Fishless Cycle Now What?

[Boohoo]

Tap Water
Ammonia~0
Nitrite~0
Nitrate~0
GH~less than 20
KH~less than 20
PH~6.2-6.4

BTW water is from a well not a town supply.

 

[tuvok]

Was this the right thing to do. I did not do a water change. I added 4 tsp. baking soda. GH was and still remains at 60 KH was less than 10 now it is 70 PH was 6.2 and is now 7.2

For what it is worth when I was doing a fishless cycle I added baking soda in a very uncontrolled manner after a pH drop. The pH shot up quite drastically but the tank still cycled a few days later (I was a few weeks into the process). I would not worry about it too much.

 

[Kasakato]

It was a good idea to add the baking soda. A water change wont help bacause the water is soft too.

 

[Boohoo]

What have I done? As I stated yesterday, I added the baking soda. I checked ammonia which was 0 and added my daily dose. I was a little lazy and didn't check nitrites or nitrates since I just checked them the day before and they were off the charts. So today I checked everything, what has happened???
Ammonia~0
Nitrite~0
Nitrate~10-20
PH~7.2
GH~60
KH~50

My test kits are fine as I checked my 2 other tanks. One of those tanks is showing a slight rise in Nitrites( I have been feeding very generously this week ) so I know the nitrite test is fine. My kit for nitrates says when there is a very high nitrite reading that the nitrate reading may not be accurateS so my guess is that my nitrates were not as high as I thought all along. Anyways did I mess something up or is this tank pretty much cycled? Today is day 19 The tank was originally seeded with 2 sponges from an established tank and then a week later I put my old filter cartridge in when I changed my 10g.

 

[Boohoo]

Bump

 

[anonapersona]

done!

Sounds like you're done... so, you've learned that you need to be very careful about keeping the GH and KH up on your tanks, always adding baking soda or some other source (coral sand or crushed coral or marble or something). And, you've demeonstrated that using seeded filters, old sponge filters, really speeds up the process!

Now, you can start adding fish. Feed lightly, monitor pH, ammonia and nitrites, monitor KH and GH. Do not let pH crash -- very bad for bacteria as well as fish. Consider how to keep pH more stable, investigate commercial additives as well as coral sands.

 

[Boohoo]

With the reading I have for nitrates should I do a large water change first or isn't it necessary?

 

[Kasakato]

Isent needed. You want to keep them below 20ppm though.

 

[tuvok]

I would do a water change as it it would be best to start off with as low a load of nitrogenous content as possible. 20ppm is the highest I prefer my NO3 levels to be, so by my standards (which are by no means authoritative) you would be due for a water change if the aquarium contained fish anyway. I would do the change in the morning of the day that you planned on stocking the tank and then head off to the LFS to pick out some fish.

 

[Boohoo]

Well they are closer to 10 than 20. I also have 6 live plants in there.