Problem with fishless cycling

[njnauticalnut]

Hi,

I started cycling my 75 gallon fish tank 12 days ago.

At first I just added amonia, have no live plants and had no bacteria source. I did this based on a thread on here from a couple of weeks ago. A couple of people were successful with this process.

Last week I added a bacteria starter and over the weekend I added sponge from my already established aquarium. I originally added a bit too much amonia and so my amonia reading has been 6ppm every day, still no nitrite spike. I have not added amonia every day as I was trying to get it down to 5ppm.

Anyone have any ideas as to why the tank will not cycle?

Thanks.

 

[luxum]

Just give it some time, and do add the ammonia every day, you want to get a huge colony of bacteria going. Depending on variables like temperature, seeding material, etc, it can take a few days or a couple weeks for the ammonia spike to drop and the nitrites to show up, and then it takes ~forever and a day~ for the nitrites to return to zero. Be patient. Add your ammonia dose every day until you see nitrites, then cut the dose in half and continue adding the half dose every day until the cycle completes.

Edit: also you may want to verify your readings with another test kit. Often test kits in the LFS have been sitting there long enough to expire before they are sold.

 

[njnauticalnut]

Luxum,

Thanks for your reply. I figured it was just that the time varies. I am not in a rush, all things in good time.

I am pretty certain that my test kit is fine as I use it on my other tank and that tank is cycled and the readings are perfect.

I guess it is okay then that my amonia is reading 6ppm? I will continue to add daily until the nitrite spike, then cut to 1/2.

Again, thanks.