Newbie here! Cycled 36 gal for 2 weeks. PH was 7.4, ammonia, nitrates and nitrites all 0. Put in 3 fancy goldfish. 1" to 3". Water and fish great for another week. Did 5 gal water change with some vacuuming. PH is 7.4, ammonia is between .50 & 1.0, nitrites and nitrates 0. Where did I go wrong and please help me on how to remedy this issue.
Ammonia levels rising
- Thread starter Tree77
- Start date
How did you cycle?? Your readings say you did not start or finish cycle. Nitrates could not have been "0". That means no cycle.
You are cycling now, not a bad thing. Add some Prime, and do some water changes.
You are cycling now, not a bad thing. Add some Prime, and do some water changes.
0 nitrates is good to have, but near impossible with a cycled freshwater tank. Fish waste turns into ammonia, bacteria turn ammonia into nitrite, different bacteria turn nitrite into nitrate. Usually it stops right there in a freshwater setup. Plants will grab some of the nitrates, but usually not enough to keep them at 0. Water changes is the way to get rid of the nitrates (basically by diluting them to low enough and safe levels), but even with plants you have to take the nitrates back out (by pruning the plants so they don't grow out of control). Chemical filtration is also possible - there you get rid of them by replacing the chemicals.
Water changes will not hurt the cycle any if all you do is change the water. If you disrupt or clean the biological media of your filter, then yes you would slow the cycle down or if overdone kill the cycling. Depends on your filtration where the bacteria live (to be effective they have to attach to surfaces, so freefloating in water won't help). Sponge filter, they live in the sponge - rinsing out the sponge to clean will take some bacteria with it. Under gravel filter - bacteria live on gravel - vacuum gravel will take out some bacteria with it. And so on and so on.
Water changes will not hurt the cycle any if all you do is change the water. If you disrupt or clean the biological media of your filter, then yes you would slow the cycle down or if overdone kill the cycling. Depends on your filtration where the bacteria live (to be effective they have to attach to surfaces, so freefloating in water won't help). Sponge filter, they live in the sponge - rinsing out the sponge to clean will take some bacteria with it. Under gravel filter - bacteria live on gravel - vacuum gravel will take out some bacteria with it. And so on and so on.
When cycling a tank you will first see ammonia, then nitrite, then finally nitrate. seeing nitrate while cycling a tank is a good thing. Your tank is not yet cycled. Keep doing water changes to keep the ammonia very low...
