FISHLESS CYCLING

[luxum]

Once you see nitrites, you should be adding enough ammonia to bring the ammonia levels to 2.5ppm instead of the 5ppm you should have begun with. The reason for cutting back once nitrites are present is because nitrite converting bacteria are much slower to colonize and are actually inhibited by really high levels of nitrite, so if you add half the ammonia you won't starve the ammonia converting colony and you won't overwhelm the nitrite converting colony as it's trying to form.

By the way, the ammonia is not likely to be what killed your plants, plants use ammonia as a nutrient.

 

[panther1505]

Luxum,
You say that once you see nitrites you should add enough ammonia to bring the ammonia level down to 2.5ppm?

I thought that once you saw a nitrite spike, you were suppose to bring the ammonia and nitrite levels back down to 0ppm?

Now, what if, you've got your ammonia level up to about 5ppm, but your nitrites are at 0ppm, then the following day when you test, your nitrite level is at .25ppm is that enough of a climb to cut your ammonia in half? Or should you wait for a larger spike?