Cycling Help for a First Timer?
Hi Folks, I got a 5 gallon aquarium set up not quite 3 weeks ago. It has gravel substrate, some driftwood and plastic plants, no fish yet. I've been trying to cycle it to prepare for a betta, but can't seem to make any headway and am stumped. I started adding a few pellets of food (included photo of the food I've been using) a few days in, and immediately got a bacterial bloom that made the water cloudy for a couple days. Everything I read said this was a good sign. I had some issues getting my test kit and was not able to start testing the water until a few days after that.
Now it's almost 3 week later, I've been testing the ammonia and nitrite every other day since I got my test kit, waiting to see the spikes there to start testing for nitrate, but have not seen that happen at any point. I saw the ammonia rising a bit last week, but it only ever got as high as 0.25ppm before falling again. I have yet to register ANY nitrite.
I am started to get a little frustrated, so I tested again yesterday and included nitrate in the off chance it had cycled during the bacterial bloom and I just missed the spike, and all levels across the board were zero.
What the heck am I doing wrong? I can't seem to get those ammonia levels to rise at all, even though at this point there is food scattered all across the bottom of my tank.