Cycling issues dont know whats going on with my tank

[jpcampbell123]

For the past two weeks i have been cycling the tank. i added 4 bags of raw shrimp for the amonnia and let it marinade. i also 20 capfuls of stability for a week and also 20 capfuls of microbacter. the water temps are pretty warm at 80 degrees. i checked the parameters for the past two weeks. also i took the shrimp out after it marinaded. the amonia has pretty much stayed between 4-8 ppm the whole time. the nitrites are at 0ppm and the nitrates at one point got between 10-20 ppm just checked it again today and its back to 0 ppm the only other thing i can think is the bio media in the sump its fully submerged maybe thats the issue. the pump in the sump cant be run dry of it will burn out.

 

[Owain4]

Even if the biomedia in the sump is submerged it should still have bacteria in it. You just need to wait until Ammonia and Nitrite get to 0 and nitrate is present. My 72 gallon took a month to cycle. The best thing to do is just wait and keep checking

 

[jpcampbell123]

did another check on the water today and the ammonia is the same. nitrites was a light purple and the nitrites was 0 ppm. what i do not understand is the nirtrites was higer yesterday and it went down today but how can the amonia stay the same every time? if the bacteria eat it it should go down. i might take a water sample out to a store to see if its my kit. i forgot to mention earlier its 180 gallons.