I'm a total newb when it comes to fishless cycling. For about a week I've had my aquarium set up with 50 pounds of cleaned Quikrete playsand as well as all of the equipment. I added nothing else. Tonight my first shipment of live plants came and I added them. I was going to start my fishless cycle tonight as well. I tested the ammonia before I did so. It was off the charts of my API master kit. I double checked and same thing. Next I tested water straight from the tap and got a reading of 0.25 ppm. Obviously I need to do a water change to bring the level in the aquarium down but can anyone explain how it got so high?
Ammonia in tank before fishless cycle
- Thread starter nanofish
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eco23
Aquarium Advice Addict
Hmm...assuming the test is correct, that's definitely interesting and I'll be following to see if anyone has ideas. Any chance the wife / husband / girlfriend / boyfriend / parents / kids wanted to get a head start and added ammonia without mentioning it? Do you have any history of sleepwalking? 
jetajockey
come get me tang police!
Some kind of organics could've snuck in the tank during setup, otherwise I don't know.
Update on this. I left the tank go for a while to see what happened while I researched. Since then I've replaced all of the driftwood and changed my water conditioner to one that actually treats ammonia and not just chloramine. I also did a large water change. That was a week ago. Since then I've seen my ammonia rise from 2.0 to 8.0. My nitrites are at least behaving and have dropped from 5.0 to .25. Anyone have any advice for me on what to do now? I'm open to anything and trying to look at the remotest of possibilities by this point from the sand causing it or cigarette smoke or well anything.
Chino1130
Aquarium Advice Activist
Where did you obtain your driftwood?
eco23
Aquarium Advice Addict
Well...the good news is that the tank is cycling without you even touching it. Bad news is we can't stock the thing if it's spiking up to 8ppm without fish or a (known) ammonia source.
Honestly, I don't have a clue and can't provide an explanation...but I'll tell you what I'd do if that tank was in my house. I'd isolate absolutely everything linked to the tank. Personally I'd throw the filter media in a bucket to keep it wet, tear down the tank, give it a quick sanitizing in a mild bleach solution followed by a thorough rinse, toss the play sand into the trash, go down to the pool store and buy a bag of PFS for $10, set it all back up with the new piece of DW you got, refill it, toss the filter media back in and see what it does. I'm sure the plants are fine to add back in. Unless you've got a jungle of rotting plants I can't see that being related personally.
Just a random experiment so you can rule out the water...fill a bucket with it, maybe throw in an air stone (no real reason there other than to prevent stagnant water), and test the water in the bucket for a while.
Again, it's not an explanation, and this is one of the biggest mysteries I've seen here...but that's personally what I'd do. Replacing the filter media now that you've colonized a ton of bacteria in there would be a crime...but everything else I'd ditch and hit reset.
Honestly, I don't have a clue and can't provide an explanation...but I'll tell you what I'd do if that tank was in my house. I'd isolate absolutely everything linked to the tank. Personally I'd throw the filter media in a bucket to keep it wet, tear down the tank, give it a quick sanitizing in a mild bleach solution followed by a thorough rinse, toss the play sand into the trash, go down to the pool store and buy a bag of PFS for $10, set it all back up with the new piece of DW you got, refill it, toss the filter media back in and see what it does. I'm sure the plants are fine to add back in. Unless you've got a jungle of rotting plants I can't see that being related personally.
Just a random experiment so you can rule out the water...fill a bucket with it, maybe throw in an air stone (no real reason there other than to prevent stagnant water), and test the water in the bucket for a while.
Again, it's not an explanation, and this is one of the biggest mysteries I've seen here...but that's personally what I'd do. Replacing the filter media now that you've colonized a ton of bacteria in there would be a crime...but everything else I'd ditch and hit reset.
Unfortunately I did somehow kill all the plants. They were removed though and haven't been in the tank for a week and a half. The water change (about 90 %) happened since then.
I have to go and buy an airstone after work tomorrow but then I'll run the experiment. I'm assuming I should put prime in as well? I'm also going to put the hood on the tank while I do that. I have a bad habit of smoking in the same room and I know it can cause a film in the tank when the surface isn't being agitated. Couldn't hurt to try while I'm waiting on the tap water. If nothing pans out from that I'm definitely taking your advice. I've been trying to do things for this take for going on a couple of months with little luck, while the first enrty in my cycle log goes back a month. Aquariums were so much easier when you threw some ugly gravel and fake plants in. At least I'm getting really good at running tests lol
I have to go and buy an airstone after work tomorrow but then I'll run the experiment. I'm assuming I should put prime in as well? I'm also going to put the hood on the tank while I do that. I have a bad habit of smoking in the same room and I know it can cause a film in the tank when the surface isn't being agitated. Couldn't hurt to try while I'm waiting on the tap water. If nothing pans out from that I'm definitely taking your advice. I've been trying to do things for this take for going on a couple of months with little luck, while the first enrty in my cycle log goes back a month. Aquariums were so much easier when you threw some ugly gravel and fake plants in. At least I'm getting really good at running tests lol
eco23
Aquarium Advice Addict
c_leed said:
Honestly couldn't fathom a way tap water would start with .25ppm, then spontaneously jump to 8ppm. Just doesn't compute with me. The idea is just to scientifically conclude that the water itself isn't the culprit in some random way.
