Huh, where did this nitrogen come from?

Hi everyone,

Total noob here, like my tank is a little more than 2 days old. I have a planted 10 gallon with no fish. I was testing my water for the third time this evening, when I discovered that I had new ammonia, nitrites, and nitrates show up today that weren't there before. Here's the timeline of events:

5/3 - Set up 10 gallon tank with eco-complete, 50W heater, Aqueon quietflow 10 filter, Aqueon Optibright + lighting with timer set for 9 hours on, some driftwood, rocks, and several plants (cardinal plants, microswords, tiny anubias plant on a rock, and cryptocoryne wendtii), and conditioned tap water. Test water several hours later, pH 7.8. Ammonia, nitrite, nitrate all 0.

5/4 - Read that I should start with a heavier plant mass to fight algae etc, so I get more plants and pick up some Seachem Flourish root tabs. Planted an Argentinian sword, E.ozelot, and dwarf hair grass. Add some root tabs (maybe a little more than directed but nothing crazy). Tested my water again several hours later, pH 7.8, ammonia, nitrite, nitrate all 0. That evening, I discover a small snail that must have snuck in with one of the plants. I remove it. Not wanting to deal with more, I put a blanched baby carrot in the tank overnight to hopefully lure any other snails.

5/5 - No additional snails this morning, so I remove the carrot after about 10 hours in the tank. I get home from work this evening and test my water. Now the pH seems to be about 7.9. Ammonia is 1ppm, nitrite is 0.5ppm, and nitrate is 5ppm.

Where did this stuff come from? I had planned to let the plants settle in for a week, and then figure out how to start cycling the tank (fishless vs TSS). But things seem to be moving ahead without me. At first, I thought it was the root tabs. After reading looking stuff up, that seemed less likely. Then I thought it could by dying plants, but they all look healthy. There is one brown anubias leaf that I missed before I put it in the tank. It's less than one cm in size and seems unlikely to be the cause. Then I thought maybe it was the carrot. But could one baby carrot in the tank for 10 hours cause all 3 measures to jump up? Not sure what to do from here, just keep waiting and testing I guess?

 

Interesting set of facts. I am just learning about this so I can only speculate. You seem like you have done your homework so you may know more than I. Seems unlikely the carrot could have deteriorated enough over night to release that much ammonia. I would say check tap water, but you have tested zero and then these reading came without a water change. The nitrate test can be finicky so I would say re test. But that would not explain the ammonia and nitrite. Your tank could have started cycling from some seed material carried by the plants. But it would need an ammonia source. Interesting.....

. Thoughts?

 

I just read up on eco-complete. It could be where all of this is coming from. Read the package here. I agree, I don't think the carrot could have caused it.

 

Oh yes. ECO Complete is packed in liquid and is supposed to have some beneficial bacteria. But it would seem if the ammonia was in there it would have be released immediately.

 

Oh yes. ECO Complete is packed in liquid and is supposed to have some beneficial bacteria. But it would seem if the ammonia was in there it would have be released immediately.

I really don't know since I've never used or researched it but that is the only thing I could see that could possibly cause what we are seeing. Maybe it took a day or two for it to react to the chemistry of this water? Just guessing here

 

I really don't know since I've never used or researched it but that is the only thing I could see that could possibly cause what we are seeing. Maybe it took a day or two for it to react to the chemistry of this water? Just guessing here

Plausible

 

Thanks for the responses you two! Maybe it is the eco complete. The package does say it has bacteria, but doesn’t say it has a nitrogen source. That being said, a lot of the bottled bacteria products seem like they have ammonium in them, so maybe that’s it.

I decided to not intervene and just see where this goes. When I checked my water this evening, the ammonia continued to increase to 2ppm. Everything else was stable at pH 7.8, nitrite 0.5ppm, and nitrate 5ppm. After this, I removed that little brown anubias leaf, and an Argentinian sword leaf that died since being put in. Plants otherwise looking healthy.

One additional thing I noticed this morning was the appearance of slimy filamentous white stuff growing on the gravel at the front of the tank. Given that my tank is only a few days old, is bacteria the most likely cause? Not sure what else would grow that quickly in a brand new tank. I’ll include a picture. Anyone know what this is and if I need to do anything about it?

 

The fact that ammonia is going up is perplexing. I do not know what the white stuff is. Something strange is going on.

 

Recently I have read about some kind of substrate that does raise the ammonia level for a while. I can't swear that it was eco-complete though. I have to think that is where all of this is coming from though including the white stuff. I think all you can do at this point is just let it run its course. You could do water changes but I think if you do you will defeating the purpose of the substrate.