What's happening with my cycle

[ibrat82]

So I started my 110 gallon tank 2 weeks ago using pure ammonia and seachem stability.

I dosed pure ammonia upto 2ppm. After a couple days ammonia went down to zero and nitrites upto 5ppm. It took a week for my nitrites to reduce to 0 and nitrates at 20ppm. Today at 10 am I dosed upto 2 ppm ammonia to make sure my tank really is cycled and as of midnight (14 hours) the ammonia is at 2ppm.

Shouldnt the ammonia be at 0 in the 14 hour time if it is really cycled?

Is something wrong with my cycle? Has it stalled ?

 

[mcgyvr]

Your tank just isn't sufficiently cycled yet..

In general we recommend retesting after 24 hours and see what ammonia/nitrites are after that..

But the reality is that you just need to give it more time and your tank hasn't sufficiently cycled yet.. patience grasshopper..

 

[lapin]

Shouldnt the ammonia be at 0 in the 14 hour time if it is really cycled?

The answer to this is no. 24 hours is the normal time we go by. 14 would be pushing it . So as the above post says."Time" .
I had one tank cycle in a week. It was with rock that had been in trash cans for over 2 months soaking. Normally 4 weeks is the rule of thumb.

 

[JUNBUG361]

Halfway through

 

[ibrat82]

So I did test it after 24 hours and the ammonia now reads 1ppm. So it’s taken 24 hours to only reduce by 1 ppm?

So my question is after all the ammoni converts to nitrates for the second time should I keep retesting by putting 2 ppm of ammoni until it’s fully converted to nitrates in 24 hours?

 

[thegrun]

No, do not add more ammonia to test the tank s ability. Once the ammonia zeros out the cycle is complete. Continuing to add ammonia will only lead to higher nitrates (the end product of the cycle). You should however add fish slowly to be sure their waste does not overwhelm your current bacteriological filtration capacity. Start with two or three fish and wait at least two weeks before adding any more. Corals add very little if anything to the bio-load so as long as you are adding easy to care for corals you can add several of them at once once the ammonia and nitrites have zeroed out for a couple of days.

 

[ibrat82]

Ok so after this second round of adding ammonia which I did to test to see if my tank was in deed cycled. I shouldn't add anymore? Then for sure it will be cycled?

Because I only added another 2ppm of pure ammonia to test if it was cycled. And clearly 48 hours later I still have ammonia reading at 1ppm.

 

[mcgyvr]

The smartest move IMO is to just wait another 2 weeks or more..
The slowly start adding.

NOTHING good happens fast in this hobby.


But you can add more ammonia if you want to be certain that your tank can process 2ppm of ammonia in 24 hours.. Its really the only way to know for sure if it can or can't..
But what its likely also doing is increasing the nitrates in the tank causing you to do more water changes post cycle to get the levels down..

The choice is really yours..
If you want that warm/fuzzy feeling that the tank is cycled then add some ammonia and see.. Or don't and just wait longer..
Neither direction is going to effect your tank long term..