High Nitrite and Nitrate but zero Ammonia?

[camsoft]

So I'm totally new to keep fish and kind of jumped into the whole thing but I'm a little overwhelmed but loving it.

Anyway I've got a fairly new fish tank had it for about 2 weeks now, it had about a week before I put fish in and has live plants. The tank now has 12 tetras, 6 glowlight and 6 neons.

I've been testing the water most days and it's been mostly the same readings each day, up to today I've recorded the following:

CL2 0
PH 7.2
KH 6°d
GH >16°d (we have very hard water due to soil being mostly chalk)
Nitrite 1mg/l
Nitrate 50 mg/l
Ammonia 0

But today the reading seems to have drastically changed:

CL2 0
PH 7.2
KH 6°d
GH >16°d
Nitrite 5mg/l
Nitrate 100 mg/l
Ammonia 0

The nitrite and nitrates for what I've been reading seem very high. Is this just a normal part of the cycle or something else, I think I may have been over feeding to try and make the food reach all the fish as some are more aggressive than others.

What confusing me is that I thought the Nitrite and Nitrates are converted from ammonia but I've never detected any. I'm using Tetra 6in1 testing strips.

Do I need to do anything i.e. water change, if so how much, I'm just worried about stressing the fish.

Thanks.

 

[BBradbury]

Your Tank

Hello cam...

Just test every day for traces of ammonia and nitrite. The other tests are unimportant, don't waste your time.

If you have a positive test for ammonia or nitrite, then remove one quarter, 25 percent, of the tank water and replace it with treated tap water.

Do this every day until you get several tests with no traces of either of these forms of nitrogen. When this happens, the tank is cycled. This takes a month or so. Then, just change half the water every week for as long as the tank is running, to keep the water safe for the fish.

That's it.

B

 

[camsoft]

Hello cam...

Just test every day for traces of ammonia and nitrite. The other tests are unimportant, don't waste your time.

If you have a positive test for ammonia or nitrite, then remove one quarter, 25 percent, of the tank water and replace it with treated tap water.

Do this every day until you get several tests with no traces of either of these forms of nitrogen. When this happens, the tank is cycled. This takes a month or so. Then, just change half the water every week for as long as the tank is running, to keep the water safe for the fish.

That's it.

B

That's really helpful, does doing the water changes stress the fish out? My fish seem a bit nervy, I think I've been interfering with the tank too much. They all school together when I'm working on the tank and generally hide in the corners. I'm worried that I'm stressing them out. One of my fish today just sat right at the bottom of the tank not moving even when I approached it to look at it, normally they would shoot off and it just sat there motionless, like it was stunned or something.

Also I can't seem to find one of my glowlight tetras, there has always been one that will do it's own thing and not school all the time with the others and I fear it's gone missing. Could it be dead, though would it not float to the surface or is it just hiding somewhere. I had a good look hence why I've scared one of the neons as I was hunting around in the tank as I have quite a lot of live plant cover (going for the natural look).

 

[dalto]

It changed that much overnight or was there longer between tests? That would be way too big of a jump overnight.

I would pick up a liquid test kit for ammonia, nitrite and nitrate and test again. If you can't do that fairly quickly I would do a series of large water changes. 5ppm would be pretty toxic for nitrites.

That being said, I am guessing it is a testing problem more than an actual nitrite spike but you never know.

 

[camsoft]

It changed that much overnight or was there longer between tests? That would be way too big of a jump overnight.

I would pick up a liquid test kit for ammonia, nitrite and nitrate and test again. If you can't do that fairly quickly I would do a series of large water changes. 5ppm would be pretty toxic for nitrites.

That being said, I am guessing it is a testing problem more than an actual nitrite spike but you never know.

I last tested on the 8th so two days ago, I'll test again now...

 

[camsoft]

Just tested again and the results are the same NO2 5 and NO3 100.

 

[camsoft]

My second test was using a liquid testing kit and the results are the same. :-( How urgent is it that I do a water change and how much would you recommend 50%?

 

[dalto]

Just tested again and the results are the same NO2 5 and NO3 100.

5ppm of nitrite is very concerning.

I would do 50% water changes twice per day. If you have any seachem prime I would do a double dose of it to try to bind the nitrites.

Big water changes may not be good for the fish but toxic nitrite levels are also not good.

 

[camsoft]

5ppm of nitrite is very concerning.

I would do 50% water changes twice per day. If you have any seachem prime I would do a double dose of it to try to bind the nitrites.

Big water changes may not be good for the fish but toxic nitrite levels are also not good.

Ok I've just done a 50% water change, I think I'm going to not feed the fish for a day or so as I don't want to compound the issue. I have some Nitrate Minus should I put some of that in?

