Have I Dropped A Clanger?

[farmerhoggers]

ok so im not sure if ive messed up here!
 
I started a fishless cycle early december and despite nitrites taking a while to show everything seemed to be going ok and fairly close to schedule. i got as far as the maintenance feed, which i carried out, and then i think it starts to go wrong. 
 
two days after the maintenance feed i planted my tank with a dozen small plants to be grown on hopefully, added some fert and started injecting co2 for 4hrs a day. i must state now that this was on advice from other posts however i do believe the replies were given on slight assumptions due to my lack of giving clear details of what kind of cycle etc i was doing. a mistake on my part. 
 
I have now got to 6 days past my maintenance feed have 0ppm ammonia, above 5ppm nitrite and 30ppm nitrate on my api liquid test kit.
 
The questions i have though are a) have i seriously mucked up adding plants and co2? b) should i do another maintenance feed while waiting for nitrite to drop? and finally c) do i need to alter the way in which i cycle my tank from the standard fishless cycle due to the above mistakes?
 
I do realise i have made some mistakes doing what i have however as a relative novice i kind of expected that, im just hoping you are all able to help me get back on track
 
 

 

[BerryAttack]

bump up the lights to around 6-8 hours (if you have the right ones) and allow the co2 if you are using gas then drip the bubbles in around 1 every 2 seconds as long as the lights are on. then go and get a few feeder fish.. sounds like your tank is doing good, just IMO the feeder fish will finish it off and in a few weeks you can get the fish you want.
do water changes when you need to.. tests will show, but do one before adding in feeders and you'll be fine. 
that's what i would do, but others might have another idea.

 

[hobby5]

Nope, adding fish to 5 ppm nitrite is not a good idea.
 
It seems to me as if your cycle was not finished (did amonia AND nitrite go to 0ppm after your maintenance feed before the tank was planted?). So you are now in the middle of the nitrite peak and you have to wait until nitrites are 0 again.

 

[farmerhoggers]

that is correct hobby i am in the middle of the nitrite peak however the tank was planted two days after the maintenance feed.

 

[farmerhoggers]

so tested this morning and nitrites now at 0ppm. added my full original dose and we'll see what the reading say tomorrow.

 

[eaglesaquarium]

Congrats farmer...

The one thing that cycling requires more than anything can't be bought from a store... Patience. You will probably find that it won't clear all in 24hours this time, might take 2 or even 3 days, but it will clear. You didn't mess anything up, at all. Nitrite bacs have slightly different needs than ammonia bacs, and are notoriously slow to show up at times.


As was stated previously, co2 is not harmful to the bacteria, unless so much is added that it pushes the pH way down, but that wouldn't be your goal anyway. That would be well above I the recommended amount for plants.


What plants do you have? Incidentally, 4 hours is to little a photoperiod for the plants to thrive, they need 6 hours minimum, but usually even longer than that.

 

[farmerhoggers]

hi eagles. i have a list of the plants on my freshwater blog titled my 'rio125 adventure' yeh i realised 4hrs was not enough after a usefull convo with my lfs and as a result have upped light and co2 levels to 7hrs light 8hrs co2 starting 2hrs before lights on and have also changed the standard juwel tubes for arcadia plant growth tubes.

 

[eaglesaquarium]

I'll take a look at that.
 
 
Glad you found some LFS advice helpful.   They get a bad rap around here sometimes, but there are many good places with good people.

 

[farmerhoggers]

wahoo im cycled

 

[fluttermoth]

Congratulations

 

[eaglesaquarium]

Awesome.

 

[Ch4rlie]

Nice 

 

[TwoTankAmin]

farm- it is possible the ferts you added contained some ammonia. But it may just have been the normal course of things since ammonia tends to vanish before nitrite. As an interesting aside on this whole debate. For the non high light tanks, Tropica suggests planting and running co2 but not fertilizing for at least 2- 4 weeks depending on the types of plants.
 
In your initial post you never mentioned ferts, as you noted above. So when I replied it was relative to your asking about co2 and not ferts.
 
I am curious about one thing, after adding the plants, have you had any algae issues?
 
OH yes- stock up that tank and enjoy your new fish

 

[farmerhoggers]

hi twotank
 
when i planted and started adding the co2 i added 20ml of tetra plantamin as a one off untill the tank was cycled, stocked and i could start ei dosing. the plants all appear healthy and there doesnt appear to be any algae growth at all so far.