Hey guys so I just started up a new 60g tank. I have a 20 long sump on it now, but nothing running besides the heater. I put 2 medium size pieces of live rock from my 32g tank in the sump and a bag of bio balls that were in the 32 for a week. Then I dumped in Dr Tim's when the water temp hit 80. I did not test anything for the first 3 days. On the 3rd day everything was reading 0 so I brought my 2 clowns over to help the cycle start. It's been a week and still have not read any ammonia, nitrite or nitrates. Just wanted to see what your thoughts are? I'm thinking the nitrates may start to just slowly climb, and I can bring over my other fish in 5 weeks or so. I've never used Dr Tim's, am I still expecting an ammonia spike for the cycle?
Cycle trouble
- Thread starter JBulk09
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Big G
captain dunsel
It will take 30 days or so for the tank's initial cycle to begin the maturing process. You may never get a true "spike," and may just get a nice gentle, relatively flat bell curve due to the rock + Dr. Tim's.
Your cycle is complete due to moving over live rock, which doesn’t kill bac. Were it not cycled, the fish would die over nite. Your measures are precisely why we don’t use nitrite or nitrate measures in updated cycling threads, only ammonia control matters. When tanks may not register nitrate or nitrite, a cycle is deemed stalled but cycles cannot stall. What makes cycles really hard to work with is the opposite from your measures: when nitrite is indicated, people still claim the cycle stalls. Measuring two params that don’t matter in carrying living bioload has no impact on the one param that matters- ammonia.
that would sound radical if your tank wasn’t already displaying what we collect in our microbiology of cycling thread. They’re able to start huge marine conventions with skip cycle tanks due to moving over fully live rock, cycle is complete. More time is needed for your dilution to be over come with that small bioload, and register nitrate.
but that has no measure of your current state of filtration bacteria, which is full.
that would sound radical if your tank wasn’t already displaying what we collect in our microbiology of cycling thread. They’re able to start huge marine conventions with skip cycle tanks due to moving over fully live rock, cycle is complete. More time is needed for your dilution to be over come with that small bioload, and register nitrate.
but that has no measure of your current state of filtration bacteria, which is full.
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Hey can you post tank pics of the rocks
we look for growth details, attachments, animal hangers-on and pigments that differentiate living rock from white base rock. Visual cycling uses a known order of ops for growths that always come after full cycle completion to make up for test kits in the hobby that frankly misread for thousands. We got lucky your ammonia didn’t interpret as .25 here, if it did you’d still be cycled and we’d be discussing how ammonia can never hold at .25 in a reef aquarium. Not at any phase, the stuck cycle cannot occur in reefing.
we look for growth details, attachments, animal hangers-on and pigments that differentiate living rock from white base rock. Visual cycling uses a known order of ops for growths that always come after full cycle completion to make up for test kits in the hobby that frankly misread for thousands. We got lucky your ammonia didn’t interpret as .25 here, if it did you’d still be cycled and we’d be discussing how ammonia can never hold at .25 in a reef aquarium. Not at any phase, the stuck cycle cannot occur in reefing.
Oh I see now, a mix of old and new rock
A few pounds of live rock masks all the typical readings from cycle testing bc it's such an ammonia hungry source. Within about three weeks the inactive sources take on bacteria from the active ones so the system still works as cycled even though half isn't
A few pounds of live rock masks all the typical readings from cycle testing bc it's such an ammonia hungry source. Within about three weeks the inactive sources take on bacteria from the active ones so the system still works as cycled even though half isn't
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