How to unstick any seemingly stuck cycle

[Delouise]

Thanks for posting! What’s your feed source for the bac

can you post a tank pic so we can look for any growth pigments on sand or rock / little signals

Thanks for posting! What’s your feed source for the bac

can you post a tank pic so we can look for any growth pigments on sand or rock / little signals

I used Fishless Fuel liquid ammonia to feed the bacteria. My tank pics are awful because I don’t have great lights up. Nothing appears to be growing, yet.

 

[brandon429]

No telling what kills fish. disease and medical forum here has many initial losses AJ. When it’s an ammonia event we get cloudy water, all animals lost, smell etc. a hard crash. Something no test is needed to see and when tested it will peg strong levels

in the disease forum they can review care options for quarantine and disease prevention clowns are usually tough. Curious if you have snails, other life forms to see


we had one thread on very fast clown deaths as soon as added they went sideways in minutes. On page six he posted his sump sealer silicone and it was the Home Depot anti microbial one, if there are other clean up crew sensitive animals in tow those help to see big picture / animals not affected by fish maladies



this was the critical detail from your thread:
Other clownfish looks normal. No heavy breathing or lack of eating

 

[Delouise]

All Rick nonsa

I used Fishless Fuel liquid ammonia to feed the bacteria. My tank pics are awful because I don’t have great lights up. Nothing appears to be growing, yet.

Bare bottom. 75lbs of rock in the display and 13 in sump

 

[brandon429]

You’ve followed Dr Tims bottle bac directions nicely, the carbon boost from a tiny pinch of feed boosts up fast, you’re on day ten of a brand of bottle bac that takes ten days per directions.

do a water change to get a base ammonia reading for your tank, then you can oxidation movement test it using our three picture set from prior works, it would be neat to see if it can move ammonia down on day ten

do you have any nitrate readings currently

 

[Delouise]

You’ve followed Dr Tims bottle bac directions nicely, the carbon boost from a tiny pinch of feed boosts up fast, you’re on day ten of a brand of bottle bac that takes ten days per directions.

do a water change to get a base ammonia reading for your tank, then you can oxidation movement test it using our three-picture set from prior works, it would be neat to see if it can move ammonia down on day ten

do you have any nitrate readings currently

The current nitrate is 2
I am sorry for my ignorance, the "oxidation movement test it using our three-picture set" is what exactly?

 

[brandon429]

thats where we take a tank in question and change water to drive down suspected free ammonia in the system, we take three pics of ammonia tests to see how ammonia behaves. First pic is after the water change, when the ammonia has been reduced as much as possible


then liquid cycling ammonia is added to the water until test pic #2 ammonia reading shows only slightly higher than pic one, the least change up you can make between the two tests. You now have two pics, second one is after ammonia was driven barely up.


third pic is an ammonia test 24 hours after the second test, post that pic. We see if the ammonia moves back to match pic 1


in your setup I’d add the pinch of grinded up fish food and let that carbon boost up some heterotrophic bacteria per Dr Reefs trick and by this Friday you can proceed how you like. Either change the water and re proof using the three steps or just skip that and begin, change water and add a little life as a start. You’ll be fifteen days in ten day bac, showing nitrate before boosting the carbon side of nutrients it will be ready safely this Friday. Add a pinch of fish food to the tank and let it stew this week. If there’s any bottle bac left add some more but if not, dont buy any more one was enough

 

[Delouise]

thats where we take a tank in question and change water to drive down suspected free ammonia in the system, we take three pics of ammonia tests to see how ammonia behaves. First pic is after the water change, when the ammonia has been reduced as much as possible


then liquid cycling ammonia is added to the water until test pic #2 ammonia reading shows only slightly higher than pic one, the least change up you can make between the two tests. You now have two pics, second one is after ammonia was driven barely up.


third pic is an ammonia test 24 hours after the second test, post that pic. We see if the ammonia moves back to match pic 1


in your setup I’d add the pinch of grinded up fish food and let that carbon boost up some heterotrophic bacteria per Dr Reefs trick and by this Friday you can proceed how you like. Either change the water and re proof using the three steps or just skip that and begin, change water and add a little life as a start. You’ll be fifteen days in ten day bac, showing nitrate before boosting the carbon side of nutrients it will be ready safely this Friday. Add a pinch of fish food to the tank and let it stew this week. If there’s any bottle bac left add some more but if not, dont buy any more one was enough

Excellent!! I will proceed with the water change tomorrow pm and send you my test pics. I added a bit of fish food this afternoon, per our previous message. I do not have any bottle bacteria so we can see how thing look without that boost.
Thank you so much.

 

[DVal]

I'm day 14 of fishless cycle with Dr Tim's. I have been following the directions exactly and following his recommendations from his Macna talk with increased temp (83) and lower salinity (1.020). Ammonia has been zero for about a week. Added about 4 oz of Fritz turbo start a few days ago. Roughly half the dose needed for my system. Nitrite is still reading between 5 and 10 ppm and Nitrate around 80. Dry sand and rock. What are your thoughts?

