Today marks the second week of cycling my tank. I used Dr. Tim's system. My ammonia reading showed zero today; however, my nitrite readings are off the chart and it has been that way for the last week. I've been dosing ammonia every other day and my ammonia goes down the next day, but today was the first day it showed zero, but the nitrite readings continue to be sky high. I'm not that concerned about it, but I thought the ammonia and nitrite readings would go down together? Any thoughts?
cycling readings
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its been dosed so much w ammonia the nitrite may not clear for a long time. todays updated cycling doesnt factor nitrite anyway, you are set.
set = if you changed out all your water (removes bac from suspension) and refilled, then dosed back to 1 ppm, then rechecked in 24 hours, I bet that ammonia w be moving down or zero (which is proof surfaces are ready)
Todays bottle bac makes tanks ready fast, way faster than 2 weeks which is how everyone is pulling off those fish-in cycles without loss. I would bet fully your tank can pass a clean water test. A wastewater test is subject to all kinds of misreads, searches on APi accuracy shows. You could easily just leave the current water running a few more weeks for it to clear, but then we're into regular cycling and didnt need that $ purchase. Its ready due to the $ purchase bottle bac.
misreads for nitrite include: any use of Prime water prep. high levels of nitrate cross read as nitrite on api kits
nitrite is unharmful at all stages, and we can see from cycling charts by day 20 it will always comply with ammonia (on a clean water test) so thats why whatever it reads right now doesnt matter. Even though the directions say to watch out for elevated levels, you can't stall a cycle with either boosted nitrite or ammonia, you can proceed. The labels are wrong.
set = if you changed out all your water (removes bac from suspension) and refilled, then dosed back to 1 ppm, then rechecked in 24 hours, I bet that ammonia w be moving down or zero (which is proof surfaces are ready)
Todays bottle bac makes tanks ready fast, way faster than 2 weeks which is how everyone is pulling off those fish-in cycles without loss. I would bet fully your tank can pass a clean water test. A wastewater test is subject to all kinds of misreads, searches on APi accuracy shows. You could easily just leave the current water running a few more weeks for it to clear, but then we're into regular cycling and didnt need that $ purchase. Its ready due to the $ purchase bottle bac.
misreads for nitrite include: any use of Prime water prep. high levels of nitrate cross read as nitrite on api kits
nitrite is unharmful at all stages, and we can see from cycling charts by day 20 it will always comply with ammonia (on a clean water test) so thats why whatever it reads right now doesnt matter. Even though the directions say to watch out for elevated levels, you can't stall a cycle with either boosted nitrite or ammonia, you can proceed. The labels are wrong.
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no that wont hurt, its considered cycled bc if you changed all the water, it retains the ability to pass a light ammonia oxidation test. I realize Im positing that before we see the tests 
am just going off big threads where Dr Reef has already tested your ammonia type added + our microbiology of cycling thread that has lots of these already on file. You can't go wrong no matter what you add or withhold until December.
am just going off big threads where Dr Reef has already tested your ammonia type added + our microbiology of cycling thread that has lots of these already on file. You can't go wrong no matter what you add or withhold until December.
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S.Pepper
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no that wont hurt, its considered cycled bc if you changed all the water, it retains the ability to pass a light ammonia oxidation test. I realize Im positing that before we see the tests
Thx, Brandon. I'm just taking it slow and easy.
one other facet from the mbc thread, you don't have to ghost feed to keep bac alive. It loads your tank w algae fuel, so if youd like to wait till Dec Id just let it ride or do the water change and not add stuff back. Literally the bac are accessing feed in many ways via the water, they do not need us to keep loading up the tank. we have a three year fallow test + some 2 yr ones for that type of reference.
Truly it’s no harm if you do. Randy once told us in a thread that nitrate doesn’t have a storage mechanism to be bound into live rock (not counting detritus organic loading that’s different and not applicable since liquid ammonia isn’t solid form nitrogen) so if you add ammonia but keep lights off or low to prevent excess primary invaders like algae, it’s no harm, theyll eat it
when people dose fish feed and whole pellet or meat to rocks that will sit a while, that does breakdown into more than nitrate alone and it begins to contribute to storing up organics and detritus in the system. Phosphate is thought to have a storage mechanism in live rock as a bound nutrient coming from whole feeds, ammonium chloride is fine to add if you like and if you don’t they’re living on natural incoming contaminants anyway.
when people dose fish feed and whole pellet or meat to rocks that will sit a while, that does breakdown into more than nitrate alone and it begins to contribute to storing up organics and detritus in the system. Phosphate is thought to have a storage mechanism in live rock as a bound nutrient coming from whole feeds, ammonium chloride is fine to add if you like and if you don’t they’re living on natural incoming contaminants anyway.
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S.Pepper
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Truly it’s no harm if you do. Randy once told us in a thread that nitrate doesn’t have a storage mechanism to be bound into live rock (not counting detritus organic loading that’s different and not applicable since liquid ammonia isn’t solid form nitrogen) so if you add ammonia but keep lights off or low to prevent excess primary invaders like algae, it’s no harm, theyll eat it
when people dose fish feed and whole pellet or meat to rocks that will sit a while, that does breakdown into more than nitrate alone and it begins to contribute to storing up organics and detritus in the system. Phosphate is thought to have a storage mechanism in live rock as a bound nutrient coming from whole feeds, ammonium chloride is fine to add if you like and if you don’t they’re living on natural incoming contaminants anyway.
Thx. I am reading your, "The microbiology of reef tank cycling." Wish i would have seen this before i started... not that i am at a point where i can't look back, but it would have given me a different thought process going into the cycling phase.
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