Little scared

[fernalfer]

Ok so i cycled my tank but was ghost feeding it with flake food and pellets in a mesh bag. My nitrates were very high 80ppm. Almost everyone on here has said to stop feeding the tank and let it do its thing because by continuing to ghost feed would just lead to my nitrates going up.

So i took their advice and it has been over a week now with no food source for the bacteria and my first fish is ready to go in the display tank from being quarantined. Needless to say i'm afraid that their will be no bacteria and i will have an ammonia spike and all those weeks of quarantine and a healthy fish will go down the drain.

I almost feel like i need to check it with pure ammonia but that will just be going backwards and adding to my nitrates.

 

[Duke4Life]

You can always do a water change to bring the nitrates down.

 

[fernalfer]

You can always do a water change to bring the nitrates down.

I know that i already have done water changes to bring it down but will my fish be safe to add to the tank after not feeding the bacteria in the tank for over week?

 

[brandon429]

Is ok to be sure! Digest test with ammonia. Agreed, is OK.

Your conscience is telling you to verify let's listen. The only time you wouldn't want to verify is if you had a bunch of living animals in your tank. Your outcome of this test will help the next person who wonders about ghost feeding in these intervals. Win win

 

[fernalfer]

Is ok to be sure! Digest test with ammonia. Agreed, is OK.

are you saying test with pure ammonia before adding the fish to make sure?

 

[Duke4Life]

I would add a bit of food or ammonia and test. I think your fine.

 

[brandon429]

The nitrates will not matter it's more important to be sure of the ammonia you may water change or use absorbing media. Even when your reef is matured someone will over feed it one day and give you a nitrate Spike and nothing will die


If you add ammonia at 1 parts per million and it goes away in 24 hours you are confirmed. To use food you wait for it to degrade into 1 parts per million then measure in 24 hours.

*not any of the online tests say nitrite digests in 24 hours, that's ammonia. When you blast ammonia, your nitrite might trail off but that doesn't mean bac died, it means only the ammonia is the high demand molecule and will digest within 24 hours.

 

[brandon429]

By not ghost feeding this whole time you got room to test a bit more

 

[fernalfer]

ok dosing 1ppm ammonia now

 

[fernalfer]

24hr clock has started will keep you guys posted.

 

[Bunnee911]

Make sure you don't use sudsy ammonia.

 

[fernalfer]

OK so dosed a little over 1 ppm of pure ammonia at 9pm

tested 1 hr later at 10pm - Ammonia - 1.2 ppm / Nitrite - 0 ppm

tested 12 hrs. later 9am - Ammonia 0.2 ppm / Nitrite - 1 ppm

So i guess even after 1 week and 4 days of not feeding anything to the bacteria they are still present. lets see if both nitrites and ammonia can get to 0 in under 24hrs. i know ammonia will, it's almost there now but not sure about nitrites.

 

[brandon429]

Well done documentation!

Only testing variation can impact nitrite reading now, it won't impact the status of the cycle per our thread because nitrite cannot run independent of ammonia after this much time underwater, regardless of what the nitrite tests say.

You are past 40 days submerged, see the nitrite charts online

 

[fernalfer]

OK so dosed a little over 1 ppm of pure ammonia at 9pm

tested 1 hr later at 10pm - Ammonia - 1.2 ppm / Nitrite - 0 ppm

tested 12 hrs. later 9am - Ammonia 0.2 ppm / Nitrite - 1 ppm

So i guess even after 1 week and 4 days of not feeding anything to the bacteria they are still present. lets see if both nitrites and ammonia can get to 0 in under 24hrs. i know ammonia will, it's almost there now but not sure about nitrites.

After 24 HRS.

tested at 9pm 24 hrs - Ammonia = 0 ppm

tested 24 hrs. later - Nitrite = 1ppm

Nitrites did not go down whatsoever in the last 12 hrs. Ammonia was basically 0 at the 12 hr. mark and 0 at the 24 hr. mark

Conclusion Ammonia definetly processed to 0 quickly around 12 hours but nitrites remained the same in the last 12 hrs. with no drop. Wondering how long it will take for the nitrites to zero out.

 

[fernalfer]

So final conclusion.

