Water Cycling PROBLEM'S

[Brad Moreau]

Hello,

I'm Brad in Oceanside Ca. trying to get my system up & cycled, so here is my story

I have a 2000+ gal system with #2 - 275 ft's a 300 gal sump 

one tank has a 55 gal bio filter & 4' x 22' dwc grow bed, out of bio filter I feed # 12 vertical towers w/ # 11 strawberry plants in each

other tank goes to 4' x 5' 6" gravel flood & drain bed ( 3/4"mixed w/pea gravel grainte) that drains into a 4' x16' dwc grow bed to sump & a 4" deep 34" x82" duck weed bed ( feed off 5/8" hose not from drain line ) to be added will be a 4' x 10' wicking bed & dutch buckets @ latter date

all drain into 300 gal sump than pumped back to ft

i built side one in april 2013( never completed cycling )

side 2 completed 6/8/13 

i have city water that shows 2 ppm nitrites out of the tap, chlormine, high ph 8+

having my nitrites off the chart for over a month now (i keep adding to size of system - 50% bigger)

after seeing that chlorine was killing my bacteria i bought a chlorine/chloamine filter before filling second ft & use it to top off fts

system reads:

amonia .25

nitrate 100

nitrites dark purple

ph 7.6 to 8

water temp 60* to 65* @ night 70* to 78* daytime

i have used nite out 2, nothing happened, added used filters from pet shop & turtle tank, as well as special blend benifical bacteria ( almost 1/2 gal ) to 2000 gal system

i have 100+ strawberry plants, approx 50 lettuce, couple squash

most strawberry are dieing, lettuce doing ok

what to do ? just wait ??? do you think i have to cycle all over again?

will post pic latter

Thanks Brad

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