rich311k said:
Ok folks we are discussing a fishless cycle. A well tested method of cycling a tank. Lets not get off topic here. The nitrate test is not reliable when nitrites are present. Just keep going when nitrite hit 0 you are done. No need for water changes.
Thank you for that interesting point, I wasn't aware the NitrAte test wasn't reliable during the NitrIte phase. That seems a viable answer, since the strange test readings occured when my NitrIte spiked.
Nothing seems to be moving forward at the moment, but I know I'm at that critical NitrIte Spike Day 10 (Day 15 total.) Hopefully the established filters will arrive today or tomorrow and help speed up the process.
I have good reasons for myself having chosen to do Fishless, though everyone around me except DH, has been trying to talk me out of it for weeks. 1) I am ordering my fish, and the bio-load has to be able to sustain the full stock from the getgo. 2) It makes perfect sense to me to "pretend" fish are in there during those first critical weeks, and having smelled ammonia every time I open the bottle, I am thankful there's nothing in that tank to subject that stuff to. 3) I am redecorating/remodeling the bathroom where it's at while I wait for the cycle to finish, which involves paint and fumes and while it's inconclusive the effect that has on fish, this way I don't even have to worry about them.
Was I hoping it would be done by now? Yeah probably, you hear people who successfully cycle in 14 days and you vow you'll do everything, temperature, KH, pH, oxygen, etc., to try and be that person, and when you go for some time without seeing any difference, or you have to explain to everyone who's observing you why you're tank is so cloudy and looks terrible when you're supposedly doing the "right" thing rather than follow the advice of the "experts" in the area... you wonder what in your particular setup worked against you. But oh well, you can't rush nature.
I've also been lax about dosing with ammonia, maybe every other day, because it just seemed like I had SO many NitrItes, but I'll continue to add some every day. This may have made my stall worse. But I guess you live and learn. At the end of the day and the cycle, I'll be glad I did. I really am not in that much of a hurry, since I still have so much left to do in that bathroom, at LEAST I don't have to worry about how the fish are doing, regular water changes, constant testing.
Hope I didn't set the cycle back too much... second guessing myself and overthinking things and not being patient enough to let things work themselves out on their own seems to get me into issues. Hopefully, that seeded media will give me some kind of a break. (That being said, when I don't feed it Ammonia, I have at least a pinch or two of fish food disentegrated in it.)
Thanks for the (other) answers.
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Devilishturtles said:
my NitrIte numbers had suffered... in two days they were back up to 20-30ppm.
Do you mean your nitrate numbers?
Sounds like it coulda been a bacterial bloom maybe.
Bactera do not live in the water, but are surface residers. You heard correctly.
Fishless cycling is really the slow way to go. I'll say, I cycled my very first tank with fish and didn't lose a single one, did water changes a LOT, and the fish were never active...but it took forever and ever to complete. I would have rather just done it the fishless way, let it sit for 3 weeks, and be done. No need for regular testing, just sit back and relax.
I have suspicions with your test kit.... really sounds like odd results. Any chance you'll beout around a petsmart, LFS today that can test the water for you?
No I do not mean NitrAte, I mean NitrIte. It's really off the charts - I had to call the API experts to have them interpret what "green" means. Then to confirm, I have to do my testing in diluted by 10 samples. *lol* To bring it back on the charts so I have an idea how much this is.
Thanks for the comment, but I wouldn't trust any LFS with my water, other than to check kH which I don't have a liquid test for. I hear too many "they said my water was fine" remarks!
P.S. All this has been covered in my previous thread as it was happening, but I didn't get any responses that said 'don't change the water' etc... So I went ahead with it. It's kind of weird talking about it after the fact, since I was trying to avoid making a mistake, which is why I brought the issues here to begin with. I guess it probably just got overlooked. I also discussed how long the tank had gone without ammonia feeding, and my exact dosing, because it
never went above 6ppm Ammonia, which is only slightly high, but it was usually 4ppm. That doesn't really sound like "overdosing" to me, but who knows?! I was told not to worry about it unless it got to 8ppm or so.
I have reduced the amount of ammonia I'm feeding it, to 1/4 tsp, which is about half as much as I had been.
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