Learning from Ryan Batcheller's (of BRS) 6-month Cycle

[Mellotang]

Maybe try KP Aquatics for some Live rock

it may seem Like a hassle and expensive to get the rock but it will pay for itself in the future.
You will enjoy your tank a lot
More when it’s progressing instead of giving you headaches

there are millions of threads about problems with dry rock, you could end up in a similar boat if you go down this path.

the biological filter is the backbone of the aquarium

try and build your tank right from
The beginning instead of chasing and trying to fix it constantly

live rock, good skimmer, RODI unit, patience

only bad thing happen quickly in the reef aquarium

 

[codee]

Add a pump with PVC in a Tee and endcaps. Drill holes into the cross section. It should be just slightly higher than the water level. Add the rocks to the heated mixed saltwater in the Brute container and add you bottle of nitrifying bacteria of your choice. Ghost feed every 3 - 4 days. Cover the Brute can with a tight fitting piece of plastic. A trash bag works great. Tap the water off of the plastic when ever you think about it. After a month, move all of the rocks over to the second Brute container that is set up the same way with a small pump and PVC Tee.

Awesome, thanks for the help, @Ippyroy. Curious, why have the PVC Tee in the Brute?

 

[Ippyroy]

Awesome, thanks for the help, @Ippyroy. Curious, why have the PVC Tee in the Brute?

I allows for cheap quick and easy circulation. It allows water from the bottom to be brought to the top. Without the Tee the water won't circulate as well. I am about to start a new build thread documenting this method. I did something similar for my tank and the ugly stages weren't too bad. I feel like I can do it much better now. If you do it, start a build thread and document it.

 

[codee]

Maybe try KP Aquatics for some Live rock

it may seem Like a hassle and expensive to get the rock but it will pay for itself in the future.
You will enjoy your tank a lot
More when it’s progressing instead of giving you headaches

there are millions of threads about problems with dry rock, you could end up in a similar boat if you go down this path.

the biological filter is the backbone of the aquarium

try and build your tank right from
The beginning instead of chasing and trying to fix it constantly

live rock, good skimmer, RODI unit, patience

only bad thing happen quickly in the reef aquarium

Yes, I'm on board with taking my time - I don't mind waiting. That's why I was interested in Ryan's long cycle - he seemed to be practicing all the patience in the world and yet I'm not sure it paid off...

Ryan went all out with that 360 build (or at least, his sponsors did ), and yet he chose to use dry rock. If it wasn't to save money, I think he wanted to do some complex NSA and have a totally "clean" tank without any baddies hitchhiking in.

This is a tough tradeoff! Build that cool aquascape and be sure you're not introducing any parasites into the tank, OR spend more and buy some aquacultured live rock but have a stable tank sooner (but maybe with some critters you don't want in there).

 

[codee]

Having done a few tanks now, and having done a few different types of rock, I am now of the opinion that dry rock is troublesome for a cycle. I don't think whatever bacterial colonies, or processes that exist in live rock, even boat rock, can become active in dry rock in under a year or two.

My usual method over the years has been 3-6 month cycle with some form of live rock. This always gave me great results. When I say cycle, I mean "cycles", because there are a number that tanks go through. There is the initial ammonia cycle, but then there are a bunch of ugly stages. I feel that in my past, live rock tanks went through all the ugly stages and into full-blown-stable in 6 months.

Dry rock though has been a nightmare. The ugly stages are much further apart. I've seen stages that I've never seen before, nothing but problems. You avoid some hitchikers, it's easier to aquascape, but I just feel like its way less stable for a longer time. I'm not saying it won't get stable, just that the cycle stage is more like 2 years.

I truly believe the fatal flaw of the BRS ULM series was the rock. I was just rewatching it recently, and the failed SPS tank, I could immediately recognize the stage from my recent use of the dry rock.

Awesome, thanks @garbled. I'm going to watch the ULM series - I hadn't seen that one.

 

[kenchilada]

Here’s my live rock from Tampa Bay Saltwater. This has been in a 75G tub since October. This will go into my new tank this month. I run two Sicce wavemakers, heater, and one Kessil A360x for ten hours a day at 50%.

I feed this tub heavily every day with whatever I’m feeding my fish in quarantine. There are also hermits and snails. I change about ten gallons every two weeks, instant ocean. I don’t test anything but salt.

Lots of purple, red, orange coralline spreading already. It’s most noticeable when you turn a rock over and see the bare side.

I do it this way because this is how I’ve started my tanks since the ‘90s and it’s always worked well for me.

 

[Mellotang]

The Hitchhiker myth is another creative way the dry rock Pushers deter you from the real
Live rock

personally I’d rather take my chances with a “hitchhiker” than have a tank that is never stