So I just got started with this new hobby a couple of weeks ago, did a considerate amount of reading, decided to go the fishless route. Picked up a 29 gallon and I've had it fully setup and running without fish for the past 2 weeks.
Dosed to 3-4 ppm ammonia with ace hardware ammonia the first day, ammonia stayed pretty consistent for the whole week (which was expected). On day one of the second week I added an AngelsPlus active sponge filter to run along side my fluval 70. I read a lot of great things about these active filters giving a significant boost in cycling, so I decided why the hell not.
24 hours after I added the filter I had ammonia drop from 4ppm to 1ppm. I tested for nitrites and saw 0, went ahead and for the hell of it tested for nitrates and bam 5ppm (I have none in my tap water). I went ahead and re-dosed to 4ppm ammonia and let it sit for another 24 hours. The next day I went ahead and tested everything again, ammonia was back down to 1ppm, nitrites still 0 and nitrates are now about 80ppm.
Is it possible that I completely skipped the nitrite spike part of the cycle. If I'm consistently reading ammonia drops and nitrate rises without any sign of nitrite where exactly am I in the cycle?
Dosed to 3-4 ppm ammonia with ace hardware ammonia the first day, ammonia stayed pretty consistent for the whole week (which was expected). On day one of the second week I added an AngelsPlus active sponge filter to run along side my fluval 70. I read a lot of great things about these active filters giving a significant boost in cycling, so I decided why the hell not.
24 hours after I added the filter I had ammonia drop from 4ppm to 1ppm. I tested for nitrites and saw 0, went ahead and for the hell of it tested for nitrates and bam 5ppm (I have none in my tap water). I went ahead and re-dosed to 4ppm ammonia and let it sit for another 24 hours. The next day I went ahead and tested everything again, ammonia was back down to 1ppm, nitrites still 0 and nitrates are now about 80ppm.
Is it possible that I completely skipped the nitrite spike part of the cycle. If I'm consistently reading ammonia drops and nitrate rises without any sign of nitrite where exactly am I in the cycle?