Cycle lost after 1year 5.5 gallon tank

[alcidmr]

Is it bad to do water change if my cycle its in its last stages?. I finally have 0ppm ammonia and 0.25ppm Nitrite and 20 to 40ppm Nitrate. I have live plants anubias nana pati. Javafern and two aquarium co op sponges with ziss air stones. I found my snail was dead for 3 to 4 days I guess got ammonia spikes so then I noticed that everything was out of wack. so I had to start the cycle again I guess. I'm with 0 Ammonia and 0.25 Nitrites, 20 to 40 Nitrites shuld I leave it along till the bb takes nitrite to 0 or shuld I do 20% water change? Thanks

[Flumpweesel]

If there are no fish in there I'd leave it to sort itself out. Fish in however you will need to keep a close eye on the levels and do the smallest changes to keep it fish safe

[AndreaW]

You haven't lost your cycle -- it's just disrupted. It does take time for the nitrifying bacteria to catch up to the ammonia spike though, so do a water change to get the nitrite levels down. The BB will catch up, and are mostly living on the surfaces in your tank -- not the water, so water changes should be fine and won't hurt. You shouldn't need to do anything beyond that to maintain your cycle.

[alcidmr]

Oh ok  @Flumpweesel and @AndreaW

thank you. 

[nabokovfan87]

On 5/20/2022 at 2:29 PM, alcidmr said:

I'm with 0 Ammonia and 0.25 Nitrites, 20 to 40 Nitrites shuld I leave it along till the bb takes nitrite to 0 or shuld I do 20% water change? Thanks

if you change 20% of the water you still will have plenty of nitrites and such in there for the bacteria to do it's thing. If you have ammonia / nitrite, you generally do a water change if there is fish in there.

Given the situation, something dead for 3-4 days, I would do a water change without hesitation.  It gives you a chance to gravel vac and clean things slightly.  It also gives you the chance to scrub things if algae took the opportunity to spike. 

Personally, I wouldn't "let it sit".

[alcidmr]

@nabokovfan87 yeah thats the othere thing that happened i think. i took the dead snail out and cleaned i guss tomuch and forgot to not clean the two sponge filters at the same time like a nubby that i am lol. then the ammonia was like 1.0 ppm then everything went wrong but now that I did a water change looks good nitrite is blue at 0ppm but will see tomorrow thnks for your help.

[nabokovfan87]

Hopefully things work out!  Sorry about the snail loss.

[alcidmr]

Yeah thanks

[Wrencher_Scott]

On 5/20/2022 at 5:42 PM, alcidmr said:

@nabokovfan87 yeah thats the othere thing that happened i think. i took the dead snail out and cleaned i guss tomuch and forgot to not clean the two sponge filters at the same time like a nubby that i am lol. then the ammonia was like 1.0 ppm then everything went wrong but now that I did a water change looks good nitrite is blue at 0ppm but will see tomorrow thnks for your help.

Never clean the sponges, only rinse them out in tank water lightly. That is where 99% of your good bacteria is, don't disrupt it.