Ammonia and Nitrite question.

[BlueDog]

Hi folks,  I'm new here.  I just rekindled my aquarium interests after 40+ years.  I have a question about ammonia/nitrite/nitrate testing. 

I'm running a 37 gallon aquarium.  It's maybe 20% planted. I have about 12 neon tetras, 10 harlequin rasboras, 10 green corys, 1 male betta, 3 ottos, 2 nerites and 4 amanos.  I'm running an Aquaclear 50 hob and a sponge filter rated for up to 50 gallons.   I've been doing about a 25% water change every other day.

I have the API fresh water master test kit and do a test every other morning.  This morning my ammonia is showing "0" ppm.  Nitrite is showing "0.50" ppm and Nitrate is showing "10" ppm.  I don't know if I should be concerned and what I can do to improve things.  Any suggestions?  Much appreciated.

[Chris]

How old is the tank? Any recent changes?

I'd recheck the nitrite test - it's possible it's a false positive or maybe the color was misread. .5 nitrite isn't great, but isn't necessarily catastrophic. 

If you still get a nitrite reading, I'd do a larger water change (50% or so) and consider cutting back on feeding a bit for the time being. Just to give your tank some time and some breathing room to catch up with the current load. 

[CoryWithAKatana]

The only concerning thing to me is the nitrites which would ideally be at 0ppm. Usually it takes time for the cycle to start (Ammonia-->Nitrites-->Nitrates) it seem s you are at the second phase where the ammonia (fish poop) has been turned into Nitrites, after a week or so it should start turning into nitrates which can be removed by plants and water changes. Hope this helps, your tank is beautiful!

EDIT; I second what Chris said, maybe hold back on feeding them as much. 

Edited May 17 by CoryWithAKatana

[doktor zhivago]

Plants will remove ammonia directly as well as nitrates. They cannot really use nitrites so those tend to build up in an uncycled planted tank. The nitrite bacteria will take a while to build up... Water changes should take care of it tho 

[BlueDog]

Thank you for such quick responses!

The tank is 6 weeks old tomorrow.  I let it cycle for 4 weeks with plants and all before adding any fish.

I did a 2nd test a moment ago and got the same result.

I'll keep changing the water.  I did a 10% water change this morning (25% yesterday).  I'll do a 50% tomorrow.  I hope the Amano will tolerate it.  Dang those things are expensive!

I'm wondering if putting in some API Quick Start would be of any benefit at this point.

Again, thank you all for responding!

Edit:  The only recent change was I took out 6 red eye tetras yesterday and gave them to the local aquarium store.  I was told they would do well with the other fish.  Not so much.  They nipped the fins of the neons and rasboras to the point where entire tails were missing right up to the meat.  Then the betta would kill the injured.

Edited May 17 by BlueDog

[Chris]

Quick start wouldn't hurt, I just wouldn't expect it to make a huge difference. Reducing the amount of food going in (temporarily) and manually removing waste will put a band-aid over the issue while you wait for the tank to catch up. 

There's quite a bit of fish in there for the tank to be 6 weeks old, so it's likely that just a bit too much was added all at once. Even after a traditional cycle, it's safest to add a little at a time - say, one school of fish at a time. Then let the tank rest for a couple weeks, and add another group. 

Either way, sounds like you have it handled! Just keep a close eye, reduce food, and up your water changes until things level out. 

Nice tank!

[BlueDog]

Thank you, Chris!