Fishless Cycle - Missing Nitrates

[elle.michelle]

I have been cycling my 29 gallon freshwater tank for 31 days now with fish food (not recommended) and a steady ammonia level of 1.0ppm, and after about 3 weeks with no signs of nitrites, I seeded my tank by adding two small filter cartridges from some established 2 gallon tanks to my filter. After 2 days I immediately saw an increase in nitrites (steady between .25 and .5 ppm, but no spike) and after a week I started seeing nitrates. I had been adding a pinch of food whenever my ammonia started dropping and then when my nitrates started showing up I started adding a small pinch once a day.

My problem now is that the past 2 days my ammonia and nitrites both read 0, but my nitrates are barely reading with my liquid test kit. I haven't done any water changes, but I never filled the tank water up when it started evaporating to encourage more air bubbles from the filter splash. I do have live plants, could they have anything to do with my lack of nitrates?

I am afraid I will have to restart from scratch, but I have still been adding fish food and my ammonia hasn't come back up. Any advice?

 

[shelaghfishface]

hmm sounds like its stalled somewhere...any chance you could pop into your LFS and ask them to swap some media or even donate some.. would save you hanging about, or a member that lives locally.. im sure theres a donation thread here somewhere.
if it was me id be tempted to chuck the whole pot of food in and go from there ;lol; ( very very bad advice

)


are you sure youre testing correctly? ( i know its the obvious Q but youd be surprised )

shelagh x

 

[elle.michelle]

Also, I ran out of pH tester a few days ago, I am getting more today so I will update that when I test, the reading never left 7.5, but I have a really bad feeling it will be off and that it messed up my cycle.

 

[shelaghfishface]

heres the donation thread.. you never know

http/www.fishforums.net/index.php?/topic/150631-list-of-members-willing-to-donate-mature-filter-media-to-newbies/

 

[Alex.]

If your using the API kit, shake, shake and shake the nitrate bottles before you use them- I learned this recently when I had 80+ nitrate levels disappear. Turned out the second of the bottles needs shaking for an accurate result.

 

[elle.michelle]

hmm sounds like its stalled somewhere...any chance you could pop into your LFS and ask them to swap some media or even donate some.. would save you hanging about, or a member that lives locally.. im sure theres a donation thread here somewhere.
if it was me id be tempted to chuck the whole pot of food in and go from there ;lol; ( very very bad advice

)


are you sure youre testing correctly? ( i know its the obvious Q but youd be surprised )

shelagh x

I really have been temped to dump all the food, but I'm going to be good and pick up some pure ammonia while I'm out today instead. I have the API liquid test kits and I double check the instructions on each before I do anything lol... I'll ask my LFS for some media as well, thank you!

 

[elle.michelle]

If your using the API kit, shake, shake and shake the nitrate bottles before you use them- I learned this recently when I had 80+ nitrate levels disappear. Turned out the second of the bottles needs shaking for an accurate result.

I shake the second bottle for exactly 30 seconds like it says, and the test tube 1 min after I add second bottle...



Could nitrates disappear with a too low or too high pH?

 

[OldMan47]

Plants that are thriving will definitely remove nitrogen from your tank. In this tank I never read any nitrates at all, regardless of how long it has been since I did a water change.

I feed that tank a surplus of fish food daily so that the uneaten part can be used by the plants as a source of nitrogen. I do water changes every few months to replenish the minerals that the plants require, not because a water change is needed for the fish. When I did high tech planted tanks with CO2 and so forth, I found it necessary to actually add nitrates to keep my plants healthy. Plants will definitely drop the nitrogen in a tank.

 

[Ram8349]

If your using the API kit, shake, shake and shake the nitrate bottles before you use them- I learned this recently when I had 80+ nitrate levels disappear. Turned out the second of the bottles needs shaking for an accurate result.

I second that!

Without shaking it for a while before using, you will get false reading. Same with after you used the bottle. It requires some more shaking. This nitrate test is quite different from the other tests for the same kit.

 

[Tonyb111111]

Plants that are thriving will definitely remove nitrogen from your tank. In this tank I never read any nitrates at all, regardless of how long it has been since I did a water change.

I feed that tank a surplus of fish food daily so that the uneaten part can be used by the plants as a source of nitrogen. I do water changes every few months to replenish the minerals that the plants require, not because a water change is needed for the fish. When I did high tech planted tanks with CO2 and so forth, I found it necessary to actually add nitrates to keep my plants healthy. Plants will definitely drop the nitrogen in a tank.

+1 my nitrates are at their highest immediately after a water change, then get consumed by the plants. Until the next water change

 

[pdludbrooke]

If your using the API kit, shake, shake and shake the nitrate bottles before you use them- I learned this recently when I had 80+ nitrate levels disappear. Turned out the second of the bottles needs shaking for an accurate result.

YES SHAKE THE SECOND BOTTLE AND BANG IT HARD AGAINST A TABLE ABOUT 10-20 TIMES WHILE YOU SHAKE FOR 1 MINUTE,I had false readings too for NitrAtes, after really clobbering the bottle I got a true reading.