 

[brandon429]

You are fully cycled and done thank you for posting!
your test will pass three point ammonia proofing from prior pages, no need to even run it due to multiple inoculation sources, even without fritz it was ready.

Why we know it’s cycled:
-you met the timeframe for ammonia control from any known cycle chart.


-you aren’t posting seneye data, it’s color reference test evaluation which is approximation not hard truth. Any reported measure could be slightly higher or lower than actual

-both directions on each strain of bottle bac state a duration time, you’ve met that for both strains independently

-ammonia zero from a prior raised source, after adding known oxidizing bacteria source, is the indication we use to deem a cycle ready in 2020 it’s not about the hard zero. The fact you read a hard zero is excellent, and rare. If you had posted the ammonia was .2, but down from a prior 1-2 ppm that would still be the same outcome, done. Not stalled.

we aren’t factoring nitrite at any time, in any setting here so boot out that factor.


The single hesitation in your cycle is the one param we don’t even need to test for in reefing, positive or neutral nitrite has no bearing on today’s cycling evaluation and no reef convention participants who handle MACNA convention skip cycles measures it either- positive or not they’d still set up shop and sell to us from a skip cycle reef tank among vendors.

a fast cycle is just as valid as a slow one per Dr Reefs cycling thread on bottle bac testing (Because only ammonia control matters)


if you added new reef life it will live. pls update us with pics that’s the final say / living specimens

 

[DVal]

You are fully cycled and done thank you for posting!
your test will pass three point ammonia proofing from prior pages, no need to even run it due to multiple inoculation sources, even without fritz it was ready.

Why we know it’s cycled:
-you met the timeframe for ammonia control from any known cycle chart.


-you aren’t posting seneye data, it’s color reference test evaluation which is approximation not hard truth. Any reported measure could be slightly higher or lower than actual

-both directions on each strain of bottle bac state a duration time, you’ve met that for both strains independently

-ammonia zero from a prior raised source, after adding known oxidizing bacteria source, is the indication we use to deem a cycle ready in 2020 it’s not about the hard zero. The fact you read a hard zero is excellent, and rare. If you had posted the ammonia was .2, but down from a prior 1-2 ppm that would still be the same outcome, done. Not stalled.

we aren’t factoring nitrite at any time, in any setting here so boot out that factor.


The single hesitation in your cycle is the one param we don’t even need to test for in reefing, positive or neutral nitrite has no bearing on today’s cycling evaluation and no reef convention participants who handle MACNA convention skip cycles measures it either- positive or not they’d still set up shop and sell to us from a skip cycle reef tank among vendors.

a fast cycle is just as valid as a slow one per Dr Reefs cycling thread on bottle bac testing (Because only ammonia control matters)


if you added new reef life it will live. pls update us with pics that’s the final say / living specimens

Thank you.. After reading through the previous pages, thats pretty much what my conclusion was. Just wanted your thoughts as well. Recommend a water change prior to.adding livestock?

 

[brandon429]

We only do that for algae control but it doesn’t seem like you dosed ammonia repeatedly, I’m sure its safe with or without the w change. Really glad to see this custom timing call on our thread it’s really suited here because nitrite control is required in most other cycling approaches. The only way to measure truth vs rumor is to amass starting tank updates, if something dies in a cloudy smelly tank that changed from clear the prior day after adding fish then that will stand out and call these updates to the rules into question. but that’s not gonna happen


any lack of ammonia control, or nitrite toxicity, will kill the whole tank and cause a cycle it isn’t selective to just one animal.

 

[DVal]

I appreciate the info. I'll post updates over the next couple of days.

 

[brandon429]

Team any updates

 

[DVal]

Team any updates

So far so good. Added my 2 clowns and fire shrimp last night. Everybody seems to be doing well. Ammonia is no problem at this point.

 

[KevPool]

So I thought I would post this here just to get your thoughts as from what I've read already you are the Cycle Guru, no joke they should make you a custom badge. I've learned more reading this thread then I have countless hours of watching you tube videos and forums with so many conflicting opinions.

So here we go:

5 gal Nano

Nov 7th I added this Quik Cycle ammonia to my tank. On the second part of the ammonia dose I over twisted the cap and when I went to put a couple drops in the drop applicator part blew off and I shot a stream of ammonia into the tank. Not a huge amount but definitely more then I should have.

After a week of daily testing my NH³/NH⁴ was I would guess 3ppm, as I was using the red Sea marine care test kit the chart only goes to 2ppm but it was darker green then the test page so I guessed 3ppm.

I thought for sure my spray of liquid ammonia messed me up and I did a 50% water change and added a cap and a half of MicrōBacter Start XLM.

Tomorrow will be two weeks to the day since I started and my readings are as such:

Ammonia 1.2ppm
Nitrite bahahhahaa gotcha no need
Nitrate 5.0

So the box did say it only takes a week to cycle but I have a feeling my miss step in the beginning led me to probably another week before my ammonia goes down. Would you suggest another water change? I was planning on doing a 10-20% tomorrow as I wanted to get into a weekly habit of Saturday morning changes.

