Nitrite question

[tony53176]

just tested today and my ammonia is now 0 or just about 0 ppm (there may have been a slight hint of green) but the nitrites are way over 5ppm, I always thought that as ammonia came down nitrites would come down as well just not as fast. I didn't test for nitrates this morning I unfortunately didn't have time but I did test for that yesterday and I was between 0 and 5ppm and its been between that for the past week I would say.

Does the ammonia reach 0ppm before the nitrites start coming down? Or is my system not producing nitrates the way it should be?

[thegrun]

Ammonia drops first, then nitrites. All is good and normal.

[tony53176]

it took about 2 weeks for me to see the ammonia drop, should I expect the same for the nitrites?

[TjwBlake]

more or less I would say. But it think it is more accurate to say that they will drop when they drop. As long as you start seeing the wave move across the 3 tests i would say its going correctly

[izzy123]

Actually, nitrites are not all that important in a reef tank, you should read up on some articles of Randy on the reef chemistry part of this forum, the chemgod explains it all.

My tank reads 0 on ammonia, 0 on nitrates and still about 5 ppm of nitrites, so no worry's ... it's all good

Happy reefing

[thegrun]

I usually see the nitrites drop quicker than ammonia, but each tank's chemistry is unique due largely to the variations in live rock.

[disc1]

Originally Posted by izzy123

Actually, nitrites are not all that important in a reef tank, you should read up on some articles of Randy on the reef chemistry part of this forum, the chemgod explains it all.

My tank reads 0 on ammonia, 0 on nitrates and still about 5 ppm of nitrites, so no worry's ... it's all good

Happy reefing

Nitrites aren't too important in a running tank because it is not toxic to marine fish. It is only toxic to freshwater fish from what I understand.

But in a cycling tank, the nitrite level is an indicator of how the microbial life is populating the tank. You want to wait until you see the nitrite level drop to zero before you start adding fish to the tank. You want to wait until you have a complete nitrogen cycle happening in the tank. Right now you've got the first step, but if you add a bunch of ammonia right now by adding a fish then the accumulation of nitrite is going to end up slowing down the consumption of ammonia.

The move with nitrates you may or may not see. Most new tanks will get a little bit of some type of algae bloom at the end of the cycle and this can mask the nitrate spike.