Lucy

I cycled my daughter's 10g. There's no fish in it.

To keep the cycle going, I told her to add a little fish food to feed the bacteria.

This is the first time I haven't used pure ammonia.

Her tank is in her bedroom, I checked on it today. The food was all moldy in the gravel. I'm never using fish food again.

Her readings were 8.0 ammonia, 0 nitrites, 80 nitrates

When we went to use the gravel vac....all that moldy old food gunked up the water. So I did a 100% water change and rinsed the gravel to get the nasty stuff out.

We kept the decorations and filter wet and warm in dechlorinated water.

Through out the day, I've been adding ammonia to see if we killed the cycle.

added 5 drops ammonia waited an hour tested 0
added 5 more, waited, tested 0
added 5 more, waited, tested 0
added 10 more, waited, tested 0
added 5 more (because I was too lazy to go downstairs and get the bottle of ammonia), waited, tested 0

Geez.

Shawnie

the fish food method is kinda ucky LOL but instead of a 100% change a 50% would have been good. with a gravel vac job...you were close by having nitrates (of course.you know all this)..but now why dont you take some filter media, gravel, or some decos from your tank thats established to jump your daughters along? goodluck dahlink! I know its so frustrating

Alessa

yes lucy, get either gravel or an used piece of filter media from the other tank

Lucy

Shawnie, you should have seen it!! Ewwwwwww lol, no way would I want a fish accidently eating any of that. It was nasty!

I had the darn thing cycled, I just wanted to test to see if we wrecked it doing the cleaning we did.

I've got extra sponges in my tanks. She has a bio wheel and I had an extra one, so i just put that in the tetra tank.

No worries.

Edit: Thanks Alessa, she's ready for fish.
Even if I seed it again, I still like to test it with ammonia.

I'm thinking we didn't mess it up.

Shawnie

I have seen it and yes its so icky LOL ..I cycled one of my tanks that way...goodluck and phew on having it all cycled !

clinton1621

The reason why it grew mold was because of the lack of bacteria... it takes a while for food to break down into ammonia, and until it does its a free meal for fungus and mold, not to mention algae. I had a discussion with someone on here not too long ago about why fish food and also raw shrimp were both really bad ideas to cycle a tank, thanks for proving my point lol!

Lucy

You're welcome. lol.

But it was cycled, seeded with filter media, 0 for ammonia & nitrites 5 nitrates.

It was keeping the cycle going that was the problem.
I guess her idea of a little fish food is different than mine. lol

So, can anyone explain why I don't have an ammonia reading after ammonia?

Guess I should take a full reading.

Lucy

And the verdict is.......


Her tank is still cycled.

0 for ammonia & nitrites
5-10 nitrates.

I tested my tap water for nitrates just in case and it tested 0.

I thought it would take the bacteria longer to process the ammonia.

Alessa

YAY

Well, I thought so too!

clinton1621

Nope, bacteria can process ammonia (and then nitrite) extremely fast if its already established... even without being fed direct ammonia it will self sustain for a limited time, as some of the bacteria die and break down then the other bacteria eat the produced waste... kind of like cannibalism lol