0.25 Ammonia, 0.25 Nitrite, 40PPM Nitrate. Struggling with cycling?

[SamuelJG]

Hello all! For the past 3 weeks I've been trying to fishless cycle my aquarium, I know this is considered still too early to add fish, but I'm just wanting to know where I'm at with my cycle as I sense things aren't as they should be.

My results after 2 tests (API Master Test Kit) are

Ammonia: 0.25
Nitrite: 0.25
Nitrate: 40PPM


As I said it's been about 3 weeks now and have only just started testing, another mistake of mine is not doing waterchanges. I've only done a 20 percent water change once in the hopes to give the bacteria a chance to grow. I've also been occasionally adding fish food to the aquarium in hopes to give the bacteria something to feed on. Apologies for the info dump but the nitrate from my tap water is 20PPM, which is frustrating. Would love a hand in regards to what to do going forward, have I just been watching stagnating water for the past 3 weeks? LOL

It's worth a mention that I also have no heater yet, will that affect my cycle at all? I've also added some water that I used to wash a filter sponge from an already established aquarium, although I'm not sure that would have made a difference. Any help, advice, or clearing up would be appreciated!

 

[SaraB]

Water changes are your best bet. Try 50% next time and see if it makes a difference.
I've not heard anything about a heater changing the cycling process.
Water from old aquariums dont have as much bb as an object like filter media, gravel or decorations.

 

[1midniterider]

What size is your aquarium? What type of substrate, if any, are you using? Which filtering system are you using? There are numerous resources that explain the nitrogen cycle on this forum. A quick search will reveal them. Lastly, what did you use as your ammonia source. At some point you will need to spike the ammonia to at least 1ppm and check for ammonia and nitrites 24hrs later. The levels should drop to 0 for both.