Hey all,
I'm new here and just want some advice. I am no stranger to reef tanks and have had successful setups for many years. Freshwater now, that is new territory.
Anyhow, I had purchased my daughter a 5.5g freshwater tank and she wanted to cycle it using ammonia. I got the ACE brand that was recommended, used Seachem Prime to condition the water before adding the ammonia, etc... Got a bubbler to speed up the process, running the tank temp around 84, & started the cycle on January 12th.
We purchased the API complete test kit. Now I have always had a problem with reading the colors on the chart even though I am not colorblind. I think I may have added too much ammonia at the start doing something like 13 drops of ammonia, my brain kept telling me I got her a 10g tank, but that was not so. The reading has been around 4.0ppm with little variance, could it possibly have been 8.0, maybe. Anyhow, with continued testing it seemed to not come down so much, which made me think the tank had a stall in the cycle. But then I notice the cycle will sometimes look, 4.0 or 2.0. Weird. It never tested for nitrates until today. I think only .25, but the ammonia is still sky high. 4.0 I'd say. Personally, after reading tons of info online, I never thought the cycle would take this long being we are in the 5th week already. But my daughter is the best and has been a patient girl.
So here's my questions:
1. Do we clean everything out and attempt to start over?
2. Is the new sign of nitrite even remotely promising?
3. Lastly, when adding water from evaporation, do you guys also treat that water with prime? I was.
If I missed anything please don't hesitate to ask questions. There is also no detection of Nitrates, figured to test everything. Sorry for the wall of txt, possibly me doing a tank this size is just a challenge for me. Thank you.
I'm new here and just want some advice. I am no stranger to reef tanks and have had successful setups for many years. Freshwater now, that is new territory.
Anyhow, I had purchased my daughter a 5.5g freshwater tank and she wanted to cycle it using ammonia. I got the ACE brand that was recommended, used Seachem Prime to condition the water before adding the ammonia, etc... Got a bubbler to speed up the process, running the tank temp around 84, & started the cycle on January 12th.
We purchased the API complete test kit. Now I have always had a problem with reading the colors on the chart even though I am not colorblind. I think I may have added too much ammonia at the start doing something like 13 drops of ammonia, my brain kept telling me I got her a 10g tank, but that was not so. The reading has been around 4.0ppm with little variance, could it possibly have been 8.0, maybe. Anyhow, with continued testing it seemed to not come down so much, which made me think the tank had a stall in the cycle. But then I notice the cycle will sometimes look, 4.0 or 2.0. Weird. It never tested for nitrates until today. I think only .25, but the ammonia is still sky high. 4.0 I'd say. Personally, after reading tons of info online, I never thought the cycle would take this long being we are in the 5th week already. But my daughter is the best and has been a patient girl.
So here's my questions:
1. Do we clean everything out and attempt to start over?
2. Is the new sign of nitrite even remotely promising?
3. Lastly, when adding water from evaporation, do you guys also treat that water with prime? I was.
If I missed anything please don't hesitate to ask questions. There is also no detection of Nitrates, figured to test everything. Sorry for the wall of txt, possibly me doing a tank this size is just a challenge for me. Thank you.