Help cycling

[Treenk]

Ok... I set up my tank 2 weeks ago a 29g biocube with 13g custom sump I made, with just base rock and dry sand. I threw in a bunch of fish food to raise ammonia, It never raised it passed .25 I've done it 3 times a good amount too. Last week I went to LPS and he gave me a huge chunk of pure coraline algea a good amount of chatea and filter sheet (they use instead of socks, he thought it would seed well). Today I woke up and there is a good amount of detritus in my second chamber of regium. I put my skimmer in after I saw it, but it's not really catching anything my water is still too clean. What can I do to jump start this? Thought about putting a damsel in my 2nd chamber of refugium is that a bad idea? Any advice would be great

 

[Mary Carmen]

Hi Treenk,
Hi have the same tank and almost the same system. You are doing fine, teo weeks is nothing. It took me a month and a lot of patience to wait for the cicle to get started and then to be safe enough to get a fish. I used a bottle of nitrifying bacteria the second week because I felt like you. It takes forever but you are on the right track.

 

[Sparkymarc]

Check out Dr. Tim’s ammonium chloride. It worked great for me

 

[Sparkymarc]

Personally I wouldn’t run a skimmer right now. You want want your ammonia to get up to about 2ppm. Like Mary said it’s going to take about a month and the bacteria helps. Dr. Tim’s makes easy because you can control the amount of ammonia you’re putting into your tank. Make sure you’re testing for ammonia and nitrite.

 

[IslandLifeReef]

Ok... I set up my tank 2 weeks ago a 29g biocube with 13g custom sump I made, with just base rock and dry sand. I threw in a bunch of fish food to raise ammonia, It never raised it passed .25 I've done it 3 times a good amount too. Last week I went to LPS and he gave me a huge chunk of pure coraline algea a good amount of chatea and filter sheet (they use instead of socks, he thought it would seed well). Today I woke up and there is a good amount of detritus in my second chamber of regium. I put my skimmer in after I saw it, but it's not really catching anything my water is still too clean. What can I do to jump start this? Thought about putting a damsel in my 2nd chamber of refugium is that a bad idea? Any advice would be great

First, was the base rock you used live rock, or was it dry?

Second, it is fine to run your skimmer during the cycle. It isn't required, but it won't hurt anything and won't remove ammonia.

Third, what are your nitrite and ammonia readings now?

We can determine how your cycle is going based on the answers you give to the questions above. You are definitely fine, but may just need a little more time.

 

[lapin]

Ok... I set up my tank 2 weeks ago ....... I put my skimmer in after I saw it, but it's not really catching anything my water is still too clean. What can I do to jump start this? Thought about putting a damsel in my 2nd chamber of refugium is that a bad idea? Any advice would be great

There is no need to try and skim anything out at this point unless you have put in a ton of fish food and it covers your sand. Time is your best friend however it sounds like you want to jump start your cycle. There is not need to kill or harm a live fish. Get a bottle of Fritz Turbo Start or some other brand of bacteria. Use that along with something like Dr Tim's ammonium chloride. Follow those directions on the bottles and in a few weeks you will be good to go. If you want to go the natural way go to the store and get a dead table shrimp. Toss that in and wait a few weeks. Test for nitrite. Once that's come and gone you will be good to add fish.

 

[Webslinger]

put some FW black mollies in. Cheap, eat algae and are easy to catch.

 

[BeejReef]

FWIW, the chaeto fuge will process ammonia as well. I wouldn't run it, or run it minimally, during your cycle. You may have hard time gauging if your rock has matured and is processing ammonia, or if your algae is doing it.

 

[Treenk]

This is my reading for this morning, but now I'm really worried because I woke up and I have the brown algae everywhere even in the display. To answer some of your questions I used actual live rock from the ocean that came to me after it had dried. I used my own rodi system to make water and used reef salt. I have my light in refugium going non stop and my light in the main tank going 6 hours full light and 2 hours of blue in the morning before and 2 hours after like a sunset/sunrise. Thank you for all of your responses so far what do I do next. I can get plain amonia or a shrimp today which would be better?and are these good enough for a filter atm?(picture below) I'm just using filter in baffles atm

 

[Mary Carmen]

Filter looks ok but does it say anything about reef appropriate in the bag? I personally look for that label, but maybe there is someone in the forum that knows better than me. This is what I get from amazon. I am on my second bag.

The brown thing on your rock is diatoms so good sign. It is going to end up all over Your tank. I hated it, but it goes away as long as you don’t mess up with the cycle once it’s stablished. Meaning don’t overstock early on.

