How to unstick any seemingly stuck cycle

[brandon429]

Team

venture into the general forum and do a search under nitrite posts, stalled cycle posts see today's trending.


Nitrite is a hot hot hot hot hot button topic, you have reef business owners posting in the threads, directors of massive reef supplement companies, you have Dan and Taricha, two of our board's most up and coming chemists posting on measures and sampling and nitrite impacts

you see aquaculturists posting, 50+ years experience in aquaculture, passionate advocates of nitrite testing and full wait for compliance before reefing, the nitrite posts you can see are numbering in the hundreds of pages we can clearly read.

Sample those threads, look at the dangers foretold by skipping nitrite testing, compare that to our results


Do you see how in reefing, anything concerning a cycle is consequence-laden information? Read their threads, there's stated bigtime consequence all down the biochemical pathway for ignoring nitrite, fish disease claims, there's a price stated for noncompliance.


How does our thread align with that?

Do you see how when building massive claims threads around written paragraphs, everyone gets a say on the rules and strong writers are angling in consequences that look real on paper, in formulas, but when you build a massive thread solely around other peoples tanks and we get pics, and follow ups, the consequences aren't found? See how there's accountability when using other people's reef tanks to make proofs, and when that's omitted, there's 200 pages of opinion and commuted fear/bad outcome?


we will never need to know nitrite in this thread, and you can tell by patterning on page 200 the outcomes will be the same as they are here on the current page. We're dealing in true pattern science as we explore updated cycling science.


old cycling science = lol you will be buying bottle bac and waiting until the cows come home for permitted action, and then all the fish die anyway in March because nobody is telling readers about fish disease risks as the absolute fundamental risk in all tank cycling. Want to see real consequence vs puffery? see any post in today's fish disease forum posts.

*I subscribe to Dan and T's posts and follow their writing. They do not hype, they study effects on biofiltration and don't try and sway posters one way or another, true chemists. When they post on nitrite I dont find it controversial, I find it illuminating. Their posts are commonly charts, graphs they made, and chemistry experiments not from 1978 but from last week using today's best lab gear, check 'em and see.

anyone beyond Dan or Taricha or Randy I don't accept their input on nitrite due to conflicts of interest and more often not a single work thread ever made.

 

[brandon429]

@zaidalin79

I saw where you were indeed running fish disease preps, thats very rare and you can tell by my writing I'd incorrectly assumed the opposite.

well. done.




this thread will always be governed by tank pictures and follow up on predictions, other people's evaluation of the results they see in their tank.



In order to evaluate claims that nitrite isn't needed to be known, we need a thread that delves into omitting nitrite. If we turn every single thread into a nitrite-caring thread as is done in the general forum, then nobody is present to study the null claim. We're twenty pages into the null claim, we need to remain opposite here in order to have a continuum to study and something that isn't just 60 pages of written paragraphs and not one working example from an independent party.

 

[zaidalin79]

@zaidalin79

I saw where you were indeed running fish disease preps, thats very rare and you can tell by my writing I'd incorrectly assumed the opposite.

well. done.

both of your posts were a real help to our thread today,

@brandon429

Thank you for the positive words, sometimes it feels like I can do nothing right in this hobby and alot of people attack even when I am trying to learn from them. I have done another water change and added the damsel. When I can find him I will see how he is doing and possibly add the trigger as well.

There is quite a bit of detrius on the sand now - should I syphon that or leave it for now? Also, am I ok to restart my UV and skimmer since the bacteria should be settled?

 

[brandon429]

fully agreed uv is excellent, I'd use one.

agreed on the siphoning out of waste agreed, so it wont compile

its not particularly harmful at all, if we merely set a few pounds of live rock in a white bucket of holding saltwater, in two hours the bottom is littered with specks even if there was no current. just about all our surfaces pump out waste via resident animals, micro ones


certain invasions I think can make use of the detritus as attachment substrate, there's trace nutrients to be extracted when it compiles.

these biosystems always seem to pump out waste pellets, and you're right its all go now that the cycle is locked, full tank access and cleaning can commence safely for sure. even a 100% water change, nothing will unstick that cycle.