Thanks

Kev.

 

[KevPool]

So just for gigs I did a test and it looks like my ammonia went back up to 2ppm from 1.2 for the past few days.

 

[brandon429]

Thank you very much for posting. We want all cycle start dates reviewed here, and you are able to cleanly show nitrate which is endpoint proof of the mechanism at work


the best part of your post: high surface area in only five easy gallons. I’m glad you fed that system well.

though we don’t have a lot of prior cycles with the mixes you used, look at those detailed test results showing each step in the conversion



and then what everyone disagrees about is the allowed start date, and if all that wastewater has to clear in order to be ready.

using the clues here, you’ve met the ammonia control times from any cycling chart plus there was a known high dose, so no concern.

the best way to know about your tank is a 100% water change back to new water. A few hours after all new water, this is known zero condition.

we really need to see a pic of your ammonia test in the known zero condition to see what it’s true baseline color is

then after that, we use this calculator here below to determine how much liquid ammonia to add in order to have 1 ppm

Calculator

after adding that amount calculated to the tank, take another ammonia reading about ten mins later, that second pic compared to the first should show a minor color change up since we just added a calculated dose to 1 ppm. If the test kit cannot register a change we know it’s not sensitive enough to base anything on


and if it does register a change, we watch for it to go back down overnite. Depending on the kits accuracy originally, it might take two days to move back down, the movement proves a cycle.

no ammonia movement for days, stuck cycle.

If you want the exact test to know if you were cycled that’s it undisputed.

but going off a guess I bet the tank has functional bioslicks in place after two weeks, with nitrate, even if the others look stuck so I bet after a full water change it will keep bioload alive. Since it appears stuck in testing, the only way to move forward is water change plus re test, or water change add some snails

 

[brandon429]

a key way we differ from other threads is that we change out the waste water revealing the living filter stuck to all surfaces.

old cycle rules firmly required waiting the combined time for the massive dose of ammonia the tank will never see again to clear, and then all its high range metabolites on low range test kits to clear. We think it’s not required to do that, we need to wait as long as these tests begin to show movement but not hard final readings, they’re all too subjective for one-off calls.


when we get this wrong, the snails or fish added to a tank deemed ready will die with cloudy water coming before the death, not after.

animals lost in acclimation or other tank poisons / contaminations die quickly first with none of the breathing symptoms and cloudy water signifying not enough bacteria on surfaces, so those in suspension have bloomed for the added fish load. That all adds up to oxygen starvation in fish with reddened gills labored breathing then loss


the #1 way above all we differ is an api kit has no final say. Just because api shows green means nothing, thats what sends all other threads instantly into doubting cycle chart times but not here. In our thread a test kit will show a stall -and- the tank can’t even keep basic life alive, thats a stalled cycle. The consequence of an incomplete is everything dies.

 

[KevPool]

Thank you very much for posting. We want all cycle start dates reviewed here, and you are able to cleanly show nitrate which is endpoint proof of the mechanism at work


the best part of your post: high surface area in only five easy gallons. I’m glad you fed that system well.

though we don’t have a lot of prior cycles with the mixes you used, look at those detailed test results showing each step in the conversion



and then what everyone disagrees about is the allowed start date, and if all that wastewater has to clear in order to be ready.

using the clues here, you’ve met the ammonia control times from any cycling chart plus there was a known high dose, so no concern.

the best way to know about your tank is a 100% water change back to new water. A few hours after all new water, this is known zero condition.

we really need to see a pic of your ammonia test in the known zero condition to see what it’s true baseline color is

then after that, we use this calculator here below to determine how much liquid ammonia to add in order to have 1 ppm

Calculator

after adding that amount calculated to the tank, take another ammonia reading about ten mins later, that second pic compared to the first should show a minor color change up since we just added a calculated dose to 1 ppm. If the test kit cannot register a change we know it’s not sensitive enough to base anything on


and if it does register a change, we watch for it to go back down overnite. Depending on the kits accuracy originally, it might take two days to move back down, the movement proves a cycle.

no ammonia movement for days, stuck cycle.

If you want the exact test to know if you were cycled that’s it undisputed.

but going off a guess I bet the tank has functional bioslicks in place after two weeks, with nitrate, even if the others look stuck so I bet after a full water change it will keep bioload alive. Since it appears stuck in testing, the only way to move forward is water change plus re test, or water change add some snails

I started to show Nitrate levels on the second day. So you would suggest a 100% water change, I can definitely do that tomorrow morning and post my results here.

 

[brandon429]

Yep after the full change and then baseline ammonia reading you can choose to re verify ammonia or just add starter life, heck test em all after the full water change. We know they should all be zero then, it will baseline all three params above I’m happy to see nitrite too. With a small nano like that we can proof your tests nicely, much better than days long wait times for huge tanks