Great article ! I am new to the hobby and relatively new to forums. I have a question. I have a 40 gallon breeder tank that I just added ammonium chloride to yesterday along with 2oz of turbo start 900. One day later (today) my ammonium is low .025 nitrite high and nitrate at 40. So after reading your article I added more ammonium chloride to get ammonia level back to 2 ppm. Was this correct ? Also I just noticed pH is now 7.8 so I will have to add something to bring that back up. Also, how to I get the nitrates out of tank ? I’m assuming just water change but at what point I am already at 40 ppm. I have dry Marco rock and 40 lbs of live sand that might not be live after all this. Lol. Thanks for all your help in advance !
First, don't worry about the nitrates now. If you have nitrite in the tank, your test kit is giving you a false high reading. It is impossible for 2 ppm of ammonia to be converted into 40 ppm of nitrate.
Second, don't keep dosing the ammonia until you see nitrites spike and then start coming back down. If you dose to much, you could stall your cycle by having to much nitrite in the tank.
Don't worry about what you have already dosed, you should be fine. Just wait until nitrites peak, and then go back down, preferably below 5 ppm.
@Brew12, you are quick on the draw!