Has My Cycle Stalled

[Lucylou]

My tank started to cycle after 3 weeks.
Am 2
Nitrite 5
Nitrate 5
I added more ammonia to get 4ppm, and the Nitrite have disapeared? I got a Nitrite reading for 2 days and now its just reading 0. But my Nitrate reading is about 10 for 5 days now. The ammonia goes down after 2/3 days, and I add more to get 4ppm.
I thought nitrate neads nitrite in order for the cycle to work?
Has my cycle stalled, should I do a small water change?

 

[Rooster]

My tank started to cycle after 3 weeks.
Am 2
Nitrite 5
Nitrate 5
I added more ammonia to get 4ppm, and the Nitrite have disapeared? I got a Nitrite reading for 2 days and now its just reading 0. But my Nitrate reading is about 10 for 5 days now. The ammonia goes down after 2/3 days, and I add more to get 4ppm.
I thought nitrate neads nitrite in order for the cycle to work?
Has my cycle stalled, should I do a small water change?

Sounds like its working to me, although I had to reread it a few times ! LOL The Ammonia gets broken down into nitrIte which in turn breaks down into nitrAte - so at first the ammonia will build up until nitrIte appears at which point the ammonia will fall (to zero if you let it, so keep topping up) and nitrIte will rise.
After a while nitrAte will appear and consume the nitrIte, so it WILL fall back to zero too until its had more ammonia to "eat".
At the end of the day you should "feed" ammonia then wait 24hours and just BEFORE you add todays ammonia, do the tests... you dont need to do this every day - 3 or 4 days will do, until you "see" nitrAte levels rise... at which point you should have zero ammonia and zero nitrIte (or close to zero)

Common misnomas are that the water plays much of a part in this, the only reason I would change the water is if I had MASSIVLY overdosed the ammonia, all the biological stuff goes on in your substrate and filter media.... You ARE running a filter I trust ?
This all happens faster if you up the temp too... time scales vary, could be a couple of weeks, could be a couple of months !
Good luck, it will get there in the end.

 

[Lucylou]

Thanks, I was concerned that I was getting the Nitrate reading with the nitrite reading 0
I thought Nitrate 'eats' Nitrite?
So without any Nitrite, the nitrate would then fall to 0, meaning I would be back at the begining again?
Sorry if it reads confusing.

 

[xoedusk]

Nitrate, to my knowledge, is a compound. NO3. Nitrogen Trioxide (any chemists, please correct me!). A compound can't eat another compound.

But bacteria eat nitrite, turning it in to nitrate. Normally, nothing will eat your nitrate. You'll have to do this via water changes every week.

Keep your ammonia readings up at 4ppm every day. Once you see you have NO ammonia and NO nitrites (within 12 hours after last dosing your tank with ammonia), I believe you are done. Someone hopefully can double check this is correct.

 

[Glod]

The only way your nitrAtes will read 0 is if you mis-test or you change all the water in the tank.

When you add ammonia, the bacteria convert that to nitrIte.
A different set of bacteria then consume the nitrIte and produce nitrAte.

NitrAte is the end product of the cycle and will only build up in the tank until you do a water change. The way nitrAte is reduced is by doing partial water changes.

If you are adding ammonia, and your nitrAtes are going up that means your nitrIte eating bacteria are coping with the nitrIte as fast as it is being produced. That is good !

You're nearing the end of your cycle now, all you need to do is build up your colonies so they deal with your full load of ammonia in a 12 hour period. I.E. when you add 4ppm or whatever of ammonia the bacteria convert all of it into nitrIte and then nitrAte in a 12 hour period you're ready to add your fish.

When all your ammonia is being used up overnight and your nitrIte is staying at 0 your nitrates will probably be very high. Keep adding ammonia to keep the system ticking over until you are ready to stock the tank. Then on the day you are bringing the fish home do a large 80% - 90% water change to bring your nitrates under control, top up with dechlorinated water and your tank will be ready for fish when the temperature stablises