Trouble cycling new tank

[cyberCoder]

Feb-28 10PM : Ammonia <4ppm. Lighter color but not 2ppm yet.
March-3 5PM: Ammonia 1-2ppm , closer to 1ppm, and nitrite at 0.1ppm

Water continue to become slightly more cloudy. Should I dose more ammonia and some fish food ?

 

[cyberCoder]

I also tested Nitrate, and i would say it's 5-10ppm. I added two pictures and the nitrate i have to use pure RODI water to compare. Looks like Nitrate is being created.

 

[lapin]

Feb 20th started cycle today March 3rd = 2 1/2 weeks.
No need to worry about nitrate. If you have nitrite the nitrate test will be off.
Let the ammonia go down to .25 if you are using api test.
Then add ammonia to bring it back up to 2ppm. It will reduce to .25 pretty fast if your cycle is going well. There should be no need to add any more ammonia after this. You then need to wait for nitrite to hit 0. This will take longer because that is the last type of bacteria to grow. When it hits 0 then change out the water to get your nitrates down to 5 ppm which is a good level for a tank.

 

[cyberCoder]

thanks, so when next time I add ammonia to 2ppm, if it takes 1 week to get to Nitrite 0ppm, i should not feed the tank in the middle? I thought the bacteria would die :)

 

[cyberCoder]

Just to summarize so far, 14 days and the ammonia continues to go down, but not yet 0.25. Nitrite is not very high. And I have not added any ammonia so far, just want to check that I should continue to wait until I see Ammonia drop to 0.25 before I do anything.

In addition, I am adding about 1 liter water RODI water every day so far without salt because the winter is quite dry here.

2/25/2019 Ammonia 4ppm.
2/28/2019 Ammonia <4ppm.
3/3/2019 Ammonia 2 Nitrite 0
3/4/2019 Ammonia 2 Nitrite 0
3/5/2019 Ammonia 1.8 Nitrite 0.2
3/6/2019 Ammonia 1 Nitrite 0.3
3/7/2019 Ammonia 1 Nitrite 0.25
3/10/2019 Ammonia 0.75 Nitrite 0.4 Nitrate 10