20 Gallon Tank Need help finishing Fishless 20G cycle

Using the freshwater API Master Test Kit current readings are: (post-40% water change today)
Ammonia 1-2ppm
Nitrite 0ppm
Nitrate 20-40ppm
We have 6 plants (mostly Java ferns)
No Fish
Axolotl is to arrive next week!!
We have been attempting to cycle for about 5 months with a few crashes along the way. We think we are close now-- please advise on how to finish up this cycle!
Do we keep adding ammonia everyday? Will an air bubbler help? Could the plants be affecting this?

 

How much ammonia have you been adding everyday?

 

You changed 40% today.
I recommend not doing anything for now.
Report back in 24 hours with your test results.

 

How much ammonia have you been adding everyday?

20-25 drops Dr. Tim's every day until a few days ago-- we started dosing every other day.

You changed 40% today.
I recommend not doing anything for now.
Report back in 24 hours with your test results.

Thanks, we will check back tomorrow. FYI we added 20 drops ammonia after the water change today. (was worried nitrate would die without fresh ammonia)

 

20-25 drops Dr. Tim's every day until a few days ago-- we started dosing every other day.

Just stop everything. Wait 1 full day and see what happens.

Your plants aren't hurting anything, they love ammonia.

But there's no need to dose ammonia every day.
I think your cycle is complete but give it 24 hours before you test again to verify.

 

20-25 drops Dr. Tim's every day until a few days ago-- we started dosing every other day.

Has your pH changed throughout the cycle?

Do you dechlorinate water added to the tank?

 

Just stop everything. Wait 1 full day and see what happens.

Your plants aren't hurting anything, they love ammonia.

But there's no need to dose ammonia every day.
I think your cycle is complete but give it 24 hours before you test again to verify.

It doesn't seem that the ammonia is changing at all-- it usually stays at the same levels after 24 hours.

Has your pH changed throughout the cycle?

Do you dechlorinate water added to the tank?

yes we dechlorinate and match temperature before water changes. The PH has spiked and gone back down throughout the cycle -- at about 7 right now

 

It doesn't seem that the ammonia is changing at all-- it usually stays at the same levels after 24 hours.

You said that you have 40ppm nitrate after a 40% water change and you had been adding ammonia every day to every 2 days.

I doubt that you have that much nitrate in your tap water so unless you have been adding fertilizer for the plants....that nitrate level only has 1 explanation.

So have you been adding fertilizer?
And...
If you wait 24hours how far down will that 1-2ppm of ammonia drop?

 

You said that you have 40ppm nitrate after a 40% water change and you had been adding ammonia every day to every 2 days.

I doubt that you have that much nitrate in your tap water so unless you have been adding fertilizer for the plants....that nitrate level only has 1 explanation.

So have you been adding fertilizer?
And...
If you wait 24hours how far down will that 1-2ppm of ammonia drop?

We have 0ppm nitrate in our tap water, and we do not add fertilizer. So do we just wait until the ammonia drops? What if after 24 hours the ammonia is still at 1-2ppm-- would you recommend adding nitrifying bacteria?

 

Using the freshwater API Master Test Kit current readings are: (post-40% water change today)

The water change may very well get things moving forward.

Ammonia 1-2ppm
Nitrite 0ppm
Nitrate 20-40ppm
We have 6 plants (mostly Java ferns)
No Fish
Axolotl is to arrive next week!!
We have been attempting to cycle for about 5 months with a few crashes along the way. We think we are close now-- please advise on how to finish up this cycle!

What makes you think your cycle is crashing. That is not something that normally happens. Please help us help you by telling us all you can think of about this tank from the time you set it up until now.

Do we keep adding ammonia everyday? Will an air bubbler help? Could the plants be affecting this?

Hold off on adding anymore ammonia until it drops to or very close to zero. If you are running a filter on this tank an airstone really isn't necessary. What temp are you keeping the tank at? I know it has to be low for your future axotoli but bacteria grows faster at higher temps.

 

We have 0ppm nitrate in our tap water, and we do not add fertilizer. So do we just wait until the ammonia drops? What if after 24 hours the ammonia is still at 1-2ppm-- would you recommend adding nitrifying bacteria?

Let's hold off for 24 hours, then we can worry about recommendations

Cycling is a big game of "hurry up and wait"...
I know it's hard yet exciting, but lets just see what happens.

 

Can you post a picture of your ammonia test?

 

ammonia levels today are the same as yesterday.. any recommendations? or do we keep waiting for it to drop?

 

At one point you said you were adding ammonia daily. Was it going down to zero daily? Have you gone through the nitrite spike and after a while it dropped to zero. Have you ever gotten a zero reading for ammonia? We really need to know more about this tank before we can determine where you are in the cycle.

You told us you went through a few crashes during the past 5 months. What did you do each time you thought the cycle had crashed. Did you clean the tank out and start from scratch each time? If that is the case when was the last time you did so?

 

Ammonia has never gotten down to zero-- we have been dosing to keep it at a consistent 1-2ppm to feed the nitrate.
Nitrite has spiked and is now at zero.
When we crashed ammonia was very high and both nitrite and nitrate were at 0. We did a full water change. Our filter also stopped working so we got a new filter. Since the new filter and full water change it has been 3.5 weeks.

