Nitrites aren't going down?

[Lil' RegalReefster]

Hi there, I have a Red Sea Reefer 450 and I started cycling my tank about 2 weeks ago. It has plenty of sand dry live rock and a couple of marine pure bricks. I am using Microbacter start XLM and I have followed all the instructions correctly. I used pure ammonium chloride as my nitrogen source. I dosed the ammonia to around 3 mg/L and after 3 days it was completely gone as indicated by three different test kits. The Nitrites went up to 4 mg/L and after two days dropped to 2 mg/L (the Nitrates went up to 100+ mg/L and did not change). After a week and a half, the nitrites did not drop whatsoever. I then decided to do a 75 percent water last night to remove excess trites and trates. This morning I tested the water again and the trites and trates remained the EXACT SAME. I double-checked with two other types of test kits and they both gave the same results. Am I missing something? please advise ( the trites tested at 2mg/L and the trates tested at 60-100mg/L)

 

[brandon429]

We now use your stated params and timeframes to deem the cycle done, not stalled. Change out as much algae fuel cycling water and begin/ ammonia control + timeframes on bottle directions have been met. Regarding nitrite control consider this, we dont care to know it:

Nitrite Toxicity

Hey guys I have an aquarium system that has about 45gallons of water cycling so I Let it cycle for about week and I added seeded marine pure ceramic balls and the bacteria in a bottle. I had no choice but to add my 2 clownfish from my quarantine into the tank.. because I needed to put a sick...

www.reef2reef.com

In any of my cycling threads you can start and be reefing lightly/ use what you established. Other approaches have you wait as long as an unassisted cycle chart shows though you bought products able to speed up that process, shown by the quick ammonia processing.

The number one assessment old school cycling states is that you are stalled, cannot begin.


The number one rule for new cycling science says you can begin since you've met time frames and ammonia control after direct inoculation

 

[Lil' RegalReefster]

How come even after the huge water change my parameters stayed the same?

 

[brandon429]

We're excluding nitrite and nitrate from the assessment though


ammonia already demonstrated controlled. Your stated nitrite params can be found in hundreds of posts doesn't mean the readings are correct. And if they are, nitrite is neutral it doesn't factor.

Nitrate by rule is produced in your ammonia oxidation, we dont need to see your measures to know about it. It's inferred from ammonia performance after inoculation. We have threads showing 50 ppm nitrate readings on a given sample between two brands, if you stated zero nitrate everyone would think you're stalled but could really be at 40 ppm


Using ammonia only cycling clearly has benefits beyond eliminating misreads.

New cycling science knows reef cycles don't stall, it's why all the sales tanks at macna have no trouble setting up shop then back home after, for 20 years.


How your tests read beyond ammonia control only matters if you use old cycling approaches. They're able to start macna reef conventions by using the new ways


however long it takes non digital test kits to register zero on numbers that are never zero in reefing is opposite of your allowed start date, depending on what kind of cycling you run.

 

[Lil' RegalReefster]

ohhhhh. ok thx.

 

[brandon429]

the truth is waiting a full month is no harm and the tests will likely line up by then

we just nerd out on earliest possible start date since everyone's in a rush nowadays w deadlines lol

If it's less confusing here's an application thread where we take stalled readings, do a full water change after the submersion time was in place, then re test to prove a cycle using ammonia only.

100% Water Change

So in my previous thread, I had an ammonia issue that was out of hand. As suggested, I did a 100% WC and now i’m wondering when I should start adding fish back. If anyone has suggestions, let me know!

www.reef2reef.com

 

[Lil' RegalReefster]

does this mean I can add? invertebrates or fish

 

[brandon429]

We like to advise choosing a fish disease protocol before adding them, first fish in brings in disease unless you choose quarantined / prepped ones for the new tank, but it can handle fish after your water change to whichever degree you can do. In my tank builds fish are delayed so the new tank uglies won’t get heavy fish fish loading and feeding, it’s ideal to begin with a clean up crew and some starter corals and slowly bring lighting up to production levels, start low so you won’t drive uglies too far and when rocks start to develop algae, clean it off vs accumulate it

clean like a new garden is manually kept clean until coral density and maturity excludes having to do much work

Who do you trust / when to skip quarantine

AlgaeBarn raises live stock in tanks that have had nothing wild for years and should therefore be clean. Reef cleaners has fish free systems, so their inverts shouldn't be carrying fish diseases. Do folks who follows the "QT anything wet" philosophy trust those vendors enough to make exceptions...

www.reef2reef.com