Why is the cycle taking so long??

[Chikadee]

I set up my 10gal snail tank at the same time as I set up my 30gal. I seeded both of them with a sponge filter from an established tank and did a fishy cycle on both tanks with daily water changes. After about 3 weeks, my 30gal was completely cycled (that was about 3 weeks ago) and is doing really well with 0 ammonia/nitrites. However, it's been 6 weeks since I started cycling my 10gal and the ammonia levels are 0 but the nitrites are STILL way too high (like 2 or 3 ppm) I am doing daily water changes but don't know what else to do. I don't have any substrate in that tank, so does that mean bacteria has less surface area to grow on?? I am also using a small box filter, since I am only keeping snails, ghost shrimp and a few guppies in it. Definitely not a heavy bioload. Is there anyway I can speed this up a bit? What am I doing wrong??

 

[QTOFFER]

I had the same experience with my 10 gal Q/H tank. Like yours, it had no substrate and seemed to take forever to cycle.

Be patient, the tank will cycle, albeit more slowly because the bacteria have less surface area to grow on like you said. I speeded things up a bit by putting in some fake plants and a large ornament from my established tank. You could also try adding some BioSpira.

Till then, keep doing those water changes to keep the nitrites down to sub-toxic levels.