Just curious, I've been cycling my tanks for a little over a month and I'm still getting nitrites, they go up about .25 every day. I've been doing daily 50% water changes (I hate to see my water bill :thud: )
How long for nitrites to get to 0?
- Thread starter karna68
- Start date
Anyone? Can I expect it to be soon since it's only rising about .25 every 24 hours? Or is this something you just can't gauge?
From what I understand about fishless, (I'm a n00b myself) the nitrites will spike for about 7-14 days before disappearing. Your ammonia-eating bacteria are established and making their nitrites as waste but the nitrite-eaters aren't plentiful enough to eat the nitrites to 0.
Here's a link about fishless FW cycling: http://www.aquariumboard.com/forums...ng-tank-fw.html
Here's a link about fishless FW cycling: http://www.aquariumboard.com/forums...ng-tank-fw.html
Are you doing fishless or fish cycle. If your doing a fishless cycle, your not supposed to do any water changes, until your ammonia is 0 and your nitrites are 0. Then you do a dose of ammonia wait 24 hours, and see if they read zero. If they do, thats when you do the water change.
It's a fishy cycle. Honestly I've only been testing myself for about a week. I had been doing w/c's bi-weekly before that and having the water tested at my LFS.
In my experience, the nitrite stage takes quite a bit longer than the initial ammonia-eating stage. I'd say you can expect to see nitrites for at least 3-4 weeks. One time, I changed 100% of my gravel on a cycled tank, left the filter totally untouched, and I still had nitrite for nearly a month. I was doing daily or even twice daily WC's, though, because my otos would breathe rapidly as soon as any nitrite registered on a test.
A fishy cycle seems to take forever, especially if you are starting from scratch and have no seeded material. Just don't do what I did, get the cycle to near completion and change filters. My tank has not been right since.
I feel your pain!
I have been doing w/c every 2-4 days, testing daily. I have been cycling with fish since end of August. I have three harlequin in my tank and do water changes once the nitrite reads over .25. I've been doing 30% w/c as needed since September 10th!
It's so frustrating. I will absolutely celebrate when those nitrites go away. I feel like my tank is stuck, but I'm trying to be patient. I wanted to put in Bio Spira but got spooked because of my three harlequin already being in there.
Keep me posted on how your tank is going. I totally understand about the water bill, ours is expensive out here in the (semi) desert.
I have been doing w/c every 2-4 days, testing daily. I have been cycling with fish since end of August. I have three harlequin in my tank and do water changes once the nitrite reads over .25. I've been doing 30% w/c as needed since September 10th!
It's so frustrating. I will absolutely celebrate when those nitrites go away. I feel like my tank is stuck, but I'm trying to be patient. I wanted to put in Bio Spira but got spooked because of my three harlequin already being in there.
Keep me posted on how your tank is going. I totally understand about the water bill, ours is expensive out here in the (semi) desert.
I just figured it up and doing 50% daily water changes on a 30 gallon is an extra 400 gallons a month!! :thud: