Did I mess up my cycle?

B

Boston HaaBaa

New Fish
#1
Apr 23, 2012
4
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#1
Hello everyone. I've had a slight issue I hope someone can help out with.

I was 3 weeks into my cycle this last weekend when I did a 75% water change of my tank. I was trying to drop the nitrites down to a readable level as they spiked and where too high for my test to read. Since then my ammonia levels have stayed at ~4ppm and I have not added any for the last 5 days. I did however add a little bit of food to the tank as I've read somewhere that food was better then ammonia for building up the nitrates. Before the water change my tank could take 5ppm down to .5-1ppm in a 24 hour window and now it seems to have stopped. I've been using Stress Zyme to help with the cycling but might switch to Prime if I can find it. The tank is a 75g, planted. Did I mess up or stall my cycle by doing a water change? Also after this water change is when I put my lights on a timer and started to use them. Would the light cycle play any affect on the nitrogen cycle? I do admit, I think I was doing my API tests somewhat wrong at the start. I was following the directions to a T on the manufactures instructions, but from reading what others have said about the API tests, you need to shake the crap out of them like there's no tomorrow. So now I am shaking them for a good 2-3 minutes before testing.

Thank you for your help!


Current readings
PH - shows 7.8 but when I use the high range PH test I get 7.6
Ammonia - ~4PPM
Nitrites - +5PPM
Nitrates - 5-10ppm
 

O

OrangeCones

Elite Fish
#2
Feb 27, 2009
4,395
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#2
Welcome to the forum, Boston HaaBaa!

Is this a fishless tank with those readings? What kind of plants do you have? If they are growing well, they should be able to utilize the nitrogen you are showing.

Doing a water change will not stall the cycling process. The beneficial bacteria reside more on the hard surfaces of your tank (deco, driftwood, gravel, etc) and in your filter than in the water itself. What type of filter are you using? How are you cleaning it?

The pH readings are not uncommon when you get to the high end of low and the low end of high (if that makes sense). I'd take it to show a 7.7 reading.
 

B

Boston HaaBaa

New Fish
#3
Apr 23, 2012
4
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#3
Thanks for the welcome! Yes, its a fishless cycle. My plants are all fake, sorry forgot to mention that, with a good amount of driftwood and other ornaments. I do plan on putting in live plants at some point. But right now I am not really impressed by the selection at any pet store around me.

As for the filters, I have 2x aqua clear 500's. The only cleaning of the tank i've done to this point was that 75% water change on Saturday and have not cleaned or touched the filter media yet. But when doing the water change I turn off my filters to protect the media inside from any possible shock caused by whatever is inside the tap water. Once drained, I've added stress zyme and let it sit for ~5 minutes before filling. I allowed this time to try and let the dechlorinator inside spread around the tank a bit. I would assume that chlorine could cause some if not a lot of the good bacteria to die off if allowed to fill first, but I could be wrong in that belief.

My tank, filters, heaters, and maybe half of the other stuff inside I used several years ago when I had tiger oscars. After that the tank wound up sitting empty and in storage for about 5 years before being put back to use so I am sure none of the old bacteria in it made any difference. Prior to starting my cycle I did re silicone all the edges as well.
 

O

OrangeCones

Elite Fish
#4
Feb 27, 2009
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#4
I would not be discouraged. The fact that you are showing nitrates now indicates that you have all of the right colonies of bacteria you need.

Are you adding ammonia to the tank? Or just adding food to decay?
 

B

Boston HaaBaa

New Fish
#5
Apr 23, 2012
4
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#5
I was using ammonia at first. Raising it up to ~5ppm daily. After my water change I gave food a try just to see how it does. At first I wanted to avoid food just for the sake of keeping my phosphates down. It wasn't until today that my ammonia levels in the tank dropped to 1ppm so I haven't been adding anything since the bacteria had plenty to eat in there already. I went back to using ammonia today and raised it back up to 4-5ppm. Will see tomorrow how my tests look.
 

O

OrangeCones

Elite Fish
#11
Feb 27, 2009
4,395
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#11
A plant growing does not produce nitrate for the water column, so not sure how a plant would RAISE nitrate levels.

If the plant is decaying (non-aquatic plant or conditions are poor for the plant), it will produce ammonia, which the beneficial bacteria would turn into nitrite and then nitrate over time.
 

B

Boston HaaBaa

New Fish
#12
Apr 23, 2012
4
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#12
From doing some reading online I think I may have stalled the first part of the cycle by adding too much ammonia at some point. I had done a series of partial water changes (about %30) each day till the levels started dropping again on their own. Now my tank can clear 2-3PPM within a 24hour period. As for my nitrite levels, they are a *****, but at least the API test now isn't turning purple the second I add the drops! Although my readings are still coming out >5PPM. I have started doing some daily %30 water changes again to see if I can help drop down the nitrites and speed up the process a bit. My nitrates are in the 10-20PPM range and do not seem to be rising at all. Since my last posting here I did add as many air stones as I could to the tank due to some white cloudiness that came back to the tank, cloudiness lasted about ~8 days or so then went away.

Thanks again for your help!
 

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