oceanblue
Aquarium Advice Apprentice
Hi,
I’m new to aquarium hobby. When my son wanted to have a pet, I walked into a local pet store and bought a 10 gallon Aqueon basic kit, without knowing anything about nitrogen cycle. The pet store owner gave a pamphlet about the nitrification process and recommended to start the cycle with 2 feeder fish. First the fish were infected with fungus, and eventually died in 2 weeks. When I was reading about the fungus, I came to know about fishless cycle. After my fish died I started with fishless cycle
Ammonia - 1ppm
Nitrites - 5ppm
Nitrate - 20ppm
I lastly dosed my tank a week ago and did pwc twice.
Finally the nitrites dropped to zero today, nitrate is at about 40ppm, however my ammonia is still at 1ppm.
I’m into 23rd day of my fishless cycle. Is this a normal process? Can the ammonia show readings when the nitrites are reading zero? Did I kill my ammonia > nitrite bacteria somewhere in the process? Thanks for all your comments and suggestions.
I’m new to aquarium hobby. When my son wanted to have a pet, I walked into a local pet store and bought a 10 gallon Aqueon basic kit, without knowing anything about nitrogen cycle. The pet store owner gave a pamphlet about the nitrification process and recommended to start the cycle with 2 feeder fish. First the fish were infected with fungus, and eventually died in 2 weeks. When I was reading about the fungus, I came to know about fishless cycle. After my fish died I started with fishless cycle
- Dosing about 4ppm of ammonia (bought from Ace store) ever other day
- The heater set to 85 F
- Adding (TopFin) bacterial supplement during water top-up/change
- Testing the water parameters after adding ammonia
Ammonia - 1ppm
Nitrites - 5ppm
Nitrate - 20ppm
I lastly dosed my tank a week ago and did pwc twice.
Finally the nitrites dropped to zero today, nitrate is at about 40ppm, however my ammonia is still at 1ppm.
I’m into 23rd day of my fishless cycle. Is this a normal process? Can the ammonia show readings when the nitrites are reading zero? Did I kill my ammonia > nitrite bacteria somewhere in the process? Thanks for all your comments and suggestions.