Houdini Nitrites????

Hahaha, so I have been testing my ammonia, nitrites and nitrates every day, twice a day, while I cycle my shrimp tank; Once in the morning again at night. Also I have been doing a 10% water change daily since I added my shrimp... Friday. My nitrite spike hit yesterday! It was 6ppms!


So I had:
Sat:
ammonia - 1ppm
Nitrites - 1ppm
Nitrates - 10ppm
Sun:
ammonia - .25ppm
Nitrites - 1ppm
Nitrates - 5ppm
Mon:
ammonia - 2ppm
Nitrites - 6ppm
Nitrates - 30ppm
Tue:
ammonia - .5ppm
Nitrites - 0ppm
Nitrates - 10ppm

??????? No sense at all!! Hahaha. I tested it twice and shook all the bottles like crazy I couldn't believe it? I did add mature filter media and had added some shrimp, but it has only been 3 weeks. Overnight they disappeared? Is this tank cycled. To digest all that in 8hrs max!

 

Still has ammonia in it, so not fully cycled, but I would say you are seeing the benefit of adding seeded media I've actually had one tank skip nitrites completely.

 

Still has ammonia in it, so not fully cycled, but I would say you are seeing the benefit of adding seeded media I've actually had one tank skip nitrites completely.

Once ammonia hits 0 how long do u normally wait.

 

Once ammonia hits 0 how long do u normally wait.

Wait for what?

 

Before calling it 'cycled'

 

Hello Rub...

10 percent water changes won't remove enough nitrogen to keep the shrimp healthy. 25 percent is better. This will get the water chemistry back into a much safer zone for the shrimp and still grow the bacteria colony. You should test daily for traces of ammonia and nitrite and only change the water when you have a positive test for either. The cycle can easily take a month. When several daily tests show no traces of the above forms of nitrogen, the tank is cycled. Then, change half the water every week or so for as long as the tank is up and running.

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