I need help, I have had my tank running for bout 3 weeks now and haven't had a cycle. I have put fish food in there and raw shrimp left it then took it out after a day, I then test a few hours later and still nothing then repeat the process and still nothing, is that a good thing? I used nutri sea water bout 30l of it in my 70l tank and topped up with lfs water,I also have 60ld of live rock and 20ld live sand
Tank won't cycle?
- Thread starter tommol
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Give it time your tank needs to build ammonia in order to start the cycle process and adding fish at 3 weeks kinda risky your tanks not quite ready yet expect a ammonia spike here shortly problem with adding fish to early is you increase the bio load so fast that what ever bacteria you might have that eats ammonia and nitrites created by ammonia cant keep up with the bioload (ammonia) and thus youll have residual ammonia that wont go away easily few things you might consider getting since you already got fish..... seachem stability, seachem prime, kent marine pro ammonia detox... good luck
My appologies i read wrong haha but you did pull the shrimp out a bit early try leaving it in for a week or so then test one day is not long enough for it to produce a desirable ammount of ammonia to cycle with try that and see what happens
Daniel92481
Valuable Member
Either put a raw shrimp, a mysis cube, or ammonia drops I believe Dr. Tims makes them. If you go the route using drops, make sure to follow the instructions on the bottle. Using mysis/brine combo cube, put one cube in the tank every 2-3 days until it dissolves until you get an ammonia spike. It will happen.
40B Knasty
Valuable Member
If you do the raw shrimp. Let it rot. It will stink, but it will definitely get your ammonia spiked and the process going. Ghost feed a little bit of all the foods you will want to use every other day(usually blood worms, mysis, brine). So your tank KNOWS what to break down. I call it beating up your tank. When it can handle any punch you throw at it. Your tank is good to go when the ammonia & nitrites are back to 0ppm. The when your nitrates comes down. Do a big water change and continue to do water changes every other day till you get your tank below 5ppm for it to be safe for pretty much any fish. 1ppm is what I prefer to get to. To let me know my tank is ready. Plus this is a good time right now to beef up your biological media with Marine Pure. The plate, balls, or block. It has way more surface area. Cnodes are in 390 range for surface area. MP has 2,300.
Tommol post pics of your tank
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/the-microbiology-of-reef-tank-cycling.214618/
that thread solves your cycle issue
True live rocks have color, and life we can see on them, show pics
The reason advice on live rock cycling is polar opposite depending on who you ask is because live rock can take whatever we throw at it. Where ammonia belongs or not is ideally determined by the presence of animals that like raw ammonia or not. All twelve pages of that thread are summarized by that sentence.
Bacteria re growth is never required when moving live rocks across town or tank to tank, as those are not antibacterial moves they’re bacteria Boosting moves
If your rock has zero life on it, and only the label at the fish store vat says live, and if they’re the type of fish store who likes to trick people, then melt shrimp or add ammonia...at least that’s a handy distinction as to when to add ammonia or not. Ammonia is for dry rock cycling.
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/the-microbiology-of-reef-tank-cycling.214618/
that thread solves your cycle issue
True live rocks have color, and life we can see on them, show pics
The reason advice on live rock cycling is polar opposite depending on who you ask is because live rock can take whatever we throw at it. Where ammonia belongs or not is ideally determined by the presence of animals that like raw ammonia or not. All twelve pages of that thread are summarized by that sentence.
Bacteria re growth is never required when moving live rocks across town or tank to tank, as those are not antibacterial moves they’re bacteria Boosting moves
If your rock has zero life on it, and only the label at the fish store vat says live, and if they’re the type of fish store who likes to trick people, then melt shrimp or add ammonia...at least that’s a handy distinction as to when to add ammonia or not. Ammonia is for dry rock cycling.
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Ubergroover
Engineer by day, Musician/golfer/reefer by night
leave it in until it disappears....Thats how I started my last tank...table shrimp. it disappeared after three weeks. took about 0ne month for the first cycle to complete.
