10 gallon cycle log (& questions galore)

[librarygirl]

Do you know WHY yours took 4 months? I keep feeling I'm doing something wrong or missing something. For the life of me I don't know what it could be.

I think mine was a special case lol I"m still not 100% sure but Eco and I narrowed it down to my tap water -- either something lacking from it that the bacteria needed or something in it that was preventing bacteria from colonizing. I switched to spring water with minerals and my tank cycled in 3 weeks. So something was up with my tap water I guess. I wouldn't go as far as that in your case yet though.

 

[Vol4Ever]

During your ordeal, were you showing -ites and -ates? Mine are off the charts which at least tells me the bacteria are there. The -ite to -ate conversion just can't keep up with the ammonia conversion speed.

 

[librarygirl]

During your ordeal, were you showing -ites and -ates? Mine are off the charts which at least tells me the bacteria are there. The -ite to -ate conversion just can't keep up with the ammonia conversion speed.

No, that was part of the problem. My ammonia would convert either not at all or stuck at a very low level of conversion and I never saw nitrites. I even put two different types of seeded filters into my tank and no progress at all. Only when I switched to spring water did I start to convert ammonia and see nitrites rise. So since you at least have nitrites and nitrates, which is showing conversion, I think you're OK. The nitrite phase is the longer of the phases so it can take a bit of time to come down, but it'll happen.

 

[Vol4Ever]

LOG WED OCT 12

Hallo-freakin-lujah!!! I *may* be there. I got in this morning and ammonia & nitrite were both clean ZERO.

I dosed 'er back up to 4 ppm this time, and we'll see what everything looks like tomorrow morning. Not sure what to expect since I didn't do a full dose yesterday. Either way, it's the first glimmer of hope that next week should be FISH WEEK.

Stay tuned . . . .

 

[librarygirl]

LOG WED OCT 12

Hallo-freakin-lujah!!! I *may* be there. I got in this morning and ammonia & nitrite were both clean ZERO.

I dosed 'er back up to 4 ppm this time, and we'll see what everything looks like tomorrow morning. Not sure what to expect since I didn't do a full dose yesterday. Either way, it's the first glimmer of hope that next week should be FISH WEEK.

Stay tuned . . . .

Awesome! See? Patience pays off in the end.

 

[pdw1731]

LOG WED OCT 12

Hallo-freakin-lujah!!! I *may* be there. I got in this morning and ammonia & nitrite were both clean ZERO.

I dosed 'er back up to 4 ppm this time, and we'll see what everything looks like tomorrow morning. Not sure what to expect since I didn't do a full dose yesterday. Either way, it's the first glimmer of hope that next week should be FISH WEEK.

Stay tuned . . . .

I'm glad to hear that because we know you've been a long time waiting. I do have a question though. Would you have been better served by only dosing ammo up to about 1-2ppm though? My thinking, based on what I've read and my experience as that you got your ammo and -trites to zero, a good thing. If you dose to 2 and it's all gone tomorrow, you'll be happy; however, if you dose to 4 and tomorrow it converts to 2, you'll be upset again. Same thing, different perspective. On Thursday, after you get your readings, dose to 3ppm. Wehn you get back on Monday, you know they'll all be gone so be ready to do a big wc and break out the credit card for fish.

Good luck bruh...know i'm rooting for ya

 

[Vol4Ever]

Nah. I won't be upset. This mornings results gave me a bit of a second wind. It was proof positive that I'm really close even if it's not tomorrow. Won't be stocking til next week anyway.

 

[pdw1731]

just checking on you, Bub

 

[Vol4Ever]

Had a bit of a setback over the weekend. Another stupid pH crash at some point, and everything halted. Did a big WC yesterday and put the lace rock in there this time to see if that helps with pH stabilize.

Since it is in my office, I don't have a ton of time to mess with it. I'm just ready to populate it with fish, feed them every day, and do small water changes every now & then! Gotta be more relaxing than what I'm doing now. Wow.

 

[Vol4Ever]

During the last 2 water changes, I switched to Prime (had been using NovAqua+ before). The Prime calls for a MUCH smaller dose than the NovAqua. For a 10 gallon tank the math works out to 1 mL to treat the entire tank, which only comes out to a couple of big drops. That's the dose I used, and now I'm afraid it wasn't enough. My cycle seems to have stalled as the tank is no longer processing ammonia. I'm scared I didn't use enough Prime, and the tap water chlorine killed off the bacteria.

If I have to start over from scratch again, I'm sorely tempted to give up this stupid hobby before I even get my first fish.

 

[pdw1731]

During the last 2 water changes, I switched to Prime (had been using NovAqua+ before). The Prime calls for a MUCH smaller dose than the NovAqua. For a 10 gallon tank the math works out to 1 mL to treat the entire tank, which only comes out to a couple of big drops. That's the dose I used, and now I'm afraid it wasn't enough. My cycle seems to have stalled as the tank is no longer processing ammonia. I'm scared I didn't use enough Prime, and the tap water chlorine killed off the bacteria.

If I have to start over from scratch again, I'm sorely tempted to give up this stupid hobby before I even get my first fish.

Hey boss, whats the update on you

 

[Vol4Ever]

Finally got the ammonia cycling again shortly after the message you just referenced. Not sure what caused the temporary stall. It never would get everything to zero, but the ammonia-nitrite-nitrate process was definitely going.

After almost 2 months of waiting, I finally said "screw it" and bought 2 guppies. Did a couple of massive WC down to the gravel until all the readings were practically zero & put them suckers in there on Oct 26. Tank has been running really stable ever since, and the fish seem to be happy. I've killed off 2 snails somehow which I don't understand? Second wasn't put in until after the first died. No more bioload than I've added, the tank is staying at 0 ammonia and nitrite while the nitrate is SLOWLY climbing. No idea why 2 different mystery snails from 2 different stores didn't last more than 48 hours?

Gonna do fish add #2 (probably harly rasbos) sometime this week or next. For now, it's just nice to actually see something swimming in the tank!