Normal??

achase

achase

Large Fish
#1
Feb 1, 2010
765
0
0
British Columbia, Canada
#1
I'm cycling my new tank. It has been a week and a bit since my nitrites spiked and they don't seem to be going down at all, they are staying constantly high.

Is this normal? I understand that cycling can take a bit but I was hoping it would be faster because I used stuff from my established tank.
 

bassbonediva

bassbonediva

Superstar Fish
#2
Oct 15, 2009
2,010
0
0
Northern Arizona
#2
Regardless of whether that's normal or not (I'm not a reliable person to say yes or no because all my current tanks cycled very quickly because I had established filters on them), adding gravel, decorations or filter media from an established tank will definitely speed up your cycle.
 

Newman

Newman

Elite Fish
#6
Sep 22, 2009
4,668
0
0
Northern NJ
#6
and dont freak out if you test ie. 10ppm nitrates one day and then you test 10 ppm nitrates three days later. this stuff takes time, so you should really be testing at larger time intervals like weeks. one week the nitrate will be 10 ppm but I bet by the second or third week the nitrates will o up to 15-20ppm if you keep adding pure ammonia like you should be.

Remember when cycling, you must not only introduce the initial 5ppm of ammonia into the tank but also keep adding a few drops of ammonia to the tank daily. the bacteria must be fed otherwise you are fooling yourself in thinking that youre done with a cycle when everything is at 0 when in fact all your bacteria are long gone...i'm not saying youre not doing it right, I'm saying that this is a trend I see from people cycling new tanks..
 

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