Help! New tank, really confusing cycle

[MNscoe]

Help please! New reefer, first tank: 55G, 34salinity, 79degrees, dry rock, wet (live) sand 1" - 2", cannister filter (running), no lights on, no skimmer, no UV.

26 days into cycle. See my chart below. Key points:
- I started too slow, then added too much ammonia (my mistake). Two doses of bacteria, one early on, one recently.
- Don't understand why Nitrates never really went up, while ammonia now won't go to zero.
- Validated ammonia test accuracy on fresh batch of saltwater, it showed zero correctly, so API test kit seems OK.
- No observable growth of "undesirables" on sand or rock yet, to my untrained eye
- With wet sand, 32oz FritzZyme 9 and later 4oz Dr Tim's, seem I should have loads of bacteria in my tank...?

Do I:
1. Just keep waiting
2. Add a dash of fish food
3. Do 50% water change
4. Something else? Cry?

Any hints/advice desperately needed. Thank you!!

 

[Sophie"s mom]

I would do a 20 to 25% water change if it were me. nice looking tank by the way. You will most likely need some more rock though. "They" say general rule of thumb is a pound of rock per gallon of water. Personally, I don't quite have that, but close. IT serves many purposes, hiding places, but it's more about bio-filtration!

 

[Mr. Mojo Rising]

Thats a lot of ammonia, it will gradually come down in time, but it could take a while... I would do a large water change to try to get it down to 2 or 3, then just wait it out.

I agree with above, the tank needs more rock, rock is vital in a saltwater tank.

 

[MNscoe]

Thanks @Mr. Mojo Rising and @Sophie"s mom , will do water change today. And will look at adding rock. Doesn’t the sand help a lot too? Or sand isn’t as effective as rock as a bio filter structure?

 

[ShanePike]

I would do a 20 to 25% water change if it were me.

Why would you do a water change?

You will most likely need some more rock though. "They" say general rule of thumb is a pound of rock per gallon of water. Personally, I don't quite have that, but close. IT serves many purposes, hiding places, but it's more about bio-filtration!

The pound-per-gallon guideline isn't a good one. There's just too much variability in weight and porosity of the various kinds of rock. If I had used a pound per gallon in my 57g tank, I wouldn't have had room for anything else

That said, I agree with you on adding more rock. That amount of rock might be fine, but a little more definitely wouldn't hurt.

 

[ShanePike]

Do I:
1. Just keep waiting
2. Add a dash of fish food
3. Do 50% water change
4. Something else? Cry?

I'm going with 4 I don't understand how you could have Ammonia at 6.0 17 days ago, see it drop to 2.0, and never see Nitrate go above 2.0. The last tank I cycled, I started with Ammonia at 1.0 and used MicroBacter 7 as my bacteria. In 9 days, Ammonia was 0 and Nitrates were 60.

API test kits have a really bad reputation for being inaccurate. The first thing I would do is get better test kits for Ammonia and Nitrate. (Don't worry about Nitrite.) Or at least take a water sample to your LFS and have them test it.

Were the sand and rock clean/new?

 

[Sophie"s mom]

Why would you do a water change?


The pound-per-gallon guideline isn't a good one. There's just too much variability in weight and porosity of the various kinds of rock. If I had used a pound per gallon in my 57g tank, I wouldn't have had room for anything else

That said, I agree with you on adding more rock. That amount of rock might be fine, but a little more definitely wouldn't hurt.

To help bring the ammonia down quicker

 

[Sophie"s mom]

Why would you do a water change?


The pound-per-gallon guideline isn't a good one. There's just too much variability in weight and porosity of the various kinds of rock. If I had used a pound per gallon in my 57g tank, I wouldn't have had room for anything else

That said, I agree with you on adding more rock. That amount of rock might be fine, but a little more definitely wouldn't hurt.

Agree about LB. per gallon. It is just a rough reference point. More rock is always better, to a point. Nothing but good will come for this tank by adding more rock. I probably have about 80 lbs. of rock in my 90 gallon. Placement, stacking, creating hiding places all come into play.

 

[ShanePike]

To help bring the ammonia down quicker

Gotcha. That will help, but it doesn't do anything to fix the underlying issue. With all the bacteria that has gone into that tank, Ammonia should not be stuck at 2.0. With that much bacteria, at this point 2.0 ought to drop to 0.0 within 24 hours. The fact that it hasn't, and the fact that Nitrate is as low as it is, seems super weird to me.

 

[Quietman]

Give it another day or two. Ammonia should (will) come down and you're good to go. I like your tank scape. Prefer more corals to rocks and you have plenty for stability.

