Start of the Nitrogen Cycle

[Hermes Soyez]

I bought a 10 gallon Top Fin hexagonal aquarium starter kit about a month
ago. At the same time, I bought 10 pounds of gravel, a couple of plastic
plants and a castle-looking thing to place on the bottom of the aquarium.

When I got home, I set up the filter, lid, etc. as instructed in the starter
kit video. I also placed the gravel, plants and castle in the aquarium.
Then, I filled the aquarium with dechlorinated water and let the system run
for a week.

At the end of the first week, I bought two 1-inch goldfish, introduced them
into the tank and started monitoring the ammonia level of the water.
Not so surprisingly, the ammonia concentration shot up to the saturation
limit of my test kit (i.e., 8 ppm). Therefore, I used a single dose of
AmmoLock and started doing frequent water changes (between 25% and 50% every
day or two). Thankfully, both fish are still alive.

Over the last 2-3 weeks, I've kept on doing water changes with dechlorinated
tap water that itself tests as having an ammonia concentration of
approximately 1 ppm. Unfortunately, no matter how often I change the water,
the ammonia level of the aquarium does not seem to dip below 4 ppm. Also,
I'm not detecting any nitrites. Therefore, I've concluded that the
nitrifying bacteria discussed in the faq.thekrib.com web site still have not
taken hold.

Is this an accurate conclusion, or am I missing something?
Also, if my conclusion is correct, is a month too long to wait for the start
of the nitrogen cycle?
Lastly, if a month is too long, please suggest what I can do to get things
started.

Thanks,

Hermes

[Paige]

How many times have you used to ammo? With our first tank my husband used
it and it seemed to cause a false positive with our test kit for ammonia.
After we stopped using it and tested the water again about a week later it
was fine.

I think that as long as your nitrites are low or negative the fish should be
fine.

Paige

[Paige]

My spell check changed the ammolock to ammo sorry.

[Brian S.]

It can take quite a while for the cycle to finish. When doing water
changes, this also causes the cycle to be longer.

It is possible that there is a lot of fish and food waste down in the rock.
Do you siphon the gravel good when doing water changes?

Lastly, it is also possibly that your tap water that you put in the tank
could contain ammonia..

Brian S.

"Hermes Soyez" > wrote in message
...
> I bought a 10 gallon Top Fin hexagonal aquarium starter kit about a month
> ago. At the same time, I bought 10 pounds of gravel, a couple of plastic
> plants and a castle-looking thing to place on the bottom of the aquarium.
>
> When I got home, I set up the filter, lid, etc. as instructed in the
starter
> kit video. I also placed the gravel, plants and castle in the aquarium.
> Then, I filled the aquarium with dechlorinated water and let the system
run
> for a week.
>
> At the end of the first week, I bought two 1-inch goldfish, introduced
them
> into the tank and started monitoring the ammonia level of the water.
> Not so surprisingly, the ammonia concentration shot up to the saturation
> limit of my test kit (i.e., 8 ppm). Therefore, I used a single dose of
> AmmoLock and started doing frequent water changes (between 25% and 50%
every
> day or two). Thankfully, both fish are still alive.
>
> Over the last 2-3 weeks, I've kept on doing water changes with
dechlorinated
> tap water that itself tests as having an ammonia concentration of
> approximately 1 ppm. Unfortunately, no matter how often I change the
water,
> the ammonia level of the aquarium does not seem to dip below 4 ppm. Also,
> I'm not detecting any nitrites. Therefore, I've concluded that the
> nitrifying bacteria discussed in the faq.thekrib.com web site still have
not
> taken hold.
>
> Is this an accurate conclusion, or am I missing something?
> Also, if my conclusion is correct, is a month too long to wait for the
start
> of the nitrogen cycle?
> Lastly, if a month is too long, please suggest what I can do to get things
> started.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Hermes
>
>

[Hermes Soyez]

I only used the ammonia neutralizer once, several weeks ago, and have since
performed numerous water changes. Therefore, I would have thought that any
false positive readings would have been done by now.

I'll keep monitoring and hoping for the best.

Thanks.


"Paige" > wrote in message
link.net...
> How many times have you used to ammo? With our first tank my husband used
> it and it seemed to cause a false positive with our test kit for ammonia.
> After we stopped using it and tested the water again about a week later it
> was fine.
>
> I think that as long as your nitrites are low or negative the fish should
be
> fine.
>
> Paige
>
>

[Hermes Soyez]

Brian,

Thanks for the reply.

"Brian S." > wrote in message
news:Quzkd.392992$D%.251243@attbi_s51...
> It can take quite a while for the cycle to finish. When doing water
> changes, this also causes the cycle to be longer.

From the graphs on the FAQ web site, I saw that the actual cycling takes
time. However, I'm wondering if it's possible for the start of the cycle to
be delayed. In other words, is it possible that not enough bacteria are
present in the aquarium after a month to cause a detectable effect?

> It is possible that there is a lot of fish and food waste down in the
rock.
> Do you siphon the gravel good when doing water changes?

A lot of waste/food in the gravel is a definite possibility. I siphon, but
my technique requires a lot of improvement. Nevertheless, if bacteria turn
ammonia into nitrite, shouldn't I be getting a positive nitrite reading if
there were bacteria in the tank?

> Lastly, it is also possibly that your tap water that you put in the tank
> could contain ammonia..

My tap water appears to contain 1 ppm of ammonia. Hence, I don't expect
water changes to bring the concentration down to zero. However, I would
have expected that after a couple of weeks, the ammonia concentration level
would be lower than 4 ppm.

>
> Brian S.

[Geezer From The Freezer]

slowly raise the temperature to the mid to high 70's - this will help speed
up the bio bugs replication.

[Hermes Soyez]

Thanks. I'll try that.

"Geezer From The Freezer" > wrote in message
...
>
> slowly raise the temperature to the mid to high 70's - this will help
speed
> up the bio bugs replication.

[Gunnie]

You are probably right about the false positive, although all the ammo
lock is probably no longer in your tank. If your ammonia test is a 1
part test, and the color card goes from yellow to orange, you will
get a false positive for ammonia when using ammo lock or amquel.

Goldfish are big waste producers, and the general rule is 1 goldfish
per 10 gallons of water. They also get quite large, and will need
a bigger than ten gallon tank later on.

Your frequent water changes are necessary, but will also slow the
cycle down.

If you don't already have one, I suggest you get an Aquarium
Pharmaceuticals master test test kit. Get the one that includes the
nitrate test in it. You will need to test for nitrates to know when
your cycle is complete. Also, it contains the 2 part ammonia test
which won't give you the false positives. It sounds like you are
going to have to dechlor your water with amquel or ammo lock anyway,
because you tap water contains ammonia, so the 2 part ammonia test
will be necessary. It's gonna be a long haul for you to get your
tank cycled becuase of the excessive ammonia being produced in a
small tank. It will take a lot of patience and daily large water
changes, but it can be done.
__________________________________________________
Posted via FishGeeks - http://Aquaria.info

[Andy Hill]

"Hermes Soyez" > wrote:
>.... is a month too long to wait for the start
>of the nitrogen cycle?
>
A month is pretty long...I'd recommend asking the LFS pretty-please for some
filter material or gravel from an established tank -- maybe your home
environment is a bit more sterile than most.