4-Month Cycling? Information overload

[RobTorMar]

Hello,

Has anyone done the 4 month lights off cycling and dosing vibrant as per recommended by BRS? Two of my LFS swear by it so I started dosing two weeks ago however I've been reading some posts that it does not work. My lights have been off since I started cycling mid February. My tank has the following specs:

55 gallon
4 T5s 50w
fx 6 cannister full of bio media ( Bi-weekly cleaning)
HOB Fluval with some media and filter floss (Bi-weekly cleaning)
2 Jebow SOWs 15
2 Clowns
0 amm
0 nitrites
5 nitrates

Should I just turn the lights on? I don't plan on adding corals for a few more months anyways.

 

[brandon429]

Your tank is cycled for ammonia control given the timeframes and feed sources already

the four month cycle is for micro layers of life to form on rocks, hopefully feeding new corals better than new rocks and hopefully suppressing dinos better than un cured new rocks.

if you turn on light that won’t hurt anything, you might bring up some algae that needs cleaning but that’s the normal situation for us all anyway. Even if you skipped bottle bac, the dilution carried it all until you passed cycling chart timelines.

 

[Azedenkae]

2 Clowns
0 amm
0 nitrites
5 nitrates

Wait, you have two clowns and have been measuring 0 ammonia (and nitrites) I presume regularly? I mean assuming you are feeding the clowns and that is your parameters and your tests are not faulty or whatever, you tank's already cycled.

 

[RobTorMar]

Wait, you have two clowns and have been measuring 0 ammonia (and nitrites) I presume regularly? I mean assuming you are feeding the clowns and that is your parameters and your tests are not faulty or whatever, you tank's already cycled.

Yea my tank is cycled in terms of ammonia but BRS talks about algae. BRS and dude at my LFS said that a 4 month cycle will reduce algae in the long term and effectively remove the "ugly phase" ( without lights on ). I'm just not sure if this is true or not

 

[RobTorMar]

Your tank is cycled for ammonia control given the timeframes and feed sources already

the four month cycle is for micro layers of life to form on rocks, hopefully feeding new corals better than new rocks and hopefully suppressing dinos better than un cured new rocks.

if you turn on light that won’t hurt anything, you might bring up some algae that needs cleaning but that’s the normal situation for us all anyway. Even if you skipped bottle bac, the dilution carried it all until you passed cycling chart timelines.

I see... I used bottled bac that they gave me and cycled with a shrimp. After my ammonia and nitrates hit 0 i threw two clownfish in. So is the lights off cycle a myth?

 

[JCTReefer]

Yeah, what @brandon429 said sums it up.

 

[BurlyWizard]

the four month cycle is for micro layers of life to form on rocks, hopefully feeding new corals better than new rocks and hopefully suppressing dinos better than un cured new rocks.

Just curious, what do you mean by "suppressing dinos better than uncured new rocks"?

 

[RobTorMar]

Yeah, what @brandon429 said sums it up.

I don't quite understand unfortunately =/ I'm kinda new. Care to explain

 

[Azedenkae]

Yea my tank is cycled in terms of ammonia but BRS talks about algae. BRS and dude at my LFS said that a 4 month cycle will reduce algae in the long term and effectively remove the "ugly phase" ( without lights on ). I'm just not sure if this is true or not

Oh man, this is something I dislike about this hobby, everyone has different definitions for something like cycling. I mean it is not a terribly big issue per se as we all kinda have a plan to get to an end goal in the end which is relatively congruent in the end (keeping live stock alive in a marine environment).

Anyways, I define cycling differently and have yet dug into the workings behind Vibrant and how it has or has not worked for others, so I cannot really offer any further help.

I would suggest though, to follow one or the other direction to a tee. If the BRS four month 'cycling' method calls for lights off and dosing Vibrant and you want to try that, then go with that, don't just dose Vibrant but leave lights on or whatever.

Personally, I would just call it a day and enjoy my clownfish with lights on. But that's me. Between 3.5 more months of 'cycling' or enjoying my fish while going through ugly periods, yeah I'd choose the latter.

P.S. And yes lights off during cycling as most people would define it (establishing nitrifiers, and maybe denitrifiers) is 100% a myth. Yes (strong) lights can inhibit or kill nitrifiers, but that point is kind of moot. Where we actually want the nitrifiers to grow won't be affected by the light, so yeah. Eh.

 

[JCTReefer]

Man, starting a tank with dry rock these days is a pain but we don’t really have the choices we used to. Back in the day we pretty much had insta cycled tank with tons of micro fauna and biodiversity. All those things are what we want to out compete things like dinos. Those things don’t come instantly with these sterile environments we start with. Biodiversity is key in my opinion. It takes a long while for our sterile environments to mature and balance out. I think old reefers had it easier in that aspect. There so many things that take place in a tanks maturity way beyond cycling. The idea is to give your tank time with the lights out to let things mature a bit. To build up some biodiversity so to speak. Once the lights are on, you’ll quickly have other things that will start to compete for space. But, at some some point you will need some light. Haha.

