Cycle day 4

Frtdrmrose7 · Nov 21, 2018

im setting up a 150G cube and I might be overthinking this but any opinions would be great. I set it up with 140 lbs new live sand,25lbs of live rock from my mature reef and about 100lbs of clean dry old live rock. I also added a bag of media into the refugium with mature rock. Ive had the media in my sump for 5-6 months anticipating this build. I have been ghost feeding the tank daily thinking I would get this cycle fired off.

Here’s where I’m stuck, from previous experience I thought any old live rock will kick off a cycle due to the decaying matter in the porous rock that you can’t get out no matter how much it’s cleaned. I’m on day 4 and my ammonia is between .25 and .50. Nitrite is 0 and nitrate is 0. I know the rock and media from my mature reef are definitely going to shorten the cycle but it seems like I can’t even get an ammonia spike to get this going.

I just don’t see how it’s possible to have enough bacteria already to be handling this. I’m about to go get a dead shrimp or two.

Thoughts?

EmdeReef · Nov 21, 2018

There are really no rules on what number ammonia will hit to consider a spike during the cycle plus there are all sorts of testing errors. Without dosing actual ammonia it’s hard to get the level up too much unless you dump a lot of food.

I would just wait until you start seeing some nitrates but you may have to feed a bit more.

User · Nov 21, 2018

Ace hardware 10% ammonia is like $7.

Use hamzareef calculator to dose to 2ppm. Your biofilter that you have established already (good job, btw) will take care of it in a couple days, but test to make sure

At that point I’d redose, test after 24 hours. You want ammonia and nitrite to be zero.

If not, let it drop to zero and redose. Repeat until 24 hour levels are 0/0

Water change to get rid of nitrates if they are much higher than 10-15ppm

With the work you’ve already done and the amount of rock you transferred, I’m sure it’ll only take 1-2 doses before you are good.

cromag27 · Nov 21, 2018

pure ammonia. 2-3ppm is optimal. back to zero within 8-12 hours and you’re good.

Frtdrmrose7 · Nov 21, 2018

neilp2006 said:
Ace hardware 10% ammonia is like $7.

Use hamzareef calculator to dose to 2ppm. Your biofilter that you have established already (good job, btw) will take care of it in a couple days, but test to make sure

At that point I’d redose, test after 24 hours. You want ammonia and nitrite to be zero.

If not, let it drop to zero and redose. Repeat until 24 hour levels are 0/0

Water change to get rid of nitrates if they are much higher than 10-15ppm

With the work you’ve already done and the amount of rock you transferred, I’m sure it’ll only take 1-2 doses before you are good.

Is this what your talking about? Clean scent 10% Ammonia? This is all that Ace here sells for 10% Ammonia. Wouldn’t I need to worry about the clean scent additive?

Rjukan · Nov 21, 2018

If it were me I would stick with your shrimp plan. Toss one or 2 in, keep them in a media bag so they are easy to get out. Your ammonia will spike in 2 days and watch how long it takes for that to come down. I bet it will be pretty quick considering the established rock and media you have in there already.

cracker · Nov 21, 2018

Your method of adding live rock & ghost feeding works just fine . That's how we all used to to do it ! Just takes a while. Only 4 days ? Just not long enough .

cromag27 · Nov 21, 2018

Frtdrmrose7 said:
Is this what your talking about? Clean scent 10% Ammonia? This is all that Ace here sells for 10% Ammonia. Wouldn’t I need to worry about the clean scent additive?

yes that’s why it has to be pure ammonia.

cromag27 · Nov 21, 2018

Eagle 2 said:
If it were me I would stick with your shrimp plan. Toss one or 2 in, keep them in a media bag so they are easy to get out. Your ammonia will spike in 2 days and watch how long it takes for that to come down. I bet it will be pretty quick considering the established rock and media you have in there already.

not a controlled process. how do you know how many shrimp you need to add to get to 2-3ppm ammonia?

User · Nov 21, 2018

Frtdrmrose7 said:
Is this what your talking about? Clean scent 10% Ammonia? This is all that Ace here sells for 10% Ammonia. Wouldn’t I need to worry about the clean scent additive?

Yes, that’s the correct stuff. There are no additives.

I always thought it strange they called it clean scent, but it doesn’t contain anything other than 90% water, 10% ammonia

Shake it- if the bubbles disperse in less than 2 seconds, it’s pure. Any additives will make the bubbles hang around longer than that.

Rjukan · Nov 21, 2018

cromag27 said:
not a controlled process. how do you know how many shrimp you need to add to get to 2-3ppm ammonia?

Why does it need to be controlled? Just spike the ammonia and move on... he mentioned using shrimp, and in my experience I've used shrimp and it worked well. I've also used live rock that had tons of decaying material on it and really spiked the ammonia, it worked fine also just took longer. My point was that I personally dont like the idea of putting straight ammonia in my system, not to say there is anything wrong with that route. I just dont like it.

cromag27 · Nov 21, 2018

neilp2006 said:
Yes, that’s the correct stuff. There are no additives.

I always thought it strange they called it clean scent, but it doesn’t contain anything other than 90% water, 10% ammonia

Shake it- if the bubbles disperse in less than 2 seconds, it’s pure. Any additives will make the bubbles hang around longer than that.

oxymoron. “clean scent” means no scent, i believe.

cromag27 · Nov 21, 2018

Eagle 2 said:
Why does it need to be controlled? Just spike the ammonia and move on... he mentioned using shrimp, and in my experience I've used shrimp and it worked well. I've also used live rock that had tons of decaying material on it and really spiked the ammonia, it worked fine also just took longer. My point was that I personally dont like the idea of putting straight ammonia in my system, not to say there is anything wrong with that route. I just dont like it.

we’re talking about efficient and accurate ways to cycle a tank. we know maintaining ammonia at 2-3ppm consistently until it drops to zero is the way to cycle tank. but if you use anything other than ammonia, how do you maintain the proper levels? you don’t know. can you cycle other ways? of course. but you risk either the cycle taking longer, or having a stalled cycle. not efficient.

so to answer your question - it doesn’t need to be controlled, but there’s way less room for error if it is controlled.

Rjukan · Nov 21, 2018

cromag27 said:
we’re talking about efficient and accurate ways to cycle a tank. we know maintaining ammonia at 2-3ppm consistently until it drops to zero is the way to cycle tank. but if you use anything other than ammonia, how do you maintain the proper levels? you don’t know. can you cycle other ways? of course. but you risk either the cycle taking longer, or having a stalled cycle. not efficient.

so to answer your question - it doesn’t need to be controlled, but there’s way less room for error if it is controlled.

Not going to argue. OP can decide what he wants to do, and what feels more comfortable. I like the au natural route, you like the mad scientist, all good

cromag27 · Nov 21, 2018

Eagle 2 said:
Not going to argue. OP can decide what he wants to do, and what feels more comfortable. I like the au natural route, you like the mad scientist, all good

different ways to achieve the same goal. all good.