First Few Days Into Cycle

[curlyriff]

Morning all,

only recieved the API master test kit yesterday and my results were as follows.

5.0ppm Ammonia, 5.0ppm nitrite, 40ppm nitrate, 7.6PH (Tested with low first off scale, then with the high PH) which is consitant to my tap water. My tank conditions are. No light from bulbs (always off while I cycle). Heater on or around 28/29 degree cel. constantly. I also have a blanket over it becuase I have no blinds in this room at moment (new flat).

I have shacked and hit every bottle on the surface to make sure they are mixed proberly and repeted the test with same/similar results an hour later.

Can anyone explain this as I have no idea. I haven't seen these sorts of results before when reading through anyone elses.

On another point the rocks and the plastic plants came from another established tank but I would have thought that they would change the readings that much.

I have also credone the test earlier today with same results or similar.

Kind Regards,

Adam

 

[OldMan47]

The readings are fine if you have some nitrate in your tap water as so many of us do. It is not impossible to get a start from moving ornaments but you often do not get much that way. That could explain the nitrites in such a short time but would be worth monitoring for a while to see if anything really is going on there.

 

[curlyriff]

The readings are fine if you have some nitrate in your tap water as so many of us do. It is not impossible to get a start from moving ornaments but you often do not get much that way. That could explain the nitrites in such a short time but would be worth monitoring for a while to see if anything really is going on there.

Cheers OM,

I will just keep an eye on it and test it every 24 hours then to see how it is over the next week or so. I will keep notes and let you guys see what is happening so I can understand how it has so quickly got to these level readings.

Kind Regards,

Adam

 

[waterdrop]

If you want to have better baseline info in your aquarium notebook you could do two jar tests: tap water jar tested right out of tap, then at 24hrs, 48 hrs. jar with substrate tested at same times. Not saying you have any problem to check, just that its interesting to have if you're curious. WD

 

[curlyriff]

If you want to have better baseline info in your aquarium notebook you could do two jar tests: tap water jar tested right out of tap, then at 24hrs, 48 hrs. jar with substrate tested at same times. Not saying you have any problem to check, just that its interesting to have if you're curious. WD

Cheers WD will try that just to see, I am hoping I just have a small boost cause of stuff that was in the tank to start. But as said will keep you all updated as well.

If this is the case hopefully I can knock a week or so off my cycle. Which is good cause I am so impatient about things.

Kind Regards,

Adam

 

[curlyriff]

Afternoon,

I have tested my water yesterday for all the parameters that the fish tank is tested with.

My results came back for my tap water as 0.0ppm ammonia, 0.0ppm Nitrate, 0.0ppm Nitrite & 7.8PH

I did a 25% water change.

My tank water today came back as having almost 8.0ppm for ammonia (I haven't added any ammonia since sunday).

My Nitrate is well over 100ppm and my Nitrite is over 5.0ppm

Any help trying to understand all my results so far. They do not seem to tally to anything that should be happening.

Kind Regards,

Adam

 

[OldMan47]

I hope you are not adding any ammonia. You need to do a water change big enough to get that ammonia under 5 ppm for a fishless cycle. At 5 ppm the right bacteria will develop in your filter. At 8 ppm, the wrong bacteria will dominate the bacterial colony in the filter so values that high are counter-productive.

 

[curlyriff]

I hope you are not adding any ammonia. You need to do a water change big enough to get that ammonia under 5 ppm for a fishless cycle. At 5 ppm the right bacteria will develop in your filter. At 8 ppm, the wrong bacteria will dominate the bacterial colony in the filter so values that high are counter-productive.

I am not adding any ammonia and the Aqua plus doesn't contain any when I am putting in new water but I can't understand why I have a higher reading when I know I only put in 5.0ppm of ammonia to start with. I can't see where the other 3.0ppm has come from and the other results don't even make sense.

Something is fundamentally wrong with the tank and I can't see what.

Can one of the moderaters maybe merge my two posts together so that all the information is in one place.

I know WD is replying in the other post but might have missed this one when I started the cycle topic seperatly.

Thanks for all your time so far.

Kind Regards,

Adam

 

[waterdrop]

Yes, I've just commented in the other thread. Reading this thread it occurs to me to ask how you are arriving at the number of milliliters of ammonia to dose to get the 5ppm? One can't just use the calculator necessarily because it assumes the labeled concentration of ammonia in your source bottle stays the same over time, which of course it does not, since its naturally a gas. In practice we actually don't find it ever seems to be far off but as a conservative measure I often recommend that people come in a little lower than what the calculator suggests and then "test their way up" until they arrive at a color that seems to match the 4ppm or so pretty closely.

