kateJD
New Member
I know there’s a thousand similar posts, so forgive me if I think my problem is a little different. I’m new at this and I appreciate all advice. I think I have a stalled cycle and I’m feeling a little stuck about next steps. Here is a timeline:
8/3: set up tank (Red Sea max E260 all in one); live sand, manufactured/dry rock cycled in LFS tank; started Red Sea reef mature mostly fishless cycle system (followed directions exactly)
on day 10, I was supposed to have 0 ammonia and 0 nitrites and was directed to add CUC. I had 0.2ppm ammonia and 0.5 ppm nitrites (and like 20 ppm nitrates) so I waited
day 14 ammonia and nitrites down to zero; but not much algae growth, directed to add algae eating fish (3) by instructions, instead I added 2 clownfish because I had no algae growing in tank
day 20 (8/23) added a small CUC (cleaner shrimp and a few (10) mixed snails);
day 30 (9/2) ammonia “spiked” to 0.4 ppm (total, Red Sea test kit) nitrite up to 4ppm (also Red Sea) so I started monitoring ammonia daily. I added some marine pure gems and Fritz turbo start to re-invigorate my bacteria and all that seemed to do was make the tank smell like farts for a couple of hours ()
since 9/2 nitrite has come down to 1.0 ppm and ammonia is hovering between 0.1-0.2 ppm. Only other livestock I’ve added is pulsing Xenia and gsp.
Now I have this horrible brown (I think) diatom stuff that gets better when I turn down the lights but the water gets cloudy and gross when I turn off the lights for a couple of days and the ammonia actually creeps up a bit (I’m guessing from die off of the diatoms?).
While my ammonia and nitrite are better some days than others they’ve never got back down to zero. I’m not 100% sure if one of the snails died in the rockwork somewhere or if something else happened?
it seems like at 6 weeks my micro biome which has been seeded twice should be a little more resilient than “a 70 gallon tank that can barely handle 2 clownfish”, and I worry because it feels like if anything happens the fish could be at risk (although everybody’s been tolerating my suboptimal water quality fine so far).
If the answer is “continue to wait” I can do that but I have the almost overwhelming urge to do something.
current parameters:
Temp 79.5
Salimity
PH 8.3
Alk 10 dKh
Ammonia 0.1
Nitrite 1.0
Nitrate > 50
open to any advice.
thank you,
Katy
8/3: set up tank (Red Sea max E260 all in one); live sand, manufactured/dry rock cycled in LFS tank; started Red Sea reef mature mostly fishless cycle system (followed directions exactly)
on day 10, I was supposed to have 0 ammonia and 0 nitrites and was directed to add CUC. I had 0.2ppm ammonia and 0.5 ppm nitrites (and like 20 ppm nitrates) so I waited
day 14 ammonia and nitrites down to zero; but not much algae growth, directed to add algae eating fish (3) by instructions, instead I added 2 clownfish because I had no algae growing in tank
day 20 (8/23) added a small CUC (cleaner shrimp and a few (10) mixed snails);
day 30 (9/2) ammonia “spiked” to 0.4 ppm (total, Red Sea test kit) nitrite up to 4ppm (also Red Sea) so I started monitoring ammonia daily. I added some marine pure gems and Fritz turbo start to re-invigorate my bacteria and all that seemed to do was make the tank smell like farts for a couple of hours ()
since 9/2 nitrite has come down to 1.0 ppm and ammonia is hovering between 0.1-0.2 ppm. Only other livestock I’ve added is pulsing Xenia and gsp.
Now I have this horrible brown (I think) diatom stuff that gets better when I turn down the lights but the water gets cloudy and gross when I turn off the lights for a couple of days and the ammonia actually creeps up a bit (I’m guessing from die off of the diatoms?).
While my ammonia and nitrite are better some days than others they’ve never got back down to zero. I’m not 100% sure if one of the snails died in the rockwork somewhere or if something else happened?
it seems like at 6 weeks my micro biome which has been seeded twice should be a little more resilient than “a 70 gallon tank that can barely handle 2 clownfish”, and I worry because it feels like if anything happens the fish could be at risk (although everybody’s been tolerating my suboptimal water quality fine so far).
If the answer is “continue to wait” I can do that but I have the almost overwhelming urge to do something.
current parameters:
Temp 79.5
Salimity
PH 8.3
Alk 10 dKh
Ammonia 0.1
Nitrite 1.0
Nitrate > 50
open to any advice.
thank you,
Katy
