Unless I'm misinterpreting, it sounds like your tank is cycled (or close to it), but you just don't really understand the point of a cycled tank?
Like, it sounds like your doing all the steps and taking all the measurements, but you don't really know why?
What makes me think so is that you're "struggling with nitrates" and that you say "but if I add ammonia my nitrate will go sky high again", which is
the whole point of the cycle.
So, apologies in advance if the below is unnecessary, but I'm just going to write out the very basic summary of cycling a tank.
I assume that once you better understand
why you are doing things, it will start to make sense.
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So,
cycling a tank. What is the point?
The point is that living things produce
ammonia. Poop, pee, rotting material all produces ammonia.
Ammonia is very toxic even in low amounts. You don't want it in your water.
Luckily, there exist
ammonia-eating bacteria.
The ammonia-eating bacteria eat the ammonia, and turn it into
nitrites. So that's good, because they get rid of the ammonia.
Sadly,
nitrites are also very toxic in low amounts. You also don't want it in your water.
Luckily, there exist
nitrites-eating bacteria as well!
The nitrites-eating bacteria eat the nitrites and turn them into
nitrates.
Nitrates are slightly toxic, but not as much as ammonia or nitrites. Where
any ammonia or nitrites is dangerous, having a bit of nitrates (up to 80 ppm) is still safe.
When we talk about
cycling a tank, this is what we mean: to have bacteria turn the
ammonia into nitrites and the
nitrites into nitrates.
Basically: to turn dangerous ammonia into far-less-dangerous nitrates.
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How?
An uncycled tank doesn't have these ammonia-eating or nitrites-eating bacteria. These bacteria will only start to breed once there is food for them.
So, you are putting in ammonia to help the bacteria grow (either pure, as you did, or by putting fish or rotting food or other sources of ammonia in).
Once you have ammonia in the tank, the ammonia-eating bacteria will think "There's food here!" and start to breed.
Their population will grow until it's big enough to eat
all the ammonia you put in.
This will take some time, so right after you start putting in ammonia you will see the ammonia rise.
Once the bacteria population is big enough, the ammonia will get eaten and the ammonia levels will go down. This is what they call the "
ammonia spike".
You know the ammonia spike is done when you can add ammonia, and it disappears in a day. That means there are enough bacteria eating it and turning it into nitrites.
It's similar for nitrites-eating bacteria.
At first, there's not a lot of them, because there's nothing for them to eat.
Once the ammonia-eating bacteria start turning the ammonia into nitrites, suddenly there are nitrites to eat! So, the nitrite-eating bacteria start to breed and become bigger and bigger.
This also takes some time, so once the ammonia spike is done, you will probably see an increase in nitrites. After a while the nitrites-eating bacteria have grown enough, and the nitrites will start going down. That's the "
nitrites spike".
The nitrites-eating bacteria will turn all the nitrites into nitrates, so the nitrates start rising.
The only way to get rid of nitrates is through plants or water changes.
Since it's far less toxic, you're not in a hurry. Doing a small water change every week is often enough.
To summarise, I drew a crappy picture. There are better pictures on google.
View attachment 85466
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Long story short:
-
"Struggling with nitrates" - yes! The end result of a cycled tank is a tank with zero ammonia, zero nitrites, and rising levels of nitrates. You'll have to do water changes every now and then to remove nitrates.
- "
As soon as I add ammonia, nitrates levels go up" - yes! This is the point of the cycle.
As long as you keep adding ammonia, your nitrates will rise. Once you have axolotl(s) in the tank, they will poop out ammonia themselves.
Probably much less than you're adding right now, though, so nitrates will also go up slower.
Does your ammonia drop back to zero within a day after you add it?
Do you see zero nitrites (or only small amounts shortly after you've added ammonia)?
Do you see rising nitrates?
If the answer to all three is "yes", your tank is cycled.
Hurray!
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Again, sorry if this was too basic.
I see a lot of people trying to cycle a tank without really understanding what they're doing - hopefully this helps a bit.
If there's a better way to explain, let me know!
so thank you!