Actually, I think my suggestion to just go bare tank that I made in the other thread will be the thing that will get you a new stage of insight hopefully.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[curlyriff]

Yes, I've just commented in the other thread. Reading this thread it occurs to me to ask how you are arriving at the number of milliliters of ammonia to dose to get the 5ppm? One can't just use the calculator necessarily because it assumes the labeled concentration of ammonia in your source bottle stays the same over time, which of course it does not, since its naturally a gas. In practice we actually don't find it ever seems to be far off but as a conservative measure I often recommend that people come in a little lower than what the calculator suggests and then "test their way up" until they arrive at a color that seems to match the 4ppm or so pretty closely.

Actually, I think my suggestion to just go bare tank that I made in the other thread will be the thing that will get you a new stage of insight hopefully.

~~waterdrop~~

Thanks WD,

Yeah I will do what you have said to see as I can't make heads or tails of the results. I did use the calculator and then took a little off. It came out at 1.2ml and I only used 1ml. As you said it is a small tank.

I am just going to do one more test to see what has happend today and then get on with removiing all the water, rocks & fake plants and just refilling it with new tap water to see what happens.

Such a pain to have to start again but since I am getting nowhere I don't see what else I can do.
Hopefully it will be all OK this time.

Cheers again for all the help, it is most appreciated.

Kind Regards,

Adam

 

[curlyriff]

Right I have just done a 50% water change to see if I can get everything back to average levels.

I managed to get the ammonia to 4.0ppm, the Nitrite to around 3.0-4.0ppm & the Nitrate to around 40ppm so all in all its not too bad. I think since these are looking more acceptable and with what has already happened I will just wait till the weekend to recheck and see how its getting on. Should the ammonia drop again I will be happy enough to leave it.

If I get another random rising result I will look into completly stripping the tank and starting again.

Thanks for all your help so far.

Regards,

Adam

 

[waterdrop]

If you have no nitrite in your tap water (and its your same API nitrite test that is showing that zero) and you have just started a brand new tank and filter with that same tap water and you have added absolutely no mature media or objects that could have come from a mature tank, then it makes no sense that there is any nitrite in the tank water.

Am I missing something here?

WD

 

[curlyriff]

If you have no nitrite in your tap water (and its your same API nitrite test that is showing that zero) and you have just started a brand new tank and filter with that same tap water and you have added absolutely no mature media or objects that could have come from a mature tank, then it makes no sense that there is any nitrite in the tank water.

Am I missing something here?

WD

At the moment I left everything as it was and decided to see if I could get my ammonia down to a normal level i.e. 4-5ppm I could watch it to see how it affects the Nitrite levels. I deffinatly have bacteria as I have checked the spong and carbon in there. If I carry on with this and now that I have got the ammonia to the correct level. I think this is what I should have done after adding the ammonia first time to make sure I started with 5.0ppm then I should be able to see a normal cycle and result start from here just with the added advantage of the nitrite already being processed.

I think something went wrong at the begining with the ammonia as the levels seemed to change. The only reason I haven't taken it all out is because I haven't got anything to put it all in at moment (new flat and lack of space).

Anyways I hope this is all OK and means I can continue my cycle. I will follow the levels closely and hopefully watch the ammonia drop over the next few days or so.

Kind Regards,

Adam

 

[curlyriff]

Morning all,

I have just done my tests and results are as follows. Ammonia is between 0.0 & 0.25, Nitrite is around 5.0ppm and my Nitrate is around 20.0ppm so I think the cycle is back on track and it is time for me to dose some more ammonia?

Kind Regards,

Adam

 

[curlyriff]

Have just tested the water again and after 48 hours the ammonia has dropped again to around 0.00ppm to 0.25ppm.

Nitrite again is around 5.0ppm and Natrate is somewhere around 80.0ppm (although am a little sceptical about this as it is the weakest test for the API kit and known to be a little off although I tested 3 times to confirm).

I guess everything seems to be going OK. My water is not really cloudy and I have no algy problems at the moment.

Hopefully this will continue in this fashion. Will dose again to around 4ppm.

Kind Regards,

Adam