I can’t tell you whether ammonia or the shrimp would be better because I didn’t try any of those methods. Either way is going to be at least a couple of weeks before is totally safe. I hope someone else can tell you more. If you want to read how I started my 29 gallon biocube. I think you can find it on my bio. I remember now that I grew impatient and used a bottle of nitrifying solution so I could put a fish in. I still have the fish so it worked.

About the tests, if you have a macroalgae on your refugium, your ammonia test won’t be able to read values, but the cycle is underway. Check for nitrites too, they come after the ammonia.
So far you are doing great, it is really boring until you start seeing little things moving in the water column. Enjoy the madness and keep us posted.

 

[AdamB]

FWIW, the chaeto fuge will process ammonia as well. I wouldn't run it, or run it minimally, during your cycle. You may have hard time gauging if your rock has matured and is processing ammonia, or if your algae is doing it.

2nd not having cheato..

 

[Treenk]

Filter looks ok but does it say anything about reef appropriate in the bag? I personally look for that label, but maybe there is someone in the forum that knows better than me. This is what I get from amazon. I am on my second bag.

The brown thing on your rock is diatoms so good sign. It is going to end up all over Your tank. I hated it, but it goes away as long as you don’t mess up with the cycle once it’s stablished. Meaning don’t overstock early on.

I can’t tell you whether ammonia or the shrimp would be better because I didn’t try any of those methods. Either way is going to be at least a couple of weeks before is totally safe. I hope someone else can tell you more. If you want to read how I started my 29 gallon biocube. I think you can find it on my bio. I remember now that I grew impatient and used a bottle of nitrifying solution so I could put a fish in. I still have the fish so it worked.

About the tests, if you have a macroalgae on your refugium, your ammonia test won’t be able to read values, but the cycle is underway. Check for nitrites too, they come after the ammonia.
So far you are doing great, it is really boring until you start seeing little things moving in the water column. Enjoy the madness and keep us posted.

I got the floss from the LFS so hopefully they use the correct kind I'm sure they do.

 

[Mary Carmen]

Then I would trust it.

 

[Treenk]

So do I wait for the diatoms to go away before adding fish?

 

[Mary Carmen]

Nope, just wait for nitrites. Then, do a water change and add fish.

 

[Sparkymarc]

I agree with not having chaeto. Need to let the ammonia do it’s thing. Make sure you’re testing for nitrite. Ammonia and nitrite are harmful to fish. Shrimp will do fine but you can get Dr. Tim’s ammonium chloride in a couple of days from amazon for like $6. What I like about Dr. Tim’s is you control the amount of ammonia. A cycled tank should be able to process 2ppm of ammonia and nitrite to 0 in 24hrs. At the end of cycle you should have high nitrates, which you should do a large water change to bring down. Looks like you have 0 nitrates. That could be because of chaeto.

 

[Treenk]

Thank you guys I took your advice I bought 10 snails 10 2 of them were a different kind and didn't move than I put them against the wall so they could attach and they did but let go a few hours later I'm pretty sure they died I'm not sure why just that kind did. Also I took your advice I bought the ammonia I put 2ppm in last night I'm down to somewhere around 1.5 12 hours later. Any input on snails? Poor little guys

 

[Webslinger]

Slow and steady wins the race. If you want to put anything in your tank, research it for a week or 2 then think about it for another week or 2 before putting it in your tank. Slow down.

 

[Mary Carmen]

I personally don’t use snails. I found out the hard way that they die and make a mess of your parameters.

My favorite cuc are hermit crabs, but you need to have the cycle done, the rocks aged, and get some fish too so they don’t starved.

webslinger has a point there too. Think and research before you buy fish. This is what happened to me. After my tank cycled I wanted to see some fish swimming in my nice tank. I wanted color too so I got a watchman goby. I knew they like to live under a rock. What I didn’t know was that they don’t like to swim in open waters. After I bought it, I didn’t see him for days. It is also a pain to feed them because they don’t swim up to get food, you have to deliver it to the door.
Your tank must be close to produce nitrites and nitrates. Have you done a test?

 

[Treenk]

For an update. I got the snails and crabs and lowered the amount of time.. I think should have done one or the other because now I have no diatoms, and afraid the snails and crabs may starve. So I'm going to turn the lights back up to more hours. I bought the ammonia suggested above and first day I got it to 2ppm and second day it was down to 1 so I put more in to get back to 2, and now it hasn't gone down in 2 days. Not sure what happened but just going to keep checking.