I started my system back at the beginning of November, not really knowing what I was doing/ getting myself into. My friend gave me a 55 gallon fish tank that I thought hey I could probably somehow turn this into a garden. I did a little research on google for aquariums systems and hit the ground running before I knew how to walk. So far what I have is a ebb and flow system that pumps water from my 55 gallon tank into my 2 ft by 4 ft grow bed that is 1 ft deep for 30 mins every two hours from 6am to midnight. My lights stay on from 6am to midnight too. Since I am not a big fan of eating fish I am trying to use tropical fish and I currently have 3 african cichlids that are still alive. I started out with two chilids and 2 dog face puffers but the puffers died. I got 4 more cichlids and three of these guys died, the first two I think got bullied by my survivors who wouldn't let them eat and then the last one I think just stopped eating. My problem that I am having right now is that my ammonia is really high and has been for a couple weeks now but I have 0 nitrite and nitrate. My fish are really tiny and I am not feeding them much because of the high ammonia. I believe my system did cycle because about a month in I had a high spike in nitrite and nitrate and then thing balanced out. The pH is currently at 6.4/6.6 after I added a pH booster cuz it was dipping down to 6.0 and maybe even lower. In addition to my fish dying my plants are starting to look a little sad with my tomato plants having wilted leave with specks of black. I am not quite sure where to go from here so any advice would be incredible helpful.
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