 

[RobTorMar]

Oh man, this is something I dislike about this hobby, everyone has different definitions for something like cycling. I mean it is not a terribly big issue per se as we all kinda have a plan to get to an end goal in the end which is relatively congruent in the end (keeping live stock alive in a marine environment).

Anyways, I define cycling differently and have yet dug into the workings behind Vibrant and how it has or has not worked for others, so I cannot really offer any further help.

I would suggest though, to follow one or the other direction to a tee. If the BRS four month 'cycling' method calls for lights off and dosing Vibrant and you want to try that, then go with that, don't just dose Vibrant but leave lights on or whatever.

Personally, I would just call it a day and enjoy my clownfish with lights on. But that's me. Between 3.5 more months of 'cycling' or enjoying my fish while going through ugly periods, yeah I'd choose the latter.

P.S. And yes lights off during cycling as most people would define it (establishing nitrifiers, and maybe denitrifiers) is 100% a myth. Yes (strong) lights can inhibit or kill nitrifiers, but that point is kind of moot. Where we actually want the nitrifiers to grow won't be affected by the light, so yeah. Eh.

thans for the reply. Yea man there is so much information out there, guess it's just trial and experience.

 

[RobTorMar]

Man, starting a tank with dry rock these days is a pain but we don’t really have the choices we used to. Back in the day we pretty much had insta cycled tank with tons of micro fauna and biodiversity. All those things are what we want to out compete things like dinos. Those things don’t come instantly with these sterile environments we start with. Biodiversity is key in my opinion. It takes a long while for our sterile environments to mature and balance out. I think old reefers had it easier in that aspect. There so many things that take place in a tanks maturity way beyond cycling. The idea is to give your tank time with the lights out to let things mature a bit. To build up some biodiversity so to speak. Once the lights are on, you’ll quickly have other things that will start to compete for space. But, at some some point you will need some light. Haha.

Gotcha! I'll give it another month and turn the lights on !

 

[Azedenkae]

Man, starting a tank with dry rock these day is a pain but we don’t really have the choices we used to. Back in the day we pretty much had insta cycled tank with tons of micro fauna and biodiversity. All those things are what we want to out compete things like dinos. Those things don’t come instantly with these sterile environments we start with. Biodiversity is key in my opinion. It takes a long while for our sterile environments to mature and balance out. I think old reefers had it easier in that aspect. There so many things that take place in a tanks maturity way beyond cycling. The idea is to give your tank time with the lights out to let things mature a bit. To build up some biodiversity so to speak. Once the lights are on, you’ll quickly have other things that will start to compete for space. But, at some some point you will need some light. Haha.

Absolutely agreed. I come from Australia and it is a blessing. I had a much easier time setting up marine aquariums than freshwater aquariums lol. We get live rock that goes from being collected from the wild to being in our tanks sometimes within days, and yeah. Yes there are heaps of crazy critters crawling out of the rockwork, but I personally believe biodiversity helps 'settle' everything in the end, and it does. There are some dangerous critters, sure, but really it is far more often hits than misses.

Here, I ordered live rock from KP Aquatics and was like... 'this is it?' Not bashing KP Aquatics specifically at all by the way! It turned out to be quite a normal thing here, and well, I guess we just gotta accept it. Or find places that sell live rock more resembling what we used to have/have overseas.

 

[mdb_talon]

I dont know about the 4 month cycle thing to minimize algae and "the uglies" so i will just assume it works.

Personally i would rather cycle in a week and then over the next couple months have the uglies and some algae.

 

[JCTReefer]

Yeah, KP Aquatics isn’t like ordering the old stuff. Fiji, Marshall Islands, Haitian, Vanuatu, Manado, Tonga, Pukani etc etc, is all a thing of the past. I’m just luckily I started Reefing long enough ago to experience the good stuff. A lot has changed in the last 20 years. dang I’m getting old. Lol. 20 years seems like yesterday.

 

[Azedenkae]

Yeah, KP Aquatics isn’t like ordering the old stuff. Fiji, Marshall Islands, Haitian, Vanuatu, Manado, Tonga, Pukani etc etc, is all a thing of the past. I’m just luckily I started Reefing long enough ago to experience the good stuff. A lot has changed in the last 20 years. dang I’m getting old. Lol. 20 years seems like yesterday.

My god, that has been a while. I only started keeping aquariums in earnest like ten years ago. XD And reef-keeping like 7 years ago.