Trying to Cycle tank

D3DPrintedThingz · Apr 29, 2022

75 gallon, put in 40 pounds of live sand, 65 pounds of dry rock, 10 pounds of live rock. added in green chromis and died after 3 days from euronema. changed the water and replaced with a yellowtail damsel after about 1 week. have had ammonia bounce between 0.25 to 1 ppm, up and down the entire time. have just recently been showing nitrites, they've been at 0 almost the entire time. nitrates have been present for about 2 weeks right around 5-10 ppm. the tank has been up and running for about 2 months.

has my tank cycled? thank you for all your help.

SlugSnorter · Apr 29, 2022

ilikefish69 said:
75 gallon, put in 40 pounds of live sand, 65 pounds of dry rock, 10 pounds of live rock. added in green chromis and died after 3 days from euronema. changed the water and replaced with a yellowtail damsel after about 1 week. have had ammonia bounce between 0.25 to 1 ppm, up and down the entire time. have just recently been showing nitrites, they've been at 0 almost the entire time. nitrates have been present for about 2 weeks right around 5-10 ppm. the tank has been up and running for about 2 months.

has my tank cycled? thank you for all your help.

sounds like they maybe died of ammonia poisoning, or acidification. Not Uronema. wait till tank has 0 ammonia, and is stable there when adding food before putting any fish. there is no need to fish in cycle, even if the fish survive they will have permanent damage

Eagle_Steve · Apr 29, 2022

ilikefish69 said:
75 gallon, put in 40 pounds of live sand, 65 pounds of dry rock, 10 pounds of live rock. added in green chromis and died after 3 days from euronema. changed the water and replaced with a yellowtail damsel after about 1 week. have had ammonia bounce between 0.25 to 1 ppm, up and down the entire time. have just recently been showing nitrites, they've been at 0 almost the entire time. nitrates have been present for about 2 weeks right around 5-10 ppm. the tank has been up and running for about 2 months.

has my tank cycled? thank you for all your help.

I suspect possible die off in the live rock added, if it was real ocean live rock (KP, Tampa Bay, etc). If LFS live rock from a bin, it could have had die off or was not "alive" as much as listed.

My suggestion is to test for ammonia, make sure it is zero, then do a test for ability to process it.

You will get some ammonia and add it to the tank to bring it to 1-2ppm and then see if that goes away in 24 hours. If so, then tank is cycled and you can slowly begin to add fish.

Lavey29 · Apr 29, 2022

If your live rock isn't getting the cycle job done there are simple bacteria dosing options to assist the cycle along rather then killing fish to complete the process.

Tidal Gardens · Apr 29, 2022

Increase your temp to 80-82 for a few weeks to increase the metabolic rate of your bacteria.

Crabmanns aquatics · Apr 29, 2022

ilikefish69 said:
75 gallon, put in 40 pounds of live sand, 65 pounds of dry rock, 10 pounds of live rock. added in green chromis and died after 3 days from euronema. changed the water and replaced with a yellowtail damsel after about 1 week. have had ammonia bounce between 0.25 to 1 ppm, up and down the entire time. have just recently been showing nitrites, they've been at 0 almost the entire time. nitrates have been present for about 2 weeks right around 5-10 ppm. the tank has been up and running for about 2 months.

has my tank cycled? thank you for all your help.

Don't rush! Throw a good pinch of food in and monitor you ammonia. If you don't see any or only a small amount at first and then its gone you should be good. If you see a spike that doesn't come down quickly its not ready yet. I've cycled a dry rock tank for around five months and thought i was good. Within a week of adding livestock the tank crashed due to a major ammonia spike that i didn't catch in time. Use food to simulate bio-load and see how your tank processes it. This will save a lot of avoidable livestock loss. There is no set time frame for cycling it just depends on how fast you can build your microbial foundation. I also agree with the no fish during cycle. Needing a fish to cycle faster is a myth and the swings the tank will experience during the cycling process if torture for the fish. Just dose a feed the bacteria untill its breaking down organics quickly into nitrate.

D3DPrintedThingz · Apr 29, 2022

SlugSnorter said:
sounds like they maybe died of ammonia poisoning, or acidification. Not Uronema. wait till tank has 0 ammonia, and is stable there when adding food before putting any fish. there is no need to fish in cycle, even if the fish survive they will have permanent damage

It was definitely Uronema. It had a brown spot wound looking thing on it, and then 1 day later it was dead. The LFS told me green chromis are likely to get this, and told me to try a yellowtail damsel instead. Chromis lived in the tank for only 3 days. I was thinking with 75 gallons and only one fish, the ammonia spike would be spread out throughout the water and not be harmful to the fish and cycle would not take any life. i miss the little guy chromis, we named him avocado, but the yellowtail is happy and eats a lot of foods.

the coraline algae on the LR has definitely began to receed. I was worried the bacteria have died or I have lost a lot of them. I have read to put temperature a little higher, so i've got it at 81 degrees.

it sounds like i need to just continue to be patient? is there anything else to do while you wait for this cycle? any DIY refugium tips? I have little plumbing experiece, have only ever hooked up a water line to a refridgerator.