Ammonia and cycling

[Quokka]

Hi everyone, I'm currently on day 12 of my cycle using cured dry rock dosing Microbacter7 and using a dead shrimp as an ammonia source. Nitrates are currently at 20ppm and my ammonia is somewhere between 0.2-0.5ppm. In a 14g tank with a medium/large piece of shrimp, is it realistic to expect my tank to handle all of the ammonia produced from the decaying shrimp and bring levels down to zero with the shrimp still in my tank?

 

[Reef.]

You need to remove the shrimp when your ammonia is that high.

 

[lapin]

I would remove the shrimp
Thats a lot of ammonia for a small tank. It will take a long time and your tank is already cycled to the point you could add a fish

 

[Reef.]

I would remove the shrimp
Thats a lot of ammonia for a small tank. It will take a long time and your tank is already cycled to the point you could add a fish

no fish with that much ammonia

 

[Jilly92]

Hi everyone, I'm currently on day 12 of my cycle using cured dry rock dosing Microbacter7 and using a dead shrimp as an ammonia source. Nitrates are currently at 20ppm and my ammonia is somewhere between 0.2-0.5ppm. In a 14g tank with a medium/large piece of shrimp, is it realistic to expect my tank to handle all of the ammonia produced from the decaying shrimp and bring levels down to zero with the shrimp still in my tank?

Yes you could always add a bottle of more bacteria to dose as well. I would advise getting atleast 1 piece of liverock though. Did you use livesand?

 

[brandon429]

Change water, then it’s ready cuz that leaves the slicks behind but new water on top

 

[brandon429]

Is mb7 cycling or digestion bac/ cleaning bac I’m searching to see

 

[brandon429]

I see they’re dual function per site. Heterotrophs that do cleaning and nitrification

It’s not magic to mix strains of bacteria that reside in water and then sell them to us, since you can see nitrate clearly the bacteria for cycling are working, we would default to the # of days in the directions on bottle. On that date, change water and begin. Change it all

if I had to bet, right now it would work like Lapin said.


emergent bacteria that are active enough to produce nitrate have latched onto surfaces, fast. It’s why the final water change doesn’t remove them but removes any overload.

it is totally ok to wait out a notable drop in current ammonia after removing mass, in fact that’s the only current allowed method in reefing

but per discovered updates we can forego the full in-house reduction ( long variable wait ) and instead swap all water on directions date and the slicks have laid down, without fail. Timeliness, for once, in reefing. Right at the start.

I’ve never seen one single fail ever, not once. But I have seen any tank on api take a bazillion days to ever allow a start date if u go old school way

 

[Quokka]

Thanks for the responses!

You need to remove the shrimp when your ammonia is that high.

People commonly dose ammonia to 2ppm for fishless cycles, I would not expect my range to be too detrimental to sustain microbial growth. Care to elaborate why? I currently have no livestock in the tank and my thought process is that I can "temper" the composition/density of my microbiome to be prepared to adequately metabolize poor water conditions now vs when I add my livestock.

Yes you could always add a bottle of more bacteria to dose as well. I would advise getting atleast 1 piece of liverock though. Did you use livesand?

I used live sand and I've been dosing daily according to the Microbacter7 instructions and plan to until week two

I see they’re dual function per site. Heterotrophs that do cleaning and nitrification

It’s not magic to mix strains of bacteria that reside in water and then sell them to us, since you can see nitrate clearly the bacteria for cycling are working, we would default to the # of days in the directions on bottle. On that date, change water and begin. Change it all

if I had to bet, right now it would work like Lapin said.


emergent bacteria that are active enough to produce nitrate have latched onto surfaces, fast. It’s why the final water change doesn’t remove them but removes any overload.

Cool, I was thinking the same thing. MB7 recommends 2 weeks (which is on Friday). I was planning on removing the shrimp then along with a 100% waterchange, turn lights on, fish/CUC arrive on Wednesday (1/27) the following week. If I have no algae, I will rubberband some nori to a piece of rubble to sustain my CUC until algae grows.

 

[Reef.]

Thanks for the responses!

People commonly dose ammonia to 2ppm for fishless cycles, I would not expect my range to be too detrimental to sustain microbial growth. Care to elaborate why?

You say you have added that amount? So why leave it in, 2-5ppm is plenty to cycle a tank. More will kill the bacteria you are trying to build up.

 

[vetteguy53081]

That range is becoming elevated and the goal is to maintain a level of 5 ppm. In the initial phase there won't be any nitrites in the water. Continue raising the ammonia and testing the water until it shows a nitrite reading. Once you obtain a nitrate reading where there is nitrites in the water reduce the ammonia and continue this regimen until both the nitrite and ammonia tests reach 0 ppm. Once you have the correct readings, perform a major water change of around 60% and add some activated carbon to help remove any unwanted toxins or waste that may have been in the tank when you raised the ammonia.
Just like ammonia, nitrite can be toxic and harmful to marine animals even at lower levels, and without nitrite present, the cycling process cannot complete itself. Nitrite will continue to rise to a high level of about 15 ppm, the most critical stage, and at about day 24 the level should begin to fall off, although it's quite possible to run on for another 7-10 days.

 

[brandon429]

And I’d add this: the surface area only holds so much, any excess is cast off in the water and swirled


and then in counter-counter point, that’s a benefit above. It means we can haphazard any ole amount and let it stew, and no amount too high or too small is going to prevent the bottle bac date from being the working date

if we’ve played the higher side of approximation then the change out trick levels it all. It means no exact dosing required, toss in some protein in some way all same ends.

in large tanks where no easy big change, meter out your known ammonia base and add it once, so that you already know how much nitrate upper end you want. that too meets the start date no big water change.

for funs: whoever set the 5 ppm lethality limit was way off. Check out my collection of eights

100% Water Change

So in my previous thread, I had an ammonia issue that was out of hand. As suggested, I did a 100% WC and now i’m wondering when I should start adding fish back. If anyone has suggestions, let me know!

www.reef2reef.com

based on that, we can never agree with the video online from macna that says five ppm is lethal range. Dont they know if they make rules, random people in forums are going to test them

it is fully true that all sources say above five ppm will stall a cycle, I think they mean legitimately stall it from meeting the due date on the bottle if left to internal processing only, we get to add that kicker addendum now

that thread was the water change on date trick. If we’d waited for wastewater digestion we’d still be waiting and barely at six ppm, the classic claimed stall

reefs don’t ever stall, the water change trick streamlines any cycle- only handy for nanos though.

 

[Quokka]

Cool, solid advice from everyone. Thanks for taking the time to help me understand some of the logic!

Also, to clarify, my ammonia is 0.2 - 0.5 ppm, not 2-5ppm.

 

[Reef.]

Cool, solid advice from everyone. Thanks for taking the time to help me understand some of the logic!

Also, to clarify, my ammonia is 0.2 - 0.5 ppm, not 2-5ppm.

My mistake, I read it as 2ppm, in that case you can go to 2ppm then remove, don’t go over 5ppm, unless the ammonia lvl has already reached 2ppm then you can remove it.