Need Cycling Advice

[mancton]

Hi everyone, I started my cycle using mature media 4 days ago ammmonia was at 5ppm yesterday now its at 0. i have nitrite (off the chart) and nitrate readings (40ppm). Is this normal? Thought this might be the kickstart the cycle gets from using mature media. Anyway added more ammonia to bring it up to 4ppm. Should i do a water change to get the nitrate down?
Thanks again

 

[cowboy507]

If it is a fish less cycle the excess will be fine. if you are going to do a water change wait until the ammonia is back down to around 0. that way your not wasting time adding more ammonia as the water change will remove the ammonia.

Some times people will do an entire cycle without any water changes until the very end they will do a larger (60-70%) change to remove the nitrate. Since you are using mature media then i would hold off on the water change

also, expect your tank to go cloudy, when this happens dont worry. It is just a bacteria spike, it will clear it self. Keep cycling through the spike.

 

[fluttermoth]

40ppm nitrate is quite normal and nothing to worry about; some people have that in their tap water!

Nitrate will stall a cycle only when it gets near the top end of your test kit, so there's no need to change any water

 

[mancton]

Just thought it was a bit fast what with reading stories about 6 week cycles n stuff. Yeah im doin a fishless cycle seems everything is going well after adding the mature media. Thanks for the replys these forums are great for info to a noob ha