The air stone won't really do anything as far as I know other than preventing a bucket of stagnant water from sitting around your house. But basically I'm just saying I'd isolate everything and rule it out. And yeah, I'd add Prime just like it was going in the tank.
Unless you've already got fish...switching out the substrate and cleaning the tank really isn't a big deal. It's personally what I'd do just to start fresh (while still being way ahead on your cycle.)
I can't remember what you just posted about how long ago you switched DW...so you could always just wait and see if the old stuff was related...I'm just too freaking impatient and would be tearing down and rebuilding, lol.
I saw an article a while ago about nicotine in a fish tank...but I couldn't believe that'd be the cause. Back in the day people smoked all over the place in houses... and I'm not sure it would really have any major effect unless you're hot-boxing the thing. ( < term from my high school years, lol)
Definitely no fish in there. I felt bad enough when the plants died. No way would I put iny fish in there while it's currently in it's death trap form.
I put the DW in only a week ago. I rinsed it really good but didn't soak it because I wanted the tanins. I might need to do the nuclear option since I believe I've had a ph crash as well. The good news at least is that the PFS will take a lot less than the 6 hours I spend cleaning the playground sand.
I've had aquariums around smoke before without any problems like this. I was just trying to think of everything since all those high school science classes aren't helping me now. BTW I looked up hotboxing just to make sure I knew what you meant. Urban Dictionary has some interesting definitions for it
librarygirl
Look It Up
Wow this is a conundrum. I'd do what Eco suggested: test the tap water after letting it sit out for 24 hours or so (test it at few hourly intervals and see what happens) and clean the tank out. Just for the heck of it, what are the last 4 digits on your ammonia test bottles? (I'm assuming you're using the API test). Just to rule out that it's an expired test. It's also possible you got a bad test bottle, it happens. If you really wanted to be safe you could buy another ammonia kit (API sells the liquid test bottles of ammonia separately) and see if you get the same readings.
As soon as I can find someone that sells PFS I will be going the redo route. I actually researched the brand of playsand I bought before hand and found people using it. With everything else changed it has to either be the sand or the aquarium I guess. Hopefully this will take care of things.
I am using the API test. The lot number ends in 0511 so it should be good, or well ar least not expired. I bought my tank at Petsmart and they included a vial to have your water tested. If the readings are still strange after I clean everything I can always have them test it just to make sure I'm not crazy. Should I clean the DW as well when I do this?
I'm not sure if I said this before and if I haven't I'm sorry but thank you everyone for the advice. I've had aquariums before but never had anything like this happen and was at a total loss.
I am using the API test. The lot number ends in 0511 so it should be good, or well ar least not expired. I bought my tank at Petsmart and they included a vial to have your water tested. If the readings are still strange after I clean everything I can always have them test it just to make sure I'm not crazy. Should I clean the DW as well when I do this?
I'm not sure if I said this before and if I haven't I'm sorry but thank you everyone for the advice. I've had aquariums before but never had anything like this happen and was at a total loss.
The water in the bucket stayed at a steady level. No real surprise there. I finally found some time in between all my OT at work so I'm doing cleaning right now. I have a dumb question though. How thorough am I cleaning? I mean should I just do inside the tank, or do I want to also do something to the DW and filter?
librarygirl
Look It Up
I'd clean the DW too, may as well at this point; some people boil it and then let it dry or run it through the dishwasher a few times (make sure the dishwasher doesn't have any soap residue in it; maybe run it empty once just to clean it out). Clean the whole tank with a very mild bleach solution and rinse the heck out of it in hot water. Change out the sand and rinse all decor and put it back in. Don't touch the filter media; just keep it wet in old tank water until you're ready to put it back in. You could clean the filter housing, just be careful how you clean it. Maybe rinse it off it very hot dechlorinated water; the last thing you want is to put something in there that will potentially kill your filter bacteria.
Thanks for the quick reply. No dishwasher so this is going to be much more time consuming than I was hoping. I have a ton of DW in there (6 small, 2 medium, 2 medium/large, and 2 large). I guess my only option is to buy a big container and just boil water to pour on top of it. The tannins were just the right color too.
librarygirl
Look It Up
Where did you get the DW from? If it hadn't been pretreated it's slightly possible that some organic matter is decomposing and causing the ammonia (just a shot in the dark here). You could soak the DW in a tub for a while and test the water before the DW goes in and then after it's in for a while, see if it shows ammonia on the test.
I got it online from Foster and Smith's Aquatics. It's Malaysian. The only prep I gave it was a good rinse and scrub. I skipped the soaking to keep the tannins. This is my seond batch of DW. The first was off ebay and was definitely not as advertised so I blew a bit off money on wood that started decomposing. Even before either of those were in I had ammonia off the charts.
librarygirl
Look It Up
Was the tank and everything in it bought new or used? This is like an enigma wrapped in a riddle shrouded in a mystery...
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