Nitrites in the fishless cycle???

Question

The nitrites have been up for about a week now in my cycle. When will they start going down? on average because every cycle is different. by the way i am doing a fishless cycle using pure ammonia. and i put a LITTLE bit in each day to keep the ammonia eating bacteria alive. So when will the nitrites be done? Please help as best you can! THANKS!

Answer 1

It's hard to say how long these things take as it depends very much on how much you have in the tank of the nitrogen compound as well as how much surface area your filter has to colonize the needed strains of bacteria.  Bacteria "consume" these compounds through a process called oxidation.  You have to have the Nitrosommas (ammonia) bacteria build up before you can build up Nitrobaciters (nitrite) bacteria, and thus takes longer for the Nitrobaciters to grow.  Generally, a total cycle takes anywhere from 6-10 weeks.  Most of  that depends on how big of a surface area you have in your filter and how much of each compound you have in the water.

Answer 2

It will take twice as long for the nitrite munching bacteria to develop than the ammonia munching bacteria.

Keep daily measurements of your tank.

And be sure to measure to nitrates too.

Once the tank is able to change 4-5ppm of ammonia to zero ammonia and zero nitrite and under 20ppm of nitrate in around 10-12 hours, then the cycle is complete.