After 1 week and 4 days of not ghost feeding anything to an empty tank after cycled i dosed the tank with a little over 1ppm pure ammonia results are as follows

-After 12 hrs. all ammonia was consumed Ammonia - 0
-After 12 hrs Nitrite spiked to 1ppm

-After 24 hrs. Ammonia - 0 and Nitrite remained at 1ppm

-After 30 hrs. Ammonia and Nitrite were at 0

so in reality it took ammonia 12 hrs to be processed and nitrite around 24 hrs. to process because it did not show up right away like Ammonia does once dosed. It has to wait until the ammonia is converted.

ALL and all i'm now convinced once you have cycled your tank and don't want to add livestock right away, your bacteria indeed don't die quickly and this test proves at least they can go 1 week and 4 days without food and still come on strong once ammonia is present.

 

[brandon429]

Fernalfer that is neat will link this to our cycling thread.

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

So final conclusion.

After 1 week and 4 days of not ghost feeding anything to an empty tank after cycled i dosed the tank with a little over 1ppm pure ammonia results are as follows

-After 12 hrs. all ammonia was consumed Ammonia - 0
-After 12 hrs Nitrite spiked to 1ppm

-After 24 hrs. Ammonia - 0 and Nitrite remained at 1ppm

-After 30 hrs. Ammonia and Nitrite were at 0

so in reality it took ammonia 12 hrs to be processed and nitrite around 24 hrs. to process because it did not show up right away like Ammonia does once dosed. It has to wait until the ammonia is converted.

ALL and all i'm now convinced once you have cycled your tank and don't want to add livestock right away, your bacteria indeed don't die quickly and this test proves at least they can go 1 week and 4 days without food and still come on strong once ammonia is present.

Ummm. Lot longer that that.
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/natures-lil-miracles-a-cycling-experiment.251318/


The next morning I put some Poly's in.

 

[brandon429]

Is likely test variation but still it does support basic cycling tenets, that no reversal occurs after we stop feeding. Prior fed organics work just fine in the recycling loop food web of a tank. It's not like we're sterilizing and starting over

When we withhold feed, bac get their own is the takeaway. No matter what the tests showed we knew that any tank that can digest ammonia can digest nitrite given at least forty days submerged and usually less, as a reliable bio trust detail given no medication at play.

Test variation is too massive to disregard, so it helps to go with only ammonia and other indicators not linked to nitrite and nitrate testing.

To me Fernalfers thread is about bio trust more than readings for sure, it's a matter of close margin that a testing variance of only .1 could have caused full doubt in the biology of accurate tank cycling.

In this case, the test and the procedure showed what all searchable online cycle charts show, nitrite compliance. When the tests vary, the keeper usually instantly reacts even when bio indicators show otherwise. The reason someone can test less after reading Fernalfers thread is because he's live time confirmed that after forty days submerged and with known, and verified ammonia oxidation testing, every tank will digest nitrite it is not necessary to test. He went a few weeks not feeding, he could have gone years, and the bacteria already set would grow (slowly) they would not decline, given no more feeding.

Bacteria get feed just fine, these are not bac labs we keep tanks in they are mold swirling AC homes

we are just speeding things up with feeding bacteria, it is not required. Fernalfer was able to feed less during his cycle knowing this info, and has less nitrate to manage now.

For the next reader, you don't even have to verify more than once to know when a cycle is done. When ammonia is digested within 24 hours, it's done and not going back.

 

[fernalfer]

Now to get my nitrates lower is the next task. I think NOPOX is on the horizon. Water changes just aren't lowering them fast enough. Also not sure if my Nitrates are 20ppm which my REDSEA kit says or 80ppm which the API kit reads.

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

its a brand new tank. eventually youll have more stuff that eats it. Including the brand new unestablished bio filter.

One observation. When I started reefing. I read books and papers on the subject from the experts. I put fish and corals in my tank. The No and Po went up and down some. My corals and fish did great with no problembs. Never used anything except carbon and foood and a refugium. Thats what the experts(not hobbiests) said to do. They said stuff would go up and down as I added for and fish and corals and a s the weather changed and as the years go by and as micro flora fauna bloomed and died. They called it chasing numbers.
Now, I still do the same thing. My little bottle of gfo is six years old. I have healthy fish and corals. Sometimes after helping people here fix thier lights and pumps and cycle and sick corals n stuff, I look at my tank and think theres something wrong and start testing stuff and reading stuff and worrying about stuff. Then I rember. I have healthy fish and corals. So I stop chasing numbers.