phosphate?

[tommyslotz]

I'm day 18 into my fishless cycle. I have a fluval 13.5 with 20 lbs carib sea aragalive and 12 -15 lbs of marco dry rock, also using dr.tims to cycle. The most my ammonia went up was .5 then nitrite went to 4 then my nitrites went to 100. after day 12 I did a 50% water change to help bring nitrates down , which didnt work. They stayed at 100 for about 5 days then went to 50. today I tested and NH3 was 0 NO2 0 but my NO3 was 35, so I tested KH 7.7 and Phosphate was 0. Am I going in the right direction. Also I've got pods coming in Friday, will they help the situation. thanks

 

[Quietman]

1 ppm ammonia becomes 2.7 ppm nitrite becomes 3.6 ppm nitrate assuming no removal and accurate test kit but still good ball park.

Might have heavily dosed ammonia to get that high so yes your water change likely had a big effect. You are in fact headed in the right direction. Wouldn't do anything but a another water change or three.

Those numbers shouldn't impact any pods and pods really won't do much with nitrates.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

FWIW, the nitrate was a false high reading from nitrite interference. Don’t do water changes on the basis of nitrate readings when nitrite is present. It’s a wasted effort.

 

[Uncle99]

I'm day 18 into my fishless cycle. I have a fluval 13.5 with 20 lbs carib sea aragalive and 12 -15 lbs of marco dry rock, also using dr.tims to cycle. The most my ammonia went up was .5 then nitrite went to 4 then my nitrites went to 100. after day 12 I did a 50% water change to help bring nitrates down , which didnt work. They stayed at 100 for about 5 days then went to 50. today I tested and NH3 was 0 NO2 0 but my NO3 was 35, so I tested KH 7.7 and Phosphate was 0. Am I going in the right direction. Also I've got pods coming in Friday, will they help the situation. thanks

Seems right to me.

Phosphate is very hard to read as the colour change is very very faint….my salifert always reads zero (clear)….when my Hanna says .2ppm (also clear)….so you likely have trace phosphate.

 

[tommyslotz]

Thanks everyone for the info. I dosed 40 drops per tims instructions. I thought the NH3 reading would have been higer initially but when I saw it that low I didn't understand how NO3 got that high. But since NO2 is finally 0 I'll do another water change and see how that goes.