First stage of the cycle appears to be done...

[Saltair]

It looks like I am at 0ppm ammonia in the main tank. I used a tap water sample as a control and they look exactly the same. It has taken 15 days to get this far. Currently my nitrites are higher than my ammonia ever got. The color chart is very vague with the purple shading, but my tests are very purple. 20% change yesterday, 50% today and not much difference in the tests that I can see. Will the nitrites take as long as the ammonia? What are the pitfalls for stalling the tank? is that why the nitrites are so high? how do you tell a tank has stalled?

 

[Marconis]

Are you adding ammonia to keep feeding the nitrifying bacteria?

Also, just curious why you are doing water changes? You're supposed to see a spike in nitrites before they reach zero.

Good luck!

 

[Saltair]

There are fish in the tank so no problem adding ammonia, but I cant let the nitrates get so high that they damage the fish.

 

[Marconis]

Ah, well that makes sense that you're doing water changes then. Nitrites are a bigger problem right now for your fish. Could you possibly post all of your parameters in terms of ppm? I have never cycled with fish so hopefully others can chime in as to what your next step should be.

 

[XimeD]

For cycling with fish I would do as many PWCs as necessary to keep ammonia and nitrites at or preferably below 0.25ppm.

Nitrites above 5ppm can stall your cycle but this is only an issue if you are fishless cycling, your nitrites should never be allowed to get that high with fish (fish would probably be dead by then)

I cycled my first tank with fish and it took about 5-7 days from when I started seeing nitrites for the tank to cycle.

 

[ChizerBunoi]

Are you vacuuming the substrate when you do the pwc?