Nitrite above 5ppm

[Christhefish]

Hello everyone, i am pretty new at this i started about 4 months ago. I set up a freshwater 55 gallon tank with a 75 gallon quite flow filter. The substrate is white sand and it was not live. I have some drift wood and some blade grass in there as well. So i started my cycle by adding fish food and bacteiria, after the tank had become stable i added the first fish which was the electric yellow cichlid. The tank took the new mate in like a champ no issues what so ever. After about a week the tank was still very stable. I added the second fish which was my gourami, and again after about a week the tank was still stable. So then i added the third fish which is my favorite he is a green severum. Soooo after a week or so the tank was stable but on the second week after adding the severum my nitrite shot through the roof. I started doing a 25% water change every si gle day as well as adding a good but extra bacteria. I started adding the API salt to help the fish breath better. This fish are showing no sign of being stressed, they swim around all day and get super excited to eat. No matter what i do to this tank the nitrite will not go down. There is no amonia showing and the PH is around 7.6. I have been adding bacteria and doing 25% water changes every singke day or a mo th now and literatly nothing has changed. What can i do? Please help

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[JoeMan]

First off: why did you put fish food in during cycling? That just causes issues like the one you are dealing with now. bigger water changes less often helps with bringing the nitrite down. Secondly: electric yellow mbuna cichlid and gourami is a BIG NO NO! Keep cichlids alone with each other. When that yellow gets bigger the gourami is a goner.

Then the severum... well. He needs 100gallon +. And should only be kept imo with other severums. I dont mean to sound degrading but a little research goes a long way and will stop you from wasting money on fish that you simply cant keep.

 

[Delapool]

For reference this other thread may be useful.

http://www.aquariumadvice.com/forums/f44/newbie-350864.html

OP, what are all your tank water chemistry readings now?