Cycling Reef Question

[Dycofree]

Hey guys. Im in the process of cycling my 29 gallon reef tank and things are going well so far. Im on day 3 of testing and my results have been as follows:

Day 1: Ammonia 1.5 ppm, Nitrite .25 ppm, Nitrate 5 ppm

Day 2: Ammonia 2.0 ppm, Nitrite 1.0 ppm, Nitrate 10 ppm

Day 3 (today): Ammonia .75 ppm, Nitrite 5.0 ppm, Nitrate 160 ppm (yikes)

The reason for my post is this: I am leaving town for 3-4 days and will obviously not be around to monitor my results (bad timing I know). Do I need to do anything before I leave, or just let the cycle take its course while I’m gone (added bonus!)? I dont want to leave without making sure I’m doing what I need to be doing! Thanks guys!

 

[FragOut]

Me personally I would dose ammonia if you’re currently doing that. Just do your normal and come back. Not much to do but have patience in the beginning. If you’re not dosing ammonia then just leave it be.

 

[Dycofree]

Update: I just arrived homed and water tested as follows:

Ammonia: 0 ppm
Nitrite: .25 ppm
Nitrate: 10 ppm

Im close! If you refer up to my original post, you can see the bacteria has been busy (along with my chaeto) the last few days. Any tips/suggestions at this point?

 

[Vahanyos]

The hardest part is leaving it alone for a couple weeks. Assuming you don’t have livestock in there you can just let it sit days on end and test every 3 days or so.

What I typically do is let it sit for two weeks, test and if he only thing high is nitrates, I do a water change and add some more ammonia to see if it’ll break it down... after I test again and get nitrate reading only I add my first fish cuz at this point it’s cycled - of course I add very slowly after that until your tank gets more established