Help- FishLESS Cycle - Ammonia keeps increasing

[beatlesfan317]

I'm doing my first fishLESS cycle, using 10% janitorial ammonia from Ace Hardware. I'm on day 12 of my cycle and my Ammonia levels keep increasing but I'm not redosing the tank. Other levels, nitrIte (0), nitrAte (0) and PH (7.6) haven't changed since the cycle began but my Ammonia went from 1.5ppm on Sunday, to 1.5 or 2 Tuesday (hard to tell), and now Wednesday night, Ammonia is clearly 2.0ppm. I haven't re-dosed the tank so I don't understand how ammonia is rising while everything else is stable. Any advice how this could be occurring? Thanks. [by the way, I haven't changed any water or the temperature, filtration, everything else is stable)

 

[mcordelia]

This is a total stab in the dark, but @ITViking was talking about how pH affects the ionization of ammonia/ium the other day, I don't know if your current issue is related to that or not.

 

[mcordelia]

My other guess is that there is something rotting in the tank - do you have plants or driftwood? What are you using as your substrate?

 

[Colin_T]

2ppm of ammonia is nothing to worry about when cycling a tank. Most people recommend having 3ppm of ammonia for cycling so 2ppm is fine.

If you had fish in the tank and the ammonia level was 2ppm, they would be in trouble. So don't worry too much until the tank has cycled.

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You can test the gravel and ornaments by putting them in buckets of clean water. test the water before to make sure it doesn't have any ammonia and then monitor the ammonia level for a week after you put the items in the buckets. If the gravel or ornament, etc are producing ammonia, it will go up in the bucket.

 

[ITViking]

This is a total stab in the dark, but @ITViking was talking about how pH affects the ionization of ammonia/ium the other day, I don't know if your current issue is related to that or not.

I've mentioned the relationship before in passing I think, but you may be think of @essjay . He goes more in-depth and has a lot more knowledge on the subject.

 

[beatlesfan317]

OK thanks for the advice. There is no driftwood or real plants in the tank. I'm using CaribSea Super Naturals Premium Aquarium Substrate sand (for freshwater, ph neutral). I didn't think the sand was live sand or would contain anything that could be breaking down into ammonia. I did start the cycle 12 days ago with a sprinkle of fish food and then used the pure ammonia. I figured having 2 different sources couldn't hurt. Haven't added anything but pure ammonia since day 1, and last added that on day 3 - I'm on day 12 now. But yeah maybe more of the initial fish food is rotting now. It's just discouraging, I knew the fishless cycle would be hard, and I expected it to stall or decrease slowly but I didn't anticipating my numbers (ammonia) to increase! I appreciate the help.

 

[Essjay]

pH (and temperature) does affect the proportion of ammonia and ammonium forms, but our test kits measure total ammonia which is both ammonia and ammonium combined so the pH won't affect the reading with a tester.

The light the test is read under can also affect the reading - daylight is best, followed by incandescent bulbs. Fluorescent light can make the liquid in the tube look greener than it really is. ( I haven't tested the colour with halogen or LED lights)
It is also difficult to get an exact reading when the colour falls between two levels on the chart.


I would just wait. Are you using this method for cycling https://www.fishforums.net/threads/cycling-your-new-fresh-water-tank-read-this-first.421488/
If you are, when you get to dose#2, I would add 3 ppm ammonia rather than 2 or 1.5.

 

[Utar]

Welcome to the forum.

Your worried about nothing where ammonia is concerned, I have cycled tanks with 4ppm ammonia and a higher. I have done four aquariums this way. The best way to go is with the liquid ammonia, which you are doing. Also another thing that helps with several tasks in an aquarium is to get a meat syringe.

The meat syringe will help to measure the amount of liquid ammonia you need to use along with the ammonia calculator found on this forum. IMHO you need to up the ammonia. Did you seed your tank with BB loaded media from another cycled aquarium or other source? Because if you didn't then it that takes much longer to cycle your tank.

You can also use the meat syringe to pull water from you tank and fill the test tubes when using the API Freshwater Master Test Kit, making it much easier. I can't live without the syringe now that I have been using it for the past several years.

 

[Essjay]

I have several syringes ranging from 1 ml though 2 and 5 to 10 ml. Those are useful for adding small amounts of all sorts.

 

[beatlesfan317]

The light the test is read under can also affect the reading - daylight is best, followed by incandescent bulbs. Fluorescent light can make the liquid in the tube look greener than it really is. ( I haven't tested the colour with halogen or LED lights)
It is also difficult to get an exact reading when the colour falls between two levels on the chart.


I would just wait. Are you using this method for cycling https://www.fishforums.net/threads/cycling-your-new-fresh-water-tank-read-this-first.421488/
If you are, when you get to dose#2, I would add 3 ppm ammonia rather than 2 or 1.5.

I think this is a good point. My two previous 1.5ppm readings (API Masterkit) were taken Sunday and Tuesday morning using daylight to read. My 2.0ppm reading was Wednesday night using a lamp to read. That could be the difference.

I started my dosage at 3ppm ammonia and it dropped to 2 on day seven. I'm on day 13 now. I did not seed the tank because my only other tank is an established 2.5 gallon betta tank (filtered and heated) but I didn't really know how to use that to seed this 10 gallon tank since it's so much smaller. For what it is worth, and I know people don't have faith in bacteria in a bottle, I have dosed a new API Quickstart supplement a couple times. I figured it couldn't hurt since I don't have any seeded material.

If you have any advice on how to seed using an established small 2.5 gallon aquarium, I am open to ideas.
The meat syringe is a good idea. But my tank is small enough that I've been using a medicine dropper that I recently bought and it has worked well.
Thanks everyone.