Nitrites too high during cycle? Help please!

[seabass]

Brandon, I agree that the sand probably didn't contain the organics. My guess is that the rock did.

 

What I don't quite grasp is how nitrite can spike so high without a correspondingly high ammonia spike. Assuming the test results are relatively close, it seems like the Nitrosomonas and Nitrosococcus genera are plentiful, but the Nitrobacter, Nitrospina, Nitrococcus, and Nitrospira genera are lacking. I wonder what genera are included in DrTim's One and Only.

[xilez]

Yes I did everything correctly, the issue is that since day 8 I have had high nitrate readings which Dr Tims method specifically says to do water change to get it down.

 

I had some people advising me to wait and see if it went down on its own, which i did, but 7 days later it didnt seem like the nitrites were moving. So now im concerned the cycle is halted and if i dont take any action it could make my cycle last months

[seabass]

Xilez, what type of dry rock are you using?

[xilez]

ReefCleaners dry rock. Fiji pink live sand

[seabass]

Hmm, both should be relatively clean. I'd say, that their guess was wrong, but their solution might still be correct.

Did my 20%ish water change, dont see much change in nitrite... Ill do another tomorrow if nothing changes

20% isn't all that much. Assume that nitrite was 7ppm, a 20% water change will lower it to 5.6 (basically 6). While it might help, you probably won't be able to see any improvement with a typical nitrite test kit. Try a larger water change if possible.

[xilez]

Would something like a salifert or a red sea test kit give me a more accurate number?

[seabass]

I personally wouldn't waste the money. Test some newly mixed saltwater and see if you get an undetectable reading. That should help verify that the kit is basically working. If it is, I'd trust the test enough to continue on with it.

 

 

Note: This doesn't work with ammonia, because ammonia is a common containment in calcium chloride and magnesium chloride (and is present in most salt mixes).

[xilez]

Tested newer saltwater, go a detectable reading of pretty much 0.

 

This process is getting confusing. I have a lot of people telling me not to do a water change and just be patient, but also have Dr Tim telling me the bacteria are inhibited by the high nitrite and that I should do a water change...

 

Do you think its possible they are recommending me to do water changes in hopes that it completes faster? If I waited a month and did nothing, would it eventually come down on its own?

 

My concern is if i go the patient route, and then after another month nothing has happened

[brandon429]

http://reef2reef.com/threads/new-tank-cycling-tank-bacteria-and-cocktail-shrimp-live-rock-no-shrimp.214618/

 

 

key points for you

 

if you don't add meds or dry the system out not any of that will kill your bac or stop you from complying with the 30 day timeframe, all the fear about too high ammonia, and too high nitrite is stopped there in that thread. That's Randy Holmes Farley in some of those "don't care about nitrite" links

 

Dr Tim H himself didn't reply to your email, that's an employee who like us posts opinions online we must consider that your nitrite levels aren't calibrated or verified at all, they are only approximates based on a color chart, disregard them altogether look how much proof we've collected there above.

 

by not care about them, we mean stop testing for nitrite and even nitrate if you like, because only ammonia and known submersion time frames matter, do what Group A rock cycling shows there in that link above... only test ammonia with a tester that is above average quality, search out which ammonia tests are reliable and make the buy.

 

 

Most don't want to do that...they literally subconsciously want the stress of nitrite, nitrate, and ammonia cycling using unverified test kits and all sorts of variation. But if you don't want that, about 1000 tanks have cycled off that thread. not a fail yet.

 

checks and balances are built in there. we aren't saying that you couldn't stall things w verified 6 ppm ammonia or trite sustained, we put a volume calculator in there for # of drops of ammonia per gallon, and a max range of 1-3 ppm set by a verified accurate tester, and that alone stops you from needing to know levels outside of 2 ppm ammonia. Your nitrite will be in a predictable range going off ammonia alone, always, 100% of the time its not needed to be tested.