 

[zaidalin79]

fully agreed uv is excellent, I'd use one.

agreed on the siphoning out of waste agreed, so it wont compile

its not particularly harmful at all, if we merely set a few pounds of live rock in a white bucket of holding saltwater, in two hours the bottom is littered with specks even if there was no current.
certain invasions I think can make use of the detritus as attachment substrate, there's trace nutrients to be extracted when it compiles.

these biosystems always seem to pump out waste pellets, and you're right its all go now that the cycle is locked, full tank access and cleaning can commence safely for sure. even a 100% water change, nothing will unstick that cycle.

Ok when I have more RODI mixed I will do another wc and syphon the bottom.

 

[LRT]

Ok when I have more RODI mixed I will do another wc and syphon the bottom.

Another great way to remove detritus or nasties is investing in a cheap 5 micron sock from Amazon.
You can siphon into sock in salt bucket and put that water back in your tank. Or siphon water through sock into a sump.
Works great between water changes especially in new systems that your trying to keep at least some detectable levels of nutrients in.

 

[zaidalin79]

Trigger and damsel made it through the night. Plan to add the puffer back today once the lights come on.

 

[zaidalin79]

@brandon429 I have a question about my other tank just over a year old, I added a gfo reactor to work on an extremely high phosphate problem and now I appear to have a bacterial bloom going on. I know you said we never need to add bacteria to a cycled tank - Other than water change - should I do anything?

 

[brandon429]

I know it feels strange to move from testing to no test assessment agreed


we have these biomarkers available though for safety proofing so it’s not just winging it:

clear water is #1
uncycled tanks with fish go cloudy fast as in 48 hours after adding and feeding. A delayed cloud a few weeks out is a common bac bloom, unrelated to bioload carry cycling. Immediate cloud is a true risk indicator, clarity for five days is total proof of cycle ready

gill flapping/opercular motion in fish is a big one
normal breathing means no ammonia burn happening


feeding and swimming normally directly indicate no ammonia burn



position in the tank: burned fish hover up top or flash around the tank in pain obviously

 

[brandon429]

Use a carbon filter after the water change to clear up the aggregates leftover, pre rinse the carbon media well so it doesn’t make clouding

if it’s a nano change all the water for new matching temp and salinity that’ll fix it up if the sandbed isn’t filled with clouding, pour new water in slowly over a rock tip if needed

 

[zaidalin79]

Use a carbon filter after the water change to clear up the aggregates leftover, pre rinse the carbon media well so it doesn’t make clouding

if it’s a nano change all the water for new matching temp and salinity that’ll fix it up if the sandbed isn’t filled with clouding, pour new water in slowly over a rock tip if needed

it is a 125 - I will do this today

 

[brandon429]

I keep a fluval 205 canister put up just for that type of need. If that 125 was mine at nine today I’d head to pets mart buy three canisters of carbon pellets, pre rinse them totally clear. Pack the canister with it and that tank would clear by tomorrow -if- the cloud is bacteria mass

if its chemistry or precipitates then water change may be needed, some wait it out to settle naturally and remove the causative GFO while clearing

agreed adding cycling bac is an added oxygen tax, we wouldn’t.

 

[zaidalin79]

I keep a fluval 205 canister put up just for that type of need. If that 125 was mine at nine today I’d head to pets mart buy three canisters of carbon pellets, pre rinse them totally clear. Pack the canister with it and that tank would clear by tomorrow -if- the cloud is bacteria mass

if its chemistry or precipitates then water change may be needed, some wait it out to settle naturally and remove the causative GFO while clearing

agreed adding cycling bac is an added oxygen tax, we wouldn’t.

I just put the carbon in the socks. I do have an old canister I might could use.

 

[SuthernReefer]

What I'm guessing is diatoms, has spread across most of the tank today. This is a sign of cycling, right? Is this what is referred to as the ugly brown phase from dry rock and sand? Anything I should do? I believe we're on day 8

 

[brandon429]

You're free to spot siphon it out or add clean up crew or just leave it, no problem either way

 

[SuthernReefer]

What I'm guessing is diatoms, has spread across most of the tank today. This is a sign of cycling, right? Is this what is referred to as the ugly brown phase from dry rock and sand? Anything I should do? I believe we're on day 8

Had to change lighting to photograph

 

[SuthernReefer]

You're free to spot siphon it out or add clean up crew or just leave it, no problem either way

Should CUC be quarantined and or dipped though?