 

Is everything in the new filter brand new?
Did you put the filter media from the old filter in the new filter?
Did the nitrite rise and fall before or after you changed the filter?

 

Ammonia has never gotten down to zero-- we have been dosing to keep it at a consistent 1-2ppm to feed the nitrate.
Nitrite has spiked and is now at zero.
When we crashed ammonia was very high and both nitrite and nitrate were at 0. We did a full water change. Our filter also stopped working so we got a new filter. Since the new filter and full water change it has been 3.5 weeks.

Last few questions:

1. When you swapped filters, did you move over the biomedia from the old filter? Or just tossed it all?
2. You mentioned you constantly dosed ammonia - to clarify, you did see ammonia drop, but then just added more to bring it back up, is that correct?

 

Ammonia has never gotten down to zero-- we have been dosing to keep it at a consistent 1-2ppm to feed the nitrate.

You are really not feeding the nitrate. Nitrates are the end results of ammonia eating bacteria eating the ammonia and producing nitrites. The second bacteria is nitrite eating bacteria. As it eats nitrites it produces nitrates. We keep the nitrates down by doing our weekly water changes.

Nitrite has spiked and is now at zero.

This tells us you have both ammonia and nitrite eating bacteria. That is really all cycling a tank is. We are growing both types of bacteria. Once we have enough of both we will no longer see either ammonia or nitrites. All we will see is nitrates. If water pets are in the tank both ammonia and nitrites are being produced but we have grown enough bacteria to keep both a constant zero.

When we crashed ammonia was very high and both nitrite and nitrate were at 0. We did a full water change. Our filter also stopped working so we got a new filter. Since the new filter and full water change it has been 3.5 weeks.

thanks for the timeline.

If you didn't keep the media from the old filter you lost some of the bacteria but thankfully there will have still been some on all the surfaces in the tank. It has only been 3.5 weeks since the water and filter change. you have been very patient over the past 5 months but I do recommend you give it time. Don't do anything or add anything to this tank until the ammonia drops to or very close to zero. I say close because some folks never see a true zero reading.

 

Thank you for all of this info!
When we got the new filter we started from scratch -- except for the plants and sand substrate.

We will just keep waiting for ammonia to drop..(and tub the axolotl until it reaches a safe ppm)
It seems strange that we haven't seen any nitrite in a while. Is it just that it becomes nitrate so fast that we never see nitrite? Worried that there is somehow a break in the chain of events..
So just to clarify.. when ammonia hits close to zero and we have safe amount of nitrate.. are we safe to put the axolotl in the tank?

 

I concur with mattgirl
We need to see how fast the ammonia drops.
Just let the tank sit and run. Dont add anything, dont do anything....just test once per day at the same time each day.

Definitely don't dose any ammonia for now.

 

Thank you for all of this info!
When we got the new filter we started from scratch -- except for the plants and sand substrate.

Not moving the media from the old filter to the new one will have set you back. There will have been some bacteria in plants, substrate and walls of the tank but it took a pretty big hit when the filter media was removed. That is where the strongest colony of it is going to be.

We will just keep waiting for ammonia to drop..(and tub the axolotl until it reaches a safe ppm)
It seems strange that we haven't seen any nitrite in a while. Is it just that it becomes nitrate so fast that we never see nitrite? Worried that there is somehow a break in the chain of events.

If there is no ammonia being processed you are not going to see any nitrites. Once the ammonia starts going down you may see some nitrites. Don't get overly concerned about it if you don't though. Right now we want to see the ammonia level start going down. That is the most important step right now.

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So just to clarify.. when ammonia hits close to zero and we have safe amount of nitrate.. are we safe to put the axolotl in the tank?

When you see zero ammonia, zero nitrites and the nitrates rising within 24 hours of adding ammonia you will know the cycle is complete and the tank should be safe for your little guy.

 

Hi everyone, thank you so much for your support so far.
We are still at 1-2 ppm of ammonia! Our axolotl has arrived and we are doing fine with tubbing but I'm getting impatient with this tank! Does anyone have experience with "Imagitarium Ammonia Remover"? can we use that to get things going?

 

Instead of having to deal with 2 tanks you may want to consider changing out as much of the water as you can in this tank and go ahead and put the little guy in there. Either way s/he is going to be living in an uncycled tank. Since you will have to be doing water changes in the temp tank you may as well be doing it in this tank.

I wouldn't be using anything that claims to remove ammonia. I would be using Prime to keep it detoxed though. .

 

mattgirl is right.
The water changes will help cycle your tank and keep your fish alive.
You will need to constantly (probably daily) change water....and test a bunch.
Don't worry about the nitrate test for now...it's irrelevant because the constant water changes will keep it diluted.
Test for ammonia and nitrite and make sure that the sum total of both of those tests is below 1ppm.
(E.g. 0.5ppm ammonia + 0.5ppm nitrite = 1ppm total)

Don't overfeed, just enough food sparingly.
If he tells you that he's hungry....don't believe him, he's lying.