Fish-in Cycle stuck on Nitrite

[JBFishFish]

I am re-posting here and it wouldn't let me copy and paste, so I took a a screenshot of my original question. I hope this works.

 

[StarGirl]

Nitrite is usually the patience breaker. One day it will just be gone. It seems you are doing everything right just gotta wait it out.

What is your pH after your tap water sits for 24 hours?

 

[Edsland]

If your dosing Prime you shouldn't have do that much water changing, Pime locks ammonia and nitrites for 48 hours. So basically you'll still see a reading during the 2 day period but its not in its deadly form. After 2 days if you still have a reading then you dose again. I wouldn't keep doing all those water changes your basically dumping the Prime down the drain and it could be stressful for your fish unless you new water is perfect. You just have to be patient and soon you'll take a reading and the nitrites zero out. Then do a water change and enjoy your tank.

 

[Frank the Fish guy]

Your pH is high. 8.0 - 8.4

This makes nitrites nontoxic. But Makes ammonia highly toxic.

High pH tanks take a long time to cycle, but end up very satisfying.


The problem with high pH tanks is that trace amounts ammonia are still toxic, while nitrite needs to be ignored.

 

[Dunk2]

If your dosing Prime you shouldn't have do that much water changing, Pime locks ammonia and nitrites for 48 hours. So basically you'll still see a reading during the 2 day period but its not in its deadly form. After 2 days if you still have a reading then you dose again. I wouldn't keep doing all those water changes your basically dumping the Prime down the drain and it could be stressful for your fish unless you new water is perfect. You just have to be patient and soon you'll take a reading and the nitrites zero out. Then do a water change and enjoy your tank.

Sorry, I disagree.

Yes, Prime is effective for 48 hours. But it only detoxifies a relatively low level of ammonia and nitrites.

Frequent (maybe daily depending on test results) water changes during a fish-in cycle aren’t optional, even when Prime is being used.

For whatever it’s worth, I think Prime is a great product, I use it myself and I recommend using it often. But it shouldn’t be used as a substitute for water changes.

 

[ppate1977]

Probably not what you want to hear, but hang in there. You are getting close. Some aquariums take a long time to cycle for some reason. You are doing a great job. It will pay off and things will get easier. Good luck!

 

[Edsland]

With his tap water at 1 ppm for ammonia it would seem that he would be adding a lot of extra ammonia to the tank with his water changes. With his bacteria changing his ammonia to nitrites and his bacteria for the nitrites still developing I would think that the water changes are adding to the nitrites in the long run.

 

[ppate1977]

Have you tried using something like tss?
I like stability, but it's very slow to take hold, mostly helps when adding new fish to an under-established bioload.

 

[Dunk2]

With his tap water at 1 ppm for ammonia it would seem that he would be adding a lot of extra ammonia to the tank with his water changes. With his bacteria changing his ammonia to nitrites and his bacteria for the nitrites still developing I would think that the water changes are adding to the nitrites in the long run.

Sorry, that’s my bad.

I didn‘t realize that the OP’s source water contained 1 ppm ammonia. I obviously missed that in the original post.

I’ve apparently become too sensitive to folks using Prime as a substitute for water changes.

 

[Edsland]

Once the nitrites zero out from the bacterial growth JBFISHFISH would be better served to buy some water from the store since its a 20 gallon tank. Say 4 gallons would be 20% instead of using the tap water and adding ammonia after the cycle is done.

 

[FishDin]

I dissagree. A cycled tank should be able to handle 1ppm ammonia from the tap water. Four gal of tap water would only be adding 0.2 ppm in a 20 gal tank. That fact that the OP's tank shows zero ammonia tells us that the tank can process it just fine. The same will happen with the nitrites. No need to create more weekly chores and expenses.

 

[Edsland]

The bacteria will definitely handle the 1 ppm ammonia but while its break it down he'll have fish, 1 of which is a gold fish thats an ammonia machine.

 

[SparkyJones]

JBFishFish,

Fish in cycling takes more time, I've had a cycle take up to 14 weeks to full cycle. there really isn't a shortcut when you are doing water changes to keep it safe and low with the fish in there, it takes longer.
Ammonia is supposed to spike asthe nitrosomas colony grows and turns it all into nitrites, and then a nitrobacter colony grows to convert nitrites to nitrates, and nitrates spike before it zeros and becomes all nitrates.

You have Ammonia testing 0s. You have high nitrites, and you have nitrates. as long as you are creating nitrates, you are cycling still. and you should still stay the course on water changes any time the fish look distressed, or the tests are looking like it will get to high for comfort. That's part of the fish in cycle, you sacrifice time and work, to keep fish safe with them in the tank while cycling.

it can be much quicker, without fish, 2-4 weeks. but when you have fish, and you have to keep ammonia and nitrites low through water changes and not just let them build up, your colony can't grow as fast as it could if let to run without fish in it.

I think you are near the end of the cycle, the nitrites should spike for a bit and you should see nitrates building faster, and then shortly the colony will be up to size and it will all be nitrates.

It takes more time to cycle to be safe when doing it fish in, there's no way around it unless you want to lose fish. the stuff you need for the bacteria to grow is toxic to the fish.
if you keep ammonia and nitrites low, the bacteria colony grows much slower than if no fish to worry about and letting it run it's course with as much ammonia and nitrites as the bacteria wants.

there's maybe other reasons for the slowness but you didn't give you tank water parameters.
if pH is low, this could be slowing you cycle, if temp is low this could slow your cycle 78F is the sweet spot for bacteria reproduction AND fish metabolism in cycle. if you have fish that can run hotter, even better if you could do 82-84F.

As far as the fluval 50, I see "ammonia remover". what is that? if that's like Zeolite, that's meant for an emergency situation to absorb ammonia in an ammonia spike. It's not meant as a filter media, it gets used up soaking up ammonia and then does nothing once full. And with your tap water always putting in ammonia, your bacteria should be fine to handle that by now.
Do not mess with your filter until after it cycles and has time to settle in, but that doesn't need to be in there and after 8 weeks of cycle, is likely doing nothing anymore.

pH of the tank might be useful, Ideally you'd like to be 6.8-7.0-7.2 or higher really for cycling, down closer to pH6 most of the ammonia is ammonium and slows things down cycling, but I don't think that's your problem now that nitrites are building and Ammonia is zeros. I think your nitrobacter colony need a bit more time to double and double and double again to be able to take out the nitrites and convert them all to nitrates. Another week or two. I think you're close by how you described what's going on.

If you want to keep you fish alive in cycle, its going to take lots of water changes and more time. you can tweek a couple things to try and make it a bit faster maybe knock it down to 6 weeks or so.
but I don't see anything really wrong here just you are losing your patience on it and tired of waiting for it to finish, but that's how it goes when you have to keep the bad stuff low to protect the fish.

 

[Edsland]

The problem with his water changes is his tap water has ammonia

 

[Frank the Fish guy]

Here is the relationship between ammonia and pH.

http://www.blueridgekoi.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/pH-and-Ammonia.pdf

Unfortunately, if the tap water has pH of 8.4, then any measurable amount of ammonia is harmful to fish. High pH tanks take a long time to cycle since you have to have a very strong biofilter that keeps ammonia at 0.

You should measure the pH of your tank.