Nitrite Lvl

[AdrianJames]

Every day I have to change my water because I have a Nitrite lvl of 50 - 1ppm! My Ammonia is always 0 and my Nitrates are 25ppm. My tank have been running for 3 and a half weeks with 5 guppies. 60l.
Why are my Nirites always high when there is no ammonia!??? So confused!

 

[FishBlast]

Every day I have to change my water because I have a Nitrite lvl of 50 - 1ppm! My Ammonia is always 0 and my Nitrates are 25ppm. My tank have been running for 3 and a half weeks with 5 guppies. 60l.
Why are my Nirites always high when there is no ammonia!??? So confused!

Those nitrites were the ammonia.
Unless tap water has nitrite?

 

[The Taffy Apple]

^^^ What FishBlast said.

It looks like any Ammonia you had in your tank is now being 'broken down' into NitrItes. You seem to be 3 and a half weeks into a 'fish-in' cycle and should be expecting your NitrItes to be 'broken down' upto twice as long as it took for your Ammonia to do the same.
You NitrItes that you are experiencing are just as bad (if not more) as what Ammonia does to our fish, but you're doing the right thing in changing water daily.

Terry.

 

[FishBlast]

^^^ What FishBlast said.

It looks like any Ammonia you had in your tank is now being 'broken down' into NitrItes. You seem to be 3 and a half weeks into a fishless cycle and should be expecting your NitrItes to be 'broken down' upto twice as long as it took for your Ammonia to do the same.
You NitrItes that you are experiencing are just as bad (if not more) as what Ammonia does to our fish, but you're doing the right thing in changing water daily.

Terry.

Fish-in cycle?

 

[KittyKat]

^^ What they said.

…and nitrite is quite harmful as it makes the fish unable to use the oxygen in the water, so in effect, it is suffocating them. I recommend that you do some large water changes to get it as close to 0 ppm as possible, then try to never let it reach 0.25 ppm. Also, try to increase the surface movement (aeration) of the water. Some dechlorinators, like Prime, claim to deal with nitrite, so do use those if possible alongside all the other precautions.

 

[The Taffy Apple]

^^^ What FishBlast said.

It looks like any Ammonia you had in your tank is now being 'broken down' into NitrItes. You seem to be 3 and a half weeks into a fishless cycle and should be expecting your NitrItes to be 'broken down' upto twice as long as it took for your Ammonia to do the same.
You NitrItes that you are experiencing are just as bad (if not more) as what Ammonia does to our fish, but you're doing the right thing in changing water daily.

Terry.

Fish-in cycle?

"Fish-in" cycle...! Thank you FishBlast .

Terry.

 

[AdrianJames]

Ok cool! Thanks guys. As I said I am changing water everyday to take the Nitrite lvl down to 0 and when I wake up in the morning its back at 50ppm. Its so frustrating having to change 90% of the water everyday! But hopefully this will be over soon! Its just weird that I test it all the time and I have NEVER detected ANY ammonia whats so ever! So it must be VERY sneaky and turns into Nitrite in a split second!

 

[KittyKat]

Are you sure nitrite is at 50 ppm? If that was the case, your fish would be dead. Could it be nitrate at 50 ppm? Or maybe your test kit does not show the results in ppm?

 

[paulyoung666]

What test kit are you using ? ...

 

[FishBlast]

Ok cool! Thanks guys. As I said I am changing water everyday to take the Nitrite lvl down to 0 and when I wake up in the morning its back at 50ppm. Its so frustrating having to change 90% of the water everyday! But hopefully this will be over soon! Its just weird that I test it all the time and I have NEVER detected ANY ammonia whats so ever! So it must be VERY sneaky and turns into Nitrite in a split second!

Wouldn't they be dead though if that measurement is real? Unless they somehow managed to mutate and adapt to huge levels of nitrite, which means guppies are next in nuclear waste tests

 

[OldMan47]

Don't be confused. All fish produce ammonia but, if you have a partially cycled tank, that will show up as nitrites in your water. The result is that we must deal with the offending nitrites. As long as you do large enough water changes that nitrites never exceed 0.25 ppm, you will be successful with your fish-in cycle.

 

[sadguppy]

you mean .5 ppm! Not great but not as deadly if you are changing water every day. Keep it up, one day you'll test and there will be none. Promise!

 

[AdrianJames]

I have the API test kits and it is reading .50ppm every day I wake up. This has been happening for 2 weeks now, my tank is a month old tomorrow. My guppies are fine, NO sign of illness and they act as normal. I havent lost any. I change 90% of the water EVERY single day to bring it back down to 0ppm. Just mentioned all that again for some of the people above and put a decimal point infront of the 50 hahaha.

 

[OldMan47]

At 0.50 ppm, the nitrite is starting to cause breathing problems for your fish. You probably see them swimming mostly near the surface when the levels are that high. At values below 0.25 ppm, they will use most of the tank instead. The effect of nitrites on fish is a lot like carbon monoxide poisoning with people. No matter how much oxygen is present, the nitrite binds too well to the fish's hemoglobin and the fish feel like they are suffocating.

 

[AdrianJames]

At 0.50 ppm, the nitrite is starting to cause breathing problems for your fish. You probably see them swimming mostly near the surface when the levels are that high. At values below 0.25 ppm, they will use most of the tank instead. The effect of nitrites on fish is a lot like carbon monoxide poisoning with people. No matter how much oxygen is present, the nitrite binds too well to the fish's hemoglobin and the fish feel like they are suffocating.

Havent noticed the fish near the surface at all, they just graze along the bottom and swim around, but as I have said I change the water first thing in the morning when it has the .50 reading which is every single morning. Looking forward to the day when it reads 0.