Hi everyone, I'm seeking the community's opinion on my tank cycling progress, as I'm getting some unexpected results.
Timeline & Parameters:
- 7 days ago: I started the cycle by adding a dose of Dr. Tim's Ammonia (to 2 ppm) and dosing Seachem Stability daily as recommended. I pre-treated the water with Seachem Prime.
- 7 days later (2 days ago): I tested the water and found Ammonia (0 ppm), Nitrite (0 ppm), and Nitrate (0 ppm). This seemed too fast, as I expected the 2 ppm dose to take much longer to disappear.
- Action Taken (2 days ago): Suspecting a false reading or consumption by something else, I redosed Ammonia back to 2 ppm.
- Today (48 hours later): The test results are again Ammonia (0 ppm), Nitrite (0 ppm), and Nitrate (0 ppm).
Tank Details:
- Temperature: 27 C or 80 F
- Plants: I have Water Lettuce and Anubias
- Animals: I have some random tiny snails that unexpectedly came with the plants lol
- Tank size: 5 gal or 20 L
Is it possible that my tank is already fully cycled in one week, with the Water Lettuce consuming the Nitrate as fast as it's produced? Or is there something else consuming the ammonia and giving me a false result?
Thanks in advance for your help!
https://www.reddit.com/gallery/1p86fzo
Posted by Gabowo17
6 Comments
Nitrate should be 5-10 ppm, without it you are risking an ammonia spike. I would continue dosing to see if you are able to get the Nitrate up
side note, love the scape!
With that API test kit shake the ever loving SHIT out of that nitrate bottle. Hell you may even need to smack it on something, otherwise it can give false negatives. My kit didn’t read nitrates for like 2 months before I read that advice somewhere and then I finally got a reading. I’ve read floating plants do like ammonia more than nitrates, take that with a grain of salt I haven’t looked into it more, but if true depending on the amount of lettuce maybe it’s absorbing the ammonia quick? I also want to say when cycling my tank I think had a dip in ammonia before I had a spike of nitrites so it still may be coming.
Seachem stability has beneficial bacteria right? So when you are giving them a food source(ammonia) they can do their job and then the other bacteria in there can do the job as well resulting in 0 nitrites. Because you have 0 nitrates I would continue like this for a while, also read the other comment about shaking the bottle well.
Once full 2ppm ammonia dose and all nitrites clear consistenly in 24 hours to 0, every day for few consecutive days , and nitrates show up large – then you will be done.
I’d try again with some fish food and see how quick it takes to cycle again. Quicker than before then yes