Oh and on API kits. Ammonia never looks like 0. It'll bottom out a color above. That's fine and perfectly save at reef pH.

 

[MNscoe]

Give it another day or two. Ammonia should (will) come down and you're good to go. I like your tank scape. Prefer more corals to rocks and you have plenty for stability.

Oh and on API kits. Ammonia never looks like 0. It'll bottom out a color above. That's fine and perfectly save at reef pH.

Ammonia is still steady today, before water change. And remember I just tested my API on fresh saltwater and it registered clearly at zero ammonia.

@ShanePike Yea, that’s why this is so weird, no meaningful Nitrates. Maybe my high spike on ammonia broke the cycle somehow?

Will report back tomorrow after 30% water change has stabilized.

 

[MNscoe]

After 30% water change last night, Ammonia went from 2ppm to around 1ppm now. Nitrites still zero, and Nitrates still near zero, maybe 1 or 2 ppm.

So I'm confused why there are no Nitrates. I'm actually thinking I should dose Ammonia again and see if it gets processed. Is that dumb? Any other suggestions or ideas on what might be going on?

 

[Dr. Reef Verified Sponsor]

I did a study on 10 or 12 different bacteria in bottle that was available few years back. It's posted here on r2r. Title was "Bacteria in the bottle, fact or myth"
Anyways stalled cycle is due to absence of carbon source or no organics. Also helpful is lower the salinity and have alkalinity in 8 to 9 dkh range.
Start ghost feeding your tank once every other day or 2 or 3 times a weeks with some fish food. Enough fish food you would feed about 4 fish for.
Your cycle will get back on track and ammonia will goto 0 soon after.

 

[BeanAnimal]

And BOOM there it is -- documented proof

That --- ohh gasp! -- a cycle can stall.

And somebody else providing fact based information to explain it, other than the same old crew.

People that say that "there is no such thing as a stalled cycle" are oblivious to, or ignoring the fact that bacteria are living things.

If there is too much ammonia or not enough oxygen or no food beyond just ammonia, the bacterial growth and succession can slow down or actually stop or even die off. Bacteria need food too... and birds are real :)

@Garf -- I don't want you to miss this one :)

 

[ShanePike]

In a situation like this, what happens to the ammonia if it's not converted to nitrite and then nitrate?

 

[Dr. Reef Verified Sponsor]

Ammonia remains ammonia. Toxic as it can be. Only under certain conditions like in a bag for shipping etc it converts to ammonium but as soon as oxygen is available it goes back to ammonia.
Stalled cycle is just that. Ammonia not converting due to whatever the reason maybe.

 

[ReefQuestCorals]

After 30% water change last night, Ammonia went from 2ppm to around 1ppm now. Nitrites still zero, and Nitrates still near zero, maybe 1 or 2 ppm.

So I'm confused why there are no Nitrates. I'm actually thinking I should dose Ammonia again and see if it gets processed. Is that dumb? Any other suggestions or ideas on what might be going on?

I just want to make a statement I haven't seen here yet. Be patient, nothing in this hobby comes fast. You rush things you will fail.

A lot of good recommendations here in your next steps, but ultimately you need to wait out the cycle and give it time if you stalled it or not. Ammonia rises then falls, nitrites will rise then fall, then nitrates will rise and fall. It's all apart of the cycle that you need to be patient with even if it takes weeks/months to achieve.

 

[Garf]

I agree that Fritzyme 9 is probably mainly heterotrophic and requires a carbon source to really get going. I'm not saying the product is designed that way, it may just happen through contamination, or whatever;

Fritzyme 9 modified cycle

Thought I’d go “live bacteria” route for cycling a QT as the wife is itching to get a few fish in her tank. The most available bacteria by me was Fritzyme 9, so that’s what I went with. Tank, ceramic rock, heater, Circulation pump were all bleached for 24 hrs then allowed to dry for 24 hrs...

www.reef2reef.com

 

[ShanePike]

Ammonia remains ammonia. Toxic as it can be. Only under certain conditions like in a bag for shipping etc it converts to ammonium but as soon as oxygen is available it goes back to ammonia.
Stalled cycle is just that. Ammonia not converting due to whatever the reason maybe.

But in this case the ammonia went way down. Something was happening to it, and that's what was confusing to me.

 

[Garf]

But in this case the ammonia went way down. Something was happening to it, and that's what was confusing to me.

There are at least some reports that different levels of ammonia promote different bacterial genus/types, whatever. The "stall" has been described as the crossover point from the boom and bust of one genus, to the prevalence of another genus/type (I'm definitely not a biologist). Due to the slow reproduction rates of true nitrifiers this crossover point looks like a "stall", according to reports.