Jtrch38

It is starting to look that way :(.

So thinking the ammonia may have been coming from the eco complete, I did an experiment. I pulled out about a cup of the substrate all the way down to the bottom in middle of tank and put in a separate container. Filled that container up with one cup of my source water, and found ZERO AMMONIA! That is 50:50 ratio of substrate to water. If it was the substrate that cup of eater should have turned high ammonia right away. Now I am really at a loss. The only other thing in this damned tank are some large fake resin Sekuri Stones I purchased from Current USA. Does anyone think these could be the culprit!? It can’t be my canister filter because I turn that off when doing a water change and ammonia still shows high before I turn it back on. Any thoughts??

Ok thank you. Yes I too experienced MAJOR algae issues in this tank for first two months. I have Fluval Stratum in other 3 tanks and it has worked AMAZINGLY. Just worried it will drop ph too much to add fish. I’ve only done planted shrimp tanks so far. This was to be my first pride and joy community tank but never happened :(.

SPENT so much time scaping

This is what I was afraid of :(. I spend so much time scaping this tank. You don’t think if I keep doing water changes it will go away? Going to be heartbreaking to remove it all. Is what it is. Thank you.

I have two kits. One API and one Fluval. Both read sane thing and work fine with other 3 tanks. Definitely not test kit

And no . I stopped adding anything during water change

Well I had tried bacteria but gave up because it didn’t do anythingZ tried 3 different brands. Ph is always about 7.3 and temp is 77

Hi. I have sifted through the entire tank and found nothing on multiple occasions, snd I check my filter every three weeks just to make sure there isn’t any gunk in it. I do not wash it out. When I do the water changes, the ammonia is immediately at 2ppm still. It makes no sense. Even with a 100 percent water change, I STILL had 2ppm ammonia one minute after refilling was complete. Great source water

I used Tims Ammonia for fishless cycle same as last three tanks no issues

Other two three tanks have different substrate and HOB filters

I was adding aquarium co op easy green but stopped two weeks ago. The ammonia was the same before I started using it. Only root tabs are a re Seachem flourish tabs. Eco complete planted substrate

Hi. Yes I’ve tested the RO water. Zero ammonia. Nitrite is zero, nitrate stays at around 10ppm. It definitely not water source. Only had one mystery snail and two small nerite snails but took them out a week ago. Don’t want to add anything until I can get this ammonia down. The tank acts like it’s cycled but something is making so much ammonia it can’t keep up.

Hi all. I have a tank that is 3 months old. I am familiar with the nitrogen cycle and water parameters. I use API test kit which works good on other 3 tanks. This 20L though has had high ammonia the whole time and will not go away. It is a planted tank with eco complete planted substrate and Fluval 207 canister filter with two baskets full of Biohome Ultimate. After two months of high ammonia I decided to start doing water changes. I have done so many water changes I’ve lost count and this last one was 50 percent. Ammonia stays at 2 ppm even after a 100 percent water change. I think the tank is cycled but there is a steady source of ammonia coming from somewhere. I use reminerlized RO water and have no livestock in tank. Did a fishless cycle. Any ideas on where all this ammonia is coming from?

Hello again. So I removed the snails from this tank and removed quite a bit of debris from just under the surface of my substrate. There was TONS of it! Brown stuff. Clouded up whole tank. Can’t imagine where all that gunk came from! Definitely not from one mystery snail I am thinking. I believe it is dead plant matter from a HUGE algae outbreak I had a while back. Anyways I also did another huge water change to get the ammonia down to 2ppm. Very strange because I did almost a 100 percent water change and still read 2ppm?? Weird. I wanted to ask, do you think adding Fritz Turbo would help? Also, I forgot to mention I added a second basket of the Biohome ultimate to my canister last week. Can I add the Fritz or should I leave alone? Thanks!

Will do!

Ok I’ll give that a try. Thanks!

Hi. I do have a couple nerite snails in there because the algae was OUT OF CONTROL. I use aquarium co op easy green fert in there too so maybe that’s the nitrates? Not sure. Here’s the REALLY weird part. On 4 separate occasions I saw the nitrite rise to .25 ppm and ammonia fell to 1ppm.The next day I would check, they were gone again and the ammonia would go back up to 2ppm! It’s almost like something is killing the nitrites before they can fully convert the ammonia.

I have not added anymore ammonia in almost three months

Hi! Thanks for the response. I have used dechlorinator in the past in this tank. I always use Dr Tims ammonia to start my tanks. I started at 4ppm because the directions said I needed to get there. After over a month and a half, I read some stuff that said it should be 2 ppm. So I did a 75 percent water change and got it down to 2ppm. It stayed there for a while and is now creeping back up over a month later back to 4ppm.

Need some expert help here. I am pretty well versed in planted aquariums, cycling, and keeping shrimp, but this one 20L tank is driving me insane. It still has not cycled in 3 months. I have successfully done 3 other fishless cycles in three other tanks that are thriving, so I’ve got good knowledge of the nitrogen cycle and things like that. This one here though 🤬. Everything thing seems to be growing nicely and looks healthy but tank just won’t process the ammonia. PH 7.4 Ammonia 4ppm Nitrite 0 Nitrate 10 GH 179 KH 71.6 Temp 78 Eco complete planted substrate Remineralized RO water Planted Fluval 207 canister filter with Biohome biomedia Only difference in this and my other tanks is this has a canister filter and eco complete substrate. I have tried EVERYTHING. Biological booster, Dr Tim’s One and Only, Fluval Cycle, Tetra Safe Start, and Prime with Stability. Nothing works. Test kits are good. API and FLUVAL. Used old media from cycled tanks too, nothing. Does ANYONE know why this cycle is not progressing?