Wrong ammonia or too impatient?

K

kb46

AC Members
May 8, 2007
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Hello,

I am currently fishless cycling an 8g tank and have had no rise in nitrites. Unfortunately I don't own a nitrate test kit but have ordered one - will receive 9th June.

I have been using Ace Hardware Ammonia http://ace.imageg.net/graphics/product_images/pACE3-951689dt.jpg
which I have seen recommended on two forums including this one. I shook the bottle before buying it and no bubbles formed.

I first added ammonia on 10th May. First reading was 3ppm so I added some more ammonia on 11th May and got 3ppm again so I added twice as much ammonia on 12th May and got 5+ppm. (My kit maxes out at 5ppm).

Boosted bacteria as follows:
10th May - before adding ammonia, put 2 sponges and 5 bio-balls from my fishless cycling tank to float in my other tank.
14th May - hung over a cup of gravel from my other tank in a stocking in the filter compartment.
19th May - added the bio-balls back into the fishless cycling tank filter.
24th May - added the floated filter sponges.
No nitrite rise (testing daily) by 26th May. I thought maybe I had OD'd the ammonia, so I did a 50% water change. Ammonia tested 3ppm.

26th May - put in filter sqeezings from other tank, took out bio-balls, rinsed in old tank water and floated them in the other tank again to re-seed them.
30th May - returned bio-balls back into the fishless cycling tank
1st July - no nitrites...

Have I used the wrong ammonia or am I just being too impatient... Should I keep going until 9th June or abandon now?
 
If you have another tank....couldn't you have just run the filter for the new tank on it for a couple of weeks, then brought it over?

If you have one tank, already, I wouldn't even bother going the ammonia route at all.
 
A couple of things come to mind here.

You mention an established tank where you're getting all the media from. Why not just use the media and skip the whole ammonia thing right off the bat? Ammonia, from my understanding, is something that you use if you're doing a fishless cycle and DON'T have access to filter media and the likes that you seem to have.

Secondly, looks like you've been at this for about three weeks or so. I did a fishy cycle and it took longer than that to see nitrites. Fishy cycles are typically faster than fishless ones as I understand it.
 
I used a 16 QT to recycle my 12g tank and it still took 2-3 weeks to do that. If you move over a lot of things, a lot of gravel etc., it may help. But my experience was that running the filter over the established tank still took some time.

Fishless cycle took 36 days. Is it possible the NitrIte test is old etc? The only question I see you show is whether or not you used the wrong ammonia, and I don't think you did since a lot of us use that type(and I still do). You're ammonia is definetly measuring. Now the question is when your NitrItes will spike.

Even if you did transfer your filter over, you still have to feed the tank something... so if there weren't any fish in it, then you'd still have to occasionally add ammonia.

I don't think it is faster to do a fishy-cycle... I think the average for most is 6-8 weeks which makes sense because you are severely limiting the amount of ammonia available to the bacteria, in order to keep it at a low maximum for the safety of the fish.

Everyone's fishless cycle is different, some do it in 2 weeks, most is usually 3-4 weeks but that still beats 6 weeks of worrying and water changes.
 
The new tank is an all-in-one with the filter built into the back of the tank. The best I could do was float the sponges & bio-balls out of it in my current tank.

Yes, I did mean 1st June.

Can't access a nitrate kit until 9th July.

I have an internal filter on my existing tank with one sponge and one pad. If I was to take either of those out of the tank it would throw it into a mini-cycle or crash it completely.

I'm really not sure about the nitrite test kit - the thought has crossed my mind it's a dud because I've never had more than the lowest reading on it. Even when I changed the gravel in the tank with fish in it. The ammonia rose a little but no change in nitrites. The nitrate kit is part of a master kit I am getting so I can double check.

When I put everything down on 'paper' here it does still seem rather a short period - it just seems so slow in the time warp at home. I don't know the hardness of the water so that could be slowing the bacteria multiplication rate too. The ammonia did test at 2ppm yesterday so it might just be starting. I have dosed it and will test again tonight.
 
Also...

What is the longest part of the cycle? Waiting for ammonia to drop, waiting for nitrites to peak, or waiting for nitrites to drop?
 
The RITE process, for it to start - peak - drop, seemed to take the longest, The whole fishy cycle lasted about 6 weeks, including the 1 week wait to make sure it was complete.........:)
 
For me I, had 0 ammonia and 10-30ppm NitrItes in 4 days. It then took 32 days to break the NitrIte spike. (So for me, it was waiting for the NitrItes to drop.)

Each person's cycle is different apparently. I had heard though that the nitrites -> nitrate bacteria has a harder time catching up with the ammonia -> nitrite.

Warmer temperatures like 85-90 can sometimes speed up multiplication, and bubblers, dropping the level of the tank to increase aeration may also assist.
 
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