Dr Tim’s fishless 2 weeks no movement

[ScubaFish802]

Just to clarify -- you mentioned you are doing a fishless cycle. What did you put in, in place of a fish? Is it possibly a large piece of shrimp or something that is still breaking down creating the constant ammonia?

As mentioned above, the presence of nitrite/nitrate means something is going on in there

 

[ReefGeezer]

I made no statements about the test kit, only the interpretation of it.

Test kit (or form of nitrogen) to confirm this tank is "cycled"; aka established nitrifying bacteria? Nitrate.

pH? Only if I wanted to get nerdy about NH4/NH3 equilibria. Not sure why that would be useful here; would need a direct measurement of NH3 and/or NH4, not total ammonia.

Let me see if I understand... Are you saying that we should not test ammonia at all but test for nitrate to verify that nitrifying bacteria has been established?

 

[HBtank]

Let me see if I understand... Are you saying that we should not test ammonia at all but test for nitrate to verify that nitrifying bacteria has been established?

If I did test for ammonia, it would only be for free ammonia. But the reality is that cycles simply don't stall or fail, and are very predictable.

 

[ReefGeezer]

If I did test for ammonia, it would only be for free ammonia. But the reality is that cycles simply don't stall or fail, and are very predictable.

Let's agree to disagree and let thr thread continue on its original course.