High nitrites after cycling

bdouglas119 · Sep 18, 2019

Hey everyone,

I recently started up my first tank. I cycled it with Red Sea Reef Mature. I started the cycle on August 10th. By September first Nitrite has spiked and retuned to 0. Over the last few days I’ve noticed another spike in nitrite. See the attached photos. Currently I have 2 clowns, 2 blood red fire shrimp, 3 emerald crabs, and 5 trochus snails and a single hammer coral which is looking very happy.

My system is a 75g display with a trigger 34 sump. I have a Red Sea skimmer, and prime fudge light in my refugium. I’ve done 2 20% water changes but nitrite is still about .3ppm

I am starting to see a small(barely noticeable) diatom bloom as well which I know is totally normal.

The screen shots are the tanks parameters, any advice would be great.

DEWreefing · Sep 18, 2019

30 parts per million nitrates are not that high I would try to keep them stable and if they do seem to keep creeping up I would use a little sugar to bring them back down.

bdouglas119 · Sep 19, 2019

DEWreefing said:
30 parts per million nitrates are not that high I would try to keep them stable and if they do seem to keep creeping up I would use a little sugar to bring them back down.

The problem is the nitrite not nitrate

brandon429 · Sep 19, 2019

Simply move on and don't factor nitrites. You are cycled. Nitrites don't need to be factored in cycling if you want to see a thread with several links explaining why and then cycling tanks for three years all in one thread without testing for nitrites it's in the microbiology of cycling thread

Idoc · Sep 19, 2019

Don't worry about the nitrites... it's not an issue in saltwater systems. You may have had a cuc member or something die... the system probably handled the ammonia quickly but the nitrite reducing bacteria are just lagging a bit.