help!

[leeds]

hi fellow reefers, started cycling my redsea reefer 170 3 weeks ago

Week 1 - with raw prawn. dosed 2 vials of Biodigest and 500ml of Fritz Zyme 9.

Week 2 - removed old prawn and put in new prawn. 40% WC

within the first 2 weeks, Ammonia started spiking at day 3 to 1.5ppm and came down to 0.5ppm on day 10. Nitrite spiked to 4ppm at day 4 and Nitrate spiked to 100pm at day 3.

as soon as i saw ammonia dropping on day 10, i was happy. then nitrite dropped to 2ppm on day 14 - even happier.

Week 3 - removed old prawn and started dosing ammonia from Brightwell. 30% WC, dosed 2 vials of Biodigest and another 200ml of Zyme 9

Since day 14 ie start of week3, ammnia has dropped to 0.15ppm currently but nitrite remained at 4.

today is nearing end of week 3; i know there's some more waiting to go but how should i react if nitrite remained at 4ppm? should i continue dosing ammonia to feed the bacteria consuming ammonia?

i read somewhere that bacteria converting nitrite to nitrate takes longer to grow. are there ways i can expedite their growth (temp, flow)?

appreciate any advice pls

[R0B]

If you don't have any live stock in the tank then you can lower the salinity to around 1.15 - 1.18 and increase the temperature slightly to 28. Adding an air stone may also help (assuming you are not running your skimmer or wavemakers) as bacteria consume oxygen. These things will aid bacterial growth.

Fyi, 4 is absolutely a good number at this stage. You don't want to go down to zero for neither Nitrate nor Phosphate. It's all about stability.

Soon you will be ready for a starter fish. So think about your choices ahead of you. Good luck but sounds like you are in a good position.

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