[seabass]

This process is getting confusing. I have a lot of people telling me not to do a water change and just be patient, but also have Dr Tim telling me the bacteria are inhibited by the high nitrite and that I should do a water change...

People are telling you not to do water changes during the cycle because that's what they've read. I've done a two part experiment which tested this idea (Part 1: Water Changes During the Cycle and Part 2: Water Changes During the Cycle). It basically shows that the nitrogen cycle gets established with or without water changes. However, it took a little longer when water changes were performed daily.

 

Furthermore, this thinking is for cycling with live rock (and not dosing ammonium chloride to build a biofilter). In these cases, ammonia and nitrite often stay below 5ppm.

 

I have personally dosed ammonia beyond the 5ppm mark and have witnessed the stall in nitrification (I was not testing nitrite, so I'm not sure of its level). A large water change lowered the ammonia level and normal nitrification started again.

 

DrTim's Aquatics states that a similar inhibition in nitrification takes place with nitrite levels above 5ppm. I have no reason to question this, and they would have no monetary reason to make this claim (as this doesn't require more of any of their products).

 

Doing a water change isn't being impatient. It's a normal maintenance practice that won't export your bacteria. And in this case, it might get the process back up and running.

[xilez]

Brandon - so you are saying, within a couple of weeks the Nitrites would come down on their own either way? At which point, I should dose ammonia and see if it comes down in 24 hours?

 

Seabass - Doing a water change might kickstart the nitrifying bacteria to convert faster...

 

I have people from my LFGroup just saying to add a little more bacteria (Bio Spira) and just continue waiting it out...I assume its ok to mix bacteria?

[brandon429]

this is what I would do

 

find a verified ammonia test kit and do a water change half way, more if needed, to try and get it to 2 ppm and disregard whatever the nitrite levels would be, set your system to 2 ppm ammonia and keep dosing bottle bac and you will be able to pass the digest test listed in there within 3-4 weeks.

 

I wouldn't dose prime to get the ammonia down, that's a written api nitrite test adulterant, id do the water change to get only your ammonia in focus and by rule the rest of the metabolites will follow. You are doing a good job of dealing with information overload lol we all really, really, really like new tank cycling here all this reading and diversity is good for reference materials.

[xilez]

My ammonia is certainly below .25 ppm because I haven't dosed in 9-10 days, my tests from last night show it almost at 0. Ammonia isnt an issue. Its the sky high nitrite readings which according to the method I used inhibits the cycling.. meaning do a water change to get nitrites down, and do not dose ammonia again until they are below 1ppm

[seabass]

Seabass - Doing a water change might kickstart the nitrifying bacteria to convert faster...

Not kick start, but remove the inhibiting factor.

 

I have people from my LFGroup just saying to add a little more bacteria (Bio Spira) and just continue waiting it out...I assume its ok to mix bacteria?

Sure it's alright to mix bacteria. This might help if Bio-Spira contains nitrite oxidizing bacteria (NOB), which appears to have progressed less than the ammonia oxidizing bacteria (AOB).

 

My ammonia is certainly below .25 ppm because I haven't dosed in 9-10 days, my tests from last night show it almost at 0. Ammonia isnt an issue. Its the sky high nitrite readings which according to the method I used inhibits the cycling.. meaning do a water change to get nitrites down, and do not dose ammonia again until they are below 1ppm

I believe they state below 0.2ppm. But I believe the main thing is that nitrite stays below 5ppm. It's really ammonia (or more specifically, AOB) that we are focusing on.

[brandon429]

it will not inhibit cycling, and chasing nitrite is going to drive you insane lol but either way you'll cycle in a month. if you want to consider nitrite its ok to, our way was just a new method to make every cycle comply by given dates the charts show to be 20-40 days.

 

 

change out your water if you want, or follow the link posted which works just fine its ok either way and says you don't have to measure nitrite and if its high, it wont be within 30 days as long as your ammonia is correct.

 

 

ways to stall you into a three mo cycle are -only- drying and desiccation, not high nitrite. Its ok to detail it continually if you want to, though.

