Cycle problems FAQ

[kreblak]

I have been thinking a lot about the number of questions posted about cycle delays and things generally taking longer than normal. Something has occurred to me, and I thought I would bounce this off of you all to see if it holds water, so to speak.

During cycling, if you add conditioned tap water for your top offs, that chlorine conditioner is detoxifying ammonia and nitrites as well. Every time you top off the tank, you are wiping out the bacteria's food source. Perhaps this is the reason for people having excessive delays in cycle time.

If you are one of the people experiencing problems cycling, could you reply to this and tell me whether or not you were using conditioned tap water or RO/DI water? During my first cycle, I used conditioned water, and it took 9 weeks for me to get ammonia and nitrites down to zero.

Perhaps going forward we should mention to people NOT to amquesl, prime, or other conditioners during a cycle. What do you all think about this?

[Ray Pollett]

I never use any of them in salt water anyway. I mix the salt straight in the tap water and pour it into the tanks.

Ray

[OrionGirl]

The chlorine conditioners do not 'get rid' of the ammonia, they convert it into a non-toxic form, ammonium. The bacteria use ammonium and ammonia equally. Actually, ammonium naturally occurs in some conditions--low pH allows the ammonia to convert to ammonium. At high pH (such as in SW tanks), the ammonium is stripped of it's -OH quickly, and becomes ammonia again.

I'm not sure what conditioners impact nitrites?

[liquafaction]

I live in the middle of the woods, and have a well dug into sparta sand. I have zero chlorine, and zero iron. There may be some bacteria of some sort, I don't know what can live that deep, and in that cold of a condition.

[kreblak]

OG - Prime claims to detoxify ammonia and nitrites.


Anyway, I guess that shoots down my theory.