 

[TomK2]

First, I suspect you have nitrates in your tap water. No way a new tank gets 50 or 100 ppm of nitrate in a few weeks. Well, one way is to use a saltwater nitrate test on fresh water, but I assume you bought a freshwater kit. Run a test on your tap water. Do ammonia and nitrite on your tap water too. If you have chloramines in your tap water, the API test tube kit should detect it as ammonia.

Second, very high levels of nitrate can cuase an elevated nitrite reading. According to my research, 100 ppm of nitrate can cause an elevated nitrite reading.

Its in the way the API tests are performed.

For ammonia, bottle one adds chlorine causing the ammonia to turn into chloramine. Bottle two turns color in the presence of chloramine. If your tap water has chloramine, it should turn color. In fact, it should turn color with just bottle two added, but I do not have access to chloramine water to test this hypothesis.

For Nitrite, sulfanilic acid reacts with nitrite to form a diazonium salt, which then reacts with the indicator. High nitrates of 100 ppm can have some of the nitrate react and elevate the test.

 

[trennamw]

Do keep testing pH. During your cycle, it can sometimes drop drastically.

But you probably never need to test KH and GH again.

Am I understanding correctly that you got the tank and put fish in right away? Did you use any water treatment that claimed to jump start your cycle by adding bacteria?

Do read about "fish in" cycling if you haven't already.

Sometimes the bacterias get established out of sync with each other. For instance the bacteria that converts ammonia to nitrite might be well established, while the one that converts nitrite to nitrate is not.


Sent from my iPhone with three hands tied behind my back.

 

[camsoft]

Do keep testing pH. During your cycle, it can sometimes drop drastically.

But you probably never need to test KH and GH again.

Am I understanding correctly that you got the tank and put fish in right away? Did you use any water treatment that claimed to jump start your cycle by adding bacteria?

Do read about "fish in" cycling if you haven't already.

Sometimes the bacterias get established out of sync with each other. For instance the bacteria that converts ammonia to nitrite might be well established, while the one that converts nitrite to nitrate is not.


Sent from my iPhone with three hands tied behind my back.

I planted the tank and added water, heater, filter and the water was treated before adding. I waited about 7 days before adding the first 6 fish.

I did read about cycles but found the information conflicting depending on where I read it online especially about how long to wait etc.

I've been testing the levels daily and they have always been the same until yesterday where the Nitrite and Nitrate level shot up. I've tested again this morning and the results are the same on the testing kit though the pinks are slightly lighter but not enough to match against the next measure on the test kit.

I've just tested the tap water and there are zero Nitries and 25mg/l Nitrates.

I have not changed the filter media yet as I read bad things about doing that, though I have swished it about in old tank water to clear the gunk off the outside of the sponge.

Should I be doing another 50% water change today?

 

[trennamw]

Sorry, got my threads mixed up. Deleted my response here because it was about someone else's!

Sounds like you need to continue the fish in cycling. It'll take time.

 

[camsoft]

I have some good news, I've now done two 50% water changes and cleaned part of the gravel and now have Nitrite down to 1mg/l and NitrAte down to 50mg/l and I've not fed the fish for a few days to try and control the situation. I'm going to feed the fish a little food this morning as they seem to be getting restless.

Hopefully these levels are controllable and I'll just do small 20% water changes each week.

 

[dalto]

1ppm of nitrite is still quite a bit. You probably want it below 0.5. I would keep doing the changes.

 

[MICEY]

how big a tank is this ?
you should have started with one or two fish waited a week and then added 1 or 2 more
to cycle your tank unless it is a large tank
tetras are not the best fish to use in a new tank they are sensitive to water conditions
barbs would be a better choice

 

[camsoft]

how big a tank is this ?
you should have started with one or two fish waited a week and then added 1 or 2 more
to cycle your tank unless it is a large tank
tetras are not the best fish to use in a new tank they are sensitive to water conditions
barbs would be a better choice

The shop I bought them from recommended them as they said they were quite hardy and were bred specifically for being in tanks.

Well I've had the fish in the tank for 2 weeks now are all 12 are still alive. 1ppm is a hell of a lot better than 5ppm though. I'll check again tonight.

 

[dalto]

Yep, the thing is, until your cycle is complete you are looking at a lot of changes. Whenever nitrite gets over 0.5 you will want to do more water changes.

 

[camsoft]

Yep, the thing is, until your cycle is complete you are looking at a lot of changes. Whenever nitrite gets over 0.5 you will want to do more water changes.

Ok, shall I continue to do 50% changes?

 

[dalto]

Ok, shall I continue to do 50% changes?

Yes, I would. Just make sure you match the temperature as close as you can.