Hello everyone,
I'm new to fish keeping and I'm cycling my first tank. It's a 10 gallon freshwater, filtered and heated at 78 degrees F, with no live plants. I'm doing a fishless cycle. I've been cycling since mid July, around 6 or 7 weeks total, and my tank is being very stubborn. I started with fish food as my ammonia source, but I could never even get my ammonia reading up to 1 ppm, so I switched to ACE ammonia around mid August. I got my ammonia up to 1 ppm. Before this, I had .5 ppm nitrites (I don't believe that they came from my tap because my tap water read 0) so I think my cycle was doing SOMETHING. Then, my levels were constant with no changes for days. I caved and bought API quick start. Within two days of adding that, my nitrites fell to 0, but my ammonia WOULD NOT fall. I contacted API and they said that it could be a low KH, but I tested that today and it's at least over 14 dKH. My pH has been quite high for most of my cycle, but I don't think it's ever gone over 8.2.
Update: Today was the first day in 2 weeks that my ammonia has dropped from 1 ppm to .5 ppm. Even though I've finally seen a slight change, I wanted to post this anyway in case it gets stuck again to see what I should be doing here. Today my nitrites remain at 0. My nitrates are at 5 ppm.
Any help would be very appreciated! I'm hoping I'm in the home stretch here but just in case, I'd be super grateful for tips or speculation.
I'm new to fish keeping and I'm cycling my first tank. It's a 10 gallon freshwater, filtered and heated at 78 degrees F, with no live plants. I'm doing a fishless cycle. I've been cycling since mid July, around 6 or 7 weeks total, and my tank is being very stubborn. I started with fish food as my ammonia source, but I could never even get my ammonia reading up to 1 ppm, so I switched to ACE ammonia around mid August. I got my ammonia up to 1 ppm. Before this, I had .5 ppm nitrites (I don't believe that they came from my tap because my tap water read 0) so I think my cycle was doing SOMETHING. Then, my levels were constant with no changes for days. I caved and bought API quick start. Within two days of adding that, my nitrites fell to 0, but my ammonia WOULD NOT fall. I contacted API and they said that it could be a low KH, but I tested that today and it's at least over 14 dKH. My pH has been quite high for most of my cycle, but I don't think it's ever gone over 8.2.
Update: Today was the first day in 2 weeks that my ammonia has dropped from 1 ppm to .5 ppm. Even though I've finally seen a slight change, I wanted to post this anyway in case it gets stuck again to see what I should be doing here. Today my nitrites remain at 0. My nitrates are at 5 ppm.
Any help would be very appreciated! I'm hoping I'm in the home stretch here but just in case, I'd be super grateful for tips or speculation.
