Cycle Week #2 : No Nitrites, but Nitrates are climbing?

[logansmomma1228]

Is this normal? My ammonia is the same, my nitrites are still 0, but I am starting to see Nitrates rising? Doesn't there have to be nitrite before nitrates? Thanks

 

[BigJim]

I have seen people miss the nitrite step of the cycle by not checking their water parameters frequently, but usually they see just ammonia levels, then just nitrate levels. Your situation is a little more bewildering, so I have a few questions for you:

1. What are your water parameters?
2. What kind of test kit are you using to measure those parameters?
3. Did you seed your fishless cycle with media from an established tank?

At the moment, I'm suspecting an inaccurate or misread water test, but I could be wrong.

 

[logansmomma1228]

I am starting to suspect inaccurate test kit as well, I have the paper kind. I bought them with everything else and once I started researching more I found that they are notorious for being inaccurate. I did indeed seed my tank with used filter media, I also put decorations in it from my old tank.
My water params are, according to the test kit I have(not sure if all these are needed):
Nitrates :20ppm
Nitrites: 0ppm
Hardness: 150ppm
Chlorine: 0ppm
Alkalinity: between 120 and 180 ppm
pH: between 7.2 and 7.8
My temp has been 76-78 degrees farenheit and my Ammonia has remained 3-5 ppm since I added it. I also put a little it of fish food in the tank yesterday.

 

[BigJim]

It's possible to have 20ppm of nitrates in your regular tap water, but you did say the nitrate level has been rising and if you're using strips, I'd blame them. I'd highly recommend getting a liquid reagent test kit. I'm a fan of the API Freshwater Master. There's a bit of sticker shock, but it's much cheaper per test than the strips. It's also much more reliable.

 

[jsoong]

Test your tap water with the kit. That should tell you how accurate it is. <Or if there is nitrates in your water to start.>

Also, if you just added the ammonia, then the level is of course 3-4 or whatever you added. However, if the cycle is completed (which is possible if you have seeded heavily), the ammonia should be all gone within a few hours of you adding it. Check the ammonia say 6-12 hrs after dosing & see what shows up.

If you have seeded the tank, it is possible to not see the nitrite spike. Since the bacteria would be there to convert it to nitrate as fast as the nitrites are being formed.

 

[logansmomma1228]

Test your tap water with the kit. That should tell you how accurate it is. <Or if there is nitrates in your water to start.>

Might I ask how I can tell if the kit is accurate from this? Thanks guys, you are a lot of help. I really appreciate it

 

[jsoong]

Tap water usu. have no nitrates, nitrites or ammonia. So your test kit should read zero. If not, something is wrong.

In areas with agricultural run-off, there might be nitrates in the water. In that case, you look up the water quality report from the water co., find what the level is, and compared that to the test. <You should then also test distilled water to make sure your kit reads zero when it is supposed to.>

To fully validate your test kit, you would also make known concentrations of nitrates (using KNO3, eg) and calibrate the test kit. The plant people do that (since most will have KNO3 on hand), but prob not needed for the average guy. As long as you know the kit can read zero, then you can trust that a positive reading of nitrates is accurate. It doesn't matter much if the "true" level is 10 or 20, as long as you can trust the kit's positive test & the level is rising, you can be confident that the cycle is progressing.