 6.4 your tank will likely never cycle (at least not fully) but...
The ammonia you are reading is actually ammonium which is not harmful to fish, but you don't want it to go up forever so add plants to use it, fast growers and floating plants are ideal
Once the plants are actively growing (i.e. you see visible new growth) add fish
Don't forget regular water changes

Here is an old pic of my 20G with plenty of ember tetras I mentioned - this tank has a pH of around 5 and the filter has never cycled. No current pics because I did some serious pruning and replanting today so it looks a bit of a mess at the mo.

FWIW this is what it looked like when I added the first lot of fish - the stuff floating on top was amazon frogbit - the bag of media (from another less acidic tank) was an attempt to introduce some bacteria but it failed.

I am not going to try to count the fish - but there are way more now than I bought

 

[TissueTenant]

SInce you are planning to keep soft water fish this is really not a problem.
If your pH is 6.4 your tank will likely never cycle (at least not fully) but...
The ammonia you are reading is actually ammonium which is not harmful to fish, but you don't want it to go up forever so add plants to use it, fast growers and floating plants are ideal
Once the plants are actively growing (i.e. you see visible new growth) add fish
Don't forget regular water changes

Here is an old pic of my 20G with plenty of ember tetras I mentioned - this tank has a pH of around 5 and the filter has never cycled. No current pics because I did some serious pruning and replanting today so it looks a bit of a mess at the mo.

FWIW this is what it looked like when I added the first lot of fish - the stuff floating on top was amazon frogbit - the bag of media (from another less acidic tank) was an attempt to introduce some bacteria but it failed.

I am not going to try to count the fish - but there are way more now than I bought

How do you do water changes without causing a big pH fluctuation when your tank pH is so low? Just curious

 

[FishAddict74]

Hello! I got a 20 gallon tank for christmas and I've been cycling it since then. The timeline has been like so:

December 25th: set up tank, added 64 drops of Dr. Tim's ammonia (about 3ppm)

December 31st: Ammonia was at 0.5ppm, nitrite at ~3ppm, nitrate test had a bit of colour but not up to where the thing starts counting yet. Added 64 more drops of ammonia (up to 3.5ppm)

January 2nd: Ammonia at 2ppm, nitrite at ~5ppm, nitrate still just slightly coloured.

It's now January 4th and the ammonia is still at 2ppm.


I'm wondering why the ammonia was converted so fast at the start, but now it's hanging at 2ppm? My other parameters are:
pH: 7.5
Alkalinity: 300ppm
Hardness: 0ppm
Temperature: 82 degrees

I haven't added any chemicals or anything other than dechlorinator when I add more water. I've added some more plants over the course of the cycling, as well, but those should make the ammonia go down faster if anything, right? I have the light on for 8 hours per day, and the rest is spent in darkness since I've heard the bacteria are photophobic.
Am I doing something wrong? Why is it stalling like this? Should I be doing something different? Thanks in advance!

You’re really cycling your tank the hard way lol. Just get some quality bottled bacteria and a little bit of cycled media from a trusted source and you can immediately start stocking lightly. I cycle my tanks in a day or two this way

 

[TissueTenant]

Tests as of today:
Ammonia 1ppm, Nitrite 5ppm, Nitrate 20ppm, pH 7.6

Looks like I'm back on track! Hopefully it stays that way!

 

[Essjay]

Be sure not to add too much ammonia. See TwoTankAmin's comments in post #18.