 

[brandon429]

For sure qt if you choose the tightest control method against disease agreed

not dipped, but from a fallowed tank not present with fish makes them less of a disease vector per Jays article in the disease forum on biosecurity

it would be easy just to lift the rock out and thumb wash it off under tap water in the sink, set back clean rock it’s harmless

 

[LRT]

Team

venture into the general forum and do a search under nitrite posts, stalled cycle posts see today's trending.


Nitrite is a hot hot hot hot hot button topic, you have reef business owners posting in the threads, directors of massive reef supplement companies, you have Dan and Taricha, two of our board's most up and coming chemists posting on measures and sampling and nitrite impacts

you see aquaculturists posting, 50+ years experience in aquaculture, passionate advocates of nitrite testing and full wait for compliance before reefing, the nitrite posts you can see are numbering in the hundreds of pages we can clearly read.

Sample those threads, look at the dangers foretold by skipping nitrite testing, compare that to our results


Do you see how in reefing, anything concerning a cycle is consequence-laden information? Read their threads, there's stated bigtime consequence all down the biochemical pathway for ignoring nitrite, fish disease claims, there's a price stated for noncompliance.


How does our thread align with that?

Do you see how when building massive claims threads around written paragraphs, everyone gets a say on the rules and strong writers are angling in consequences that look real on paper, in formulas, but when you build a massive thread solely around other peoples tanks and we get pics, and follow ups, the consequences aren't found? See how there's accountability when using other people's reef tanks to make proofs, and when that's omitted, there's 200 pages of opinion and commuted fear/bad outcome?


we will never need to know nitrite in this thread, and you can tell by patterning on page 200 the outcomes will be the same as they are here on the current page. We're dealing in true pattern science as we explore updated cycling science.


old cycling science = lol you will be buying bottle bac and waiting until the cows come home for permitted action, and then all the fish die anyway in March because nobody is telling readers about fish disease risks as the absolute fundamental risk in all tank cycling. Want to see real consequence vs puffery? see any post in today's fish disease forum posts.

*I subscribe to Dan and T's posts and follow their writing. They do not hype, they study effects on biofiltration and don't try and sway posters one way or another, true chemists. When they post on nitrite I dont find it controversial, I find it illuminating. Their posts are commonly charts, graphs they made, and chemistry experiments not from 1978 but from last week using today's best lab gear, check 'em and see.

anyone beyond Dan or Taricha or Randy I don't accept their input on nitrite due to conflicts of interest and more often not a single work thread ever made.

Brandon what is the margin of error for most color coded hobbyist nitrite kits?

 

[brandon429]

I spend so much time avoiding them, avoiding their measure as any sort of start marker - truly don’t know. We rely on Randy’s 2005 article on nitrite neutrality to justify ignoring nitrite always here for display cycling.

Secondarily we now have twenty pages of our own results to pull from, and this isn’t the only positive nitrite start thread there’s another one from the chemistry forum probably 13 or so pages of tank entrants. The microbiology of reef tank cycIing thread is about twenty pages of entrants, all these by design were positive nitrite start tank study threads aimed to test Randy’s article


I don’t want the other threads swarmed by the current +nitrite factoring crew lol so I never bump them.


I’m certain from my own experience nitrite has no factor in display tank reefing I get updates in posts and messages from tanks we unstalled five years ago, the results are exactly what we wanted there’s no reason to change course.


if it helps any, Lasse uses digital nitrite tracking on his matured tank and it runs .0x hundredths ppm as the steady state exchange rate into nitrate

just as digital seneye nh3 tracking shows an inherent link between all cycling reef tanks that use similar surface area and current arrangements and the ten day drop of ammonia from a cycling chart , those same charts show 25-30 days to nitrite control and there’s no reason to disbelieve them so far


in a world of competing non digital test kits, unstated doses of prime misleading at the time, the safe bet to fact check parameters is to reference a cycling chart. If a nitrite test kit shows no control on day ninety, the kit is amiss not the biology.