My tank will not cycle.

[altinure]

Hey everyone,

I've had a tank set up for a little over one week, and it is not cycling at all. Every day, the ammonia level is a 1.0ppm, and the nitrite level is a .005ppm. It never changes. The fish seems happy in the tank, and I haven't changed the filter or anything, so I have no clue why it won't cycle. I even went out and purchased a piece of drift wood from my local petstore that was in one of their tanks to hopefully get some of the bacteria in my tank, and still no luck. My water is chlorinated, and my tank size is 5 gallons.

Is it possible my tank is already cycled and this is as good as it's going to get?

Thanks.

 

[altinure]

Hey everyone,

I've had a tank set up for a little over one week, and it is not cycling at all. Every day, the ammonia level is a 1.0ppm, and the nitrite level is a .005ppm. It never changes. The fish seems happy in the tank, and I haven't changed the filter or anything, so I have no clue why it won't cycle. I even went out and purchased a piece of drift wood from my local petstore that was in one of their tanks to hopefully get some of the bacteria in my tank, and still no luck. My water is chlorinated, and my tank size is 5 gallons.

Is it possible my tank is already cycled and this is as good as it's going to get?

Thanks.

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Ok, and I meant to post this in Beginner Questions. Sorry.

 

[GirlinWayside]

well, Im certainly no expert by any means, but Im pretty sure it takes longer than a week for a tank to cycle. Im sure others will comment soon. If you dont mind me asking, why did you add fish before it was cycled??

 

[altinure]

well, Im certainly no expert by any means, but Im pretty sure it takes longer than a week for a tank to cycle. Im sure others will comment soon. If you dont mind me asking, why did you add fish before it was cycled??

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I'm not doing a fishless cycle. I'm cycling it with a platty.

 

[rdd1952]

It will take 2 to 4 weeks for a tank to cycle with fish depending on what type they are and how many you have. Since youhave only the one fish, it shouldn't take too long but will still take a while. Cycling with fish is actually a slower process than a fishless cycle because you need to keep doing daily water changes to keep the ammonia and nitrite levels safe. You should try to keep the levels at a maximum of .5 ppm to prevent a lot of serious harm to your fish.

In a fishless cycle, the ammonia will generally cycle in about a week since you add ammonia as soon as you set it up. But in a cycle with fish, it takes a little longer because the fish has to add the ammonia over the course of the first couple days and he continues to add more ammonia every day. That delays the ammonia processing from starting to form and also extends the time it takes to process it all back to zero.

Nitrite generally takes about twice as long as ammonia to cycle. It should run about the same in a cycle with fish since the process there is about the same. Nitrite processing bacteria won't start to form until some of the ammonia has been transformed into nitrite.

 

[Tolak]

Here's a little chart I stole from another site that may help;

Tolak

 

[altinure]

Here's a little chart I stole from another site that may help;

Tolak

[snapback]913245[/snapback]​

yeah, i saw a chart like that, so if i'm at like day 10, shouldn't my tank have started cycling? it's kind of been sitting at 1ppm for a long time.

 

[Tolak]

It's a ballpark deal. You will soon learn with aquatics that nothing is written in stone, there are plenty of variables. Cycling is one of them.

What type of dechlorinator are you using, and have you cleaned the filter or gravel at all?

Tolak