 

If there is one single instance where nitrite matters in a reef cycle we w update the thread to remove all the times saying it doesn't, including your case here where the two are imbalanced, still will not make you into a 3 mo cycle. only drying or meds does that.

[seabass]

it will not inhibit cycling...

Brandon, have you tested this? I have witnessed high ammonia inhibit/stall the establishment of the nitrogen cycle. It seems possible that the same might be true with nitrite. I don't have a clean nitrite source so I can't test it myself.

 

However, I agree that under normal conditions, nitrite levels are usually inconsequential.

[brandon429]

There is no need to test it, lol pun intended.

 

 

Posters always get into nuanced battles and its fun lol, good carving times but in the end I go back to what large threads do or don't do. Not once have we needed to know nitrite and when it stalls a cycle out we w need to know it, if this is the first tank going to accomplish that I cant wait to see.

 

the same happens in algae threads, everyone has a proven way on paper but it doesn't translate into 60 pages of them doing something repeating with the idea. That's not to impugn anything stated here as I do agree certain amounts could hamper a cycle, just not the amounts unverified here. As long as we keep turning out tank after tank of group A rocks done in 3 weeks to a mo I need to keep things simple, test only ammonia.

 

The bottle bac they are adding here will mature out and eat up those nitrites even if the initial start-fresh water change didn't occur, within the stated timeframes. I also don't think we are dealing with known amounts here, and what they've dosed so far wouldn't strike me as antibacterial given the curr digestion of ammonia that took place prob solely off the bottle bacs added just guessing.

[seabass]

Brandon, so setting nitrite aside for the time being. Are you saying that ammonia above 8ppm will not inhibit the development of ammonia oxidizing bacteria? I've personally witnessed that it does.

 

I agree with your premise when it comes to typical cycles. However, do these mass threads even address this condition?

[xilez]

Brandon, if my ammonia is <.25ppm - should I dose again? (even though told not to from Dr Tims?)

[brandon429]

agree that may inhibit, but above I put in bold my thread has checks and balances such that 8 ppm ammonia will never occur even if they aren't using any tester to discern ammonia levels. Our volume calculator and a known time frame can cycle in 30 days...with zero testing at all

 

the nitrite levels here going off known prior dosings I claim wont be inhibitory given the right time frame upcoming and a few more doses of bac.

 

 

doing a quick water change is so easy in a nano though, I say go for it and start clean if you like even though ur halfway through.

[seabass]

OK. So to deal with xilez's current situation, we should get these values back down to more reasonable numbers (via water changes) and let the bacteria do their job.

[xilez]

I have the girlfriend going to the LFS today to grab me some more saltwater.

 

This is my plan: 12 gallon tank with approx 6 added gallons via sump. I am going to shoot for a 50% water change. I will measure the levels tonight and report back later. Should I buy some Bio Spira as well?

[brandon429]

sure its good stuff, boosting the bottle bacs and not waiting for natural complements is how we get to 2-3 weeks to completion real easy. that a few drops of good ole ammonia c

I wouldn't be doing our slanted thread above a favor if I didn't yap a way to even avoid nitrite testing here:

 

change all 12 gallons, dose the AC to 2 ppm, hit the bottle bac

[xilez]

Changing all 12 gallons seems a little drastic. I am going to go with 50% (~ 9 gallons) and test the levels.

[xilez]

Did my water change tonight.

 

Pre water change my ammonia had to been 0-.10ppm(tested with both API and Red Sea).

 

Nitrites were definitly above 5ppm, almost instantly turning dark purple when I began to shake.

 

Post water change----

Ammonia is definitly at 0ppm.

 

Nitrites start out light blue and turn to a medium hue purple, so I'd safely say they are 1ppm - <5ppm.

 

I was unable to get some bio Spira today, I will pick some up tomorrow.

 

I will test again in another 24 hours and see where the nitrites are and then maybe put in a half dose of bio spira