Snack Dose? Or Full Dose?

[WestCoastChelle]

This is my first time doing a proper fishless cycle. Initially I was following the Dr Tim's method (but using TSS+) however the ammonia was stubbornly staying put and not going down when testing over 10 days. So I figured the TSS+ I'd gotten was bust and figured I'd do the method posted on this form by TwoTankAmin. You can see all my measurements here in my tank journal.

tl'dr: We're on day 15. We did a full dose of ammonia on Day 1, and then Day 13 I did another full dose of ammonia after the ammonia read 0 and nitrite was around 2. Since the beginning I've been seeing climbing nitrate in the tank.

My question is this. With today's readings of 0 ammonia and 0.25 (or less tbh, it's hard to tell) of nitrite. Am I looking at a snack dose? Or a full dose again?

Because I've had the nitrite go up and now it's definitely dropped. So I thiiiink maybe I'm on the "day 7/8" Dr Tim's method. If I understand correctly I need to feed the BB some ammonia today, as I'm not quite ready for a water change and fish. But do I need a full dose or the snack dose from Amin's method?

Leaning to a full dose and then testing tomorrow. If the BB is able to clear the ammonia and drop the nitrite to less than 0.2 (well Tim's says 0.2 and Amin's says 0) within 24h then I think at that point I'm cycled and can do a water change and add fishies.

 

[TwoTankAmin]

Hi WestCoastChelle

After the second ammonia addition (Dose #2) {you did this}, while waiting for nitrite to rise, peak and drop, the bacteria will need a maintenance feeding (Dose #3) {this is next dose to be done}. Give the bacteria a “snack” by adding 1/3 of the full dose when you get two consecutive every other day ammonia test readings of 0 ppm,. This “snack” (Dose #3) should be needed somewhere between days 21 and 27 of the cycle. Only a single snack dose is needed.

Since you did Dose #2 on the 13th, the 15th (today) would be your first ammonia every other day ammonia test and the second would be on the 17th. If you are still at 0, which I assume you should be, ad the snack dose.

The purpose of the snack dose is to keep thre ammonia bacteria from going to sleep. However, recent science has discovered that the bacteria known to process the nitrite to nitrate in our tanks are also able to process ammonia to nitrate. So I doubt they are going dormant as long as their is nitrite. And you indicated your first ammonia 0 test was accompanied by about 2 ppm on the nitrite test.

The method in the article is designed to do two things, get a tank cycled reliably and too avoid the most common cause of stalled/failed cycles. That is usually too much nitrite which can be caused by adding too much ammonia at one time or too often. Some people used to even do both.

 

[WestCoastChelle]

Thanks for the reply! Where I wasn't sure was because the nitrite is also basically 0, down from 2ppm. And today in fact the nitrite IS 0. So I decided to add the snack dose. Too much nitrite is definitely not a problem I'm currently having.