spanko
Henry
No not on your bicycle, after all this is about aquariums. For an understanding of the different ways to cycle aquariums first let’s look at a dictionary explanation of what a cycle is.
cy•cle (s k l)
n.
1. An interval of time during which a characteristic, often regularly repeated event or sequence of events occurs: Sunspots increase and decrease in intensity in an 11-year cycle.
2.
a. A single complete execution of a periodically repeated phenomenon: A year constitutes a cycle of the seasons.
b. A periodically repeated sequence of events: the cycle of birth, growth, and death; a cycle of reprisal and retaliation.
Myself, I like definition #2, b. as an explanation for what we will discuss here.
One of the cycles that occur in our aquariums is called the Nitrogen Cycle.
Many times you will read or hear a new aquarist ask “is my cycle done yet� While we know that they are talking about the initial set up of the aquarium and its ability to now have life added to it, we need to understand that truly our aquarium never stops cycling. Remember, “A periodically repeated sequence of events� Well that’s what happens in our aquariums.
So alright, we now understand that our aquariums periodically cycle but what is this periodic sequence?
Well a brief explanation about the Nitrogen Cycle is in order. You see everywhere there is a breakdown of dead protein material, read plants, animals, waste here, there is a compound called ammonia (NH3) generated during the breakdown. There are bacteria that exist in nature that consume this ammonia. The byproduct of this is a compound called Nitrites (N02). Low and behold there is a bacterium that consumes these Nitrites and turns them into Nitrate (N03). And finally there are bacteria that consume the Nitrates and turn them into the element Nitrogen (N2). This is the cycle we will be concentrating on in the upcoming discussion. After all you can see why this happens in our aquariums, fish, coral, algae, all manner of critters die as well as excrete waste products. If there were no bacteria to convert these proteins as they rotted, ammonia would continue to accumulate to toxic levels and our aquarium would crash! The bacteria are what is called our bio filter and must be built up prior to the addition of other life in our tank.
So continuing on we can now discuss some of the different methods we can employ to kick start this initial build up of our bio filter (nitrifying and denitrifying bacteria).
Well now we have done some up front reading. Decided on what size tank we will get, the filters, a skimmer, lights, what salt water or mix we will use and have thought about what critters we wish to keep. Finally it is time to set up the aquarium. WAIT! You forgot the most important equipment, the tests. You see you need to monitor the cycle to know when the initial build up has completed. To do this you need ammonia, nitrite and nitrate test kits. There are many out there but for the most part people use API on the low end cost or Salifert for the high end. What is the difference you say besides the cost? Well the API will certainly do what you to do but the Salifert kits will do a more precise job of it. In my opinion for this part of the hobby I go with the API. Surely you will find all kinds of different opinions on this so go with what your research tells you. See what others are using and make your own decision.
Alright, now we are ready to start.
Got the tank in place on the stand, everything leveled to perfection, all equipment in place ready to go. Remember the most important part of this setup is to start the Nitrogen Cycle and to do this we need to introduce either a protein that will decay into ammonia, or ammonia itself. Live sand and live rock will supply what is termed die-off, dead and or decaying material to introduce the ammonia. Any real protein can be used at this point, a cocktail shrimp left to rot, a fish that will produce waste, fish food, pure ammonia and I have read of people using urine. YUCKO, please don’t pee in your tank!
Whatever is used you will need to start to monitor your tank with the test kits. The two that should be used are the ammonia and nitrite kits at this point. What we are looking for is a rise in ammonia first, then after some time nitrites will begin to rise. This process will continue until at some point the ammonia will begin to fall, then the nitrites will begin to fall. When you have seen both of these fall back to zero you can be assured that you have done the initial cycling of your tank. That is you have built a colony of bacteria that are capable of consuming your ammonia and nitrites as they are produced with the bio load that is available in your tank right now. . The size of the colony and how much ammonia it can process is for now insignificant, you have the ball rolling. Then using the nitrate kit you will or should show a reading of nitrates. This reading may or may not go down depending on whether your aquarium has the necessary denitrifying bacteria to convert the nitrates into nitrogen. We will discuss this more later on.
Okay so now you have an idea of how this magic works, let’s talk about some detailed way in which to accomplish it.
Cycling #1 Most accepted process currently.
This method utilizes live rock and either live or dry sand. You set the tank up and introduce the sand and live rock then start testing. The live rock will come to you in a couple of different ways. Cured or uncured. Cured rock simply is rock that has been set up in a tank at the local fish store for some time, has experienced the cycling process there, and will for the most part not cause any spikes in your aquarium because it already has a small colony of bacteria working. Your job is to build on this small colony to the point you can safely start to add critters. Transport from the fish store to your house is important here. If the rock is out of the water as it is transported things will begin to die off. If this happens, when you introduce it to your tank this die-off may be more than the colony of bacteria can handle and there may be a spike in the ammonia. Something could even die if the rock is transported in water for an extended period and say it is a hot or even a very cold day. Providing the transport time is quick – the die off is small – you may not even be able to detect the ammonia spike when testing the water after adding the rock. Oh Boy! Can I start to add fish now? Well it would be advisable to do some testing over the next week or so. This just to ensure that there is no detectable ammonia being produced. During this time you can actually add a little bit of fish food and test the water that day and the next two or so to see if there are any readings. This will tell you how well the colony of bacteria handle the addition of load put on it. If not, or even if there is a small spike that goes away quickly, you can start to begin to watch and wonder at what will be happening. There is life in them there live rocks. Little critters called pods, maybe a crab or snail, certainly some algae, if you are lucky maybe even a coral of some kind. After you are assured by testing that the bacteria colony is actually there and doing its thing you can take the nitrate reading, do a 10-20% water change with new saltwater and begin to add a small cleanup crew. (i.e. snails crabs etc) As you add things you again want to test for ammonia to see if there is a spike. If there is don’t worry at this point the bacteria should multiply enough to be able to handle it and bring the reading back to zero. Remember though, small additions is the key. The more you add the more of a bio load will be produced and it may cause the ammonia to go so high as to be detrimental or even deadly to what you are adding. So slow is the name of the game. Then week by week start to add something else like a fish here, a coral there, until you get the tank looking like what you had envisioned. The same method can be used for the uncured rock, rock that is in essence shipped directly from the ocean to the retailer to your tank. This rock has an abundance of life on it, hopefully little die-off and will provide you with some interesting and sometimes unwanted critters from the ocean. The same method is used for the initial cycle though as you want to ensure that along the way the rocks die-off is not so much as to cause a cesspool in your tank of deadly ammonia. Please read my other article called Cycling for Life to gain some insight about a method to preserve what comes in on this type of rock.
cy•cle (s k l)
n.
1. An interval of time during which a characteristic, often regularly repeated event or sequence of events occurs: Sunspots increase and decrease in intensity in an 11-year cycle.
2.
a. A single complete execution of a periodically repeated phenomenon: A year constitutes a cycle of the seasons.
b. A periodically repeated sequence of events: the cycle of birth, growth, and death; a cycle of reprisal and retaliation.
Myself, I like definition #2, b. as an explanation for what we will discuss here.
One of the cycles that occur in our aquariums is called the Nitrogen Cycle.
Many times you will read or hear a new aquarist ask “is my cycle done yet� While we know that they are talking about the initial set up of the aquarium and its ability to now have life added to it, we need to understand that truly our aquarium never stops cycling. Remember, “A periodically repeated sequence of events� Well that’s what happens in our aquariums.
So alright, we now understand that our aquariums periodically cycle but what is this periodic sequence?
Well a brief explanation about the Nitrogen Cycle is in order. You see everywhere there is a breakdown of dead protein material, read plants, animals, waste here, there is a compound called ammonia (NH3) generated during the breakdown. There are bacteria that exist in nature that consume this ammonia. The byproduct of this is a compound called Nitrites (N02). Low and behold there is a bacterium that consumes these Nitrites and turns them into Nitrate (N03). And finally there are bacteria that consume the Nitrates and turn them into the element Nitrogen (N2). This is the cycle we will be concentrating on in the upcoming discussion. After all you can see why this happens in our aquariums, fish, coral, algae, all manner of critters die as well as excrete waste products. If there were no bacteria to convert these proteins as they rotted, ammonia would continue to accumulate to toxic levels and our aquarium would crash! The bacteria are what is called our bio filter and must be built up prior to the addition of other life in our tank.
So continuing on we can now discuss some of the different methods we can employ to kick start this initial build up of our bio filter (nitrifying and denitrifying bacteria).
Well now we have done some up front reading. Decided on what size tank we will get, the filters, a skimmer, lights, what salt water or mix we will use and have thought about what critters we wish to keep. Finally it is time to set up the aquarium. WAIT! You forgot the most important equipment, the tests. You see you need to monitor the cycle to know when the initial build up has completed. To do this you need ammonia, nitrite and nitrate test kits. There are many out there but for the most part people use API on the low end cost or Salifert for the high end. What is the difference you say besides the cost? Well the API will certainly do what you to do but the Salifert kits will do a more precise job of it. In my opinion for this part of the hobby I go with the API. Surely you will find all kinds of different opinions on this so go with what your research tells you. See what others are using and make your own decision.
Alright, now we are ready to start.
Got the tank in place on the stand, everything leveled to perfection, all equipment in place ready to go. Remember the most important part of this setup is to start the Nitrogen Cycle and to do this we need to introduce either a protein that will decay into ammonia, or ammonia itself. Live sand and live rock will supply what is termed die-off, dead and or decaying material to introduce the ammonia. Any real protein can be used at this point, a cocktail shrimp left to rot, a fish that will produce waste, fish food, pure ammonia and I have read of people using urine. YUCKO, please don’t pee in your tank!
Whatever is used you will need to start to monitor your tank with the test kits. The two that should be used are the ammonia and nitrite kits at this point. What we are looking for is a rise in ammonia first, then after some time nitrites will begin to rise. This process will continue until at some point the ammonia will begin to fall, then the nitrites will begin to fall. When you have seen both of these fall back to zero you can be assured that you have done the initial cycling of your tank. That is you have built a colony of bacteria that are capable of consuming your ammonia and nitrites as they are produced with the bio load that is available in your tank right now. . The size of the colony and how much ammonia it can process is for now insignificant, you have the ball rolling. Then using the nitrate kit you will or should show a reading of nitrates. This reading may or may not go down depending on whether your aquarium has the necessary denitrifying bacteria to convert the nitrates into nitrogen. We will discuss this more later on.
Okay so now you have an idea of how this magic works, let’s talk about some detailed way in which to accomplish it.
Cycling #1 Most accepted process currently.
This method utilizes live rock and either live or dry sand. You set the tank up and introduce the sand and live rock then start testing. The live rock will come to you in a couple of different ways. Cured or uncured. Cured rock simply is rock that has been set up in a tank at the local fish store for some time, has experienced the cycling process there, and will for the most part not cause any spikes in your aquarium because it already has a small colony of bacteria working. Your job is to build on this small colony to the point you can safely start to add critters. Transport from the fish store to your house is important here. If the rock is out of the water as it is transported things will begin to die off. If this happens, when you introduce it to your tank this die-off may be more than the colony of bacteria can handle and there may be a spike in the ammonia. Something could even die if the rock is transported in water for an extended period and say it is a hot or even a very cold day. Providing the transport time is quick – the die off is small – you may not even be able to detect the ammonia spike when testing the water after adding the rock. Oh Boy! Can I start to add fish now? Well it would be advisable to do some testing over the next week or so. This just to ensure that there is no detectable ammonia being produced. During this time you can actually add a little bit of fish food and test the water that day and the next two or so to see if there are any readings. This will tell you how well the colony of bacteria handle the addition of load put on it. If not, or even if there is a small spike that goes away quickly, you can start to begin to watch and wonder at what will be happening. There is life in them there live rocks. Little critters called pods, maybe a crab or snail, certainly some algae, if you are lucky maybe even a coral of some kind. After you are assured by testing that the bacteria colony is actually there and doing its thing you can take the nitrate reading, do a 10-20% water change with new saltwater and begin to add a small cleanup crew. (i.e. snails crabs etc) As you add things you again want to test for ammonia to see if there is a spike. If there is don’t worry at this point the bacteria should multiply enough to be able to handle it and bring the reading back to zero. Remember though, small additions is the key. The more you add the more of a bio load will be produced and it may cause the ammonia to go so high as to be detrimental or even deadly to what you are adding. So slow is the name of the game. Then week by week start to add something else like a fish here, a coral there, until you get the tank looking like what you had envisioned. The same method can be used for the uncured rock, rock that is in essence shipped directly from the ocean to the retailer to your tank. This rock has an abundance of life on it, hopefully little die-off and will provide you with some interesting and sometimes unwanted critters from the ocean. The same method is used for the initial cycle though as you want to ensure that along the way the rocks die-off is not so much as to cause a cesspool in your tank of deadly ammonia. Please read my other article called Cycling for Life to gain some insight about a method to preserve what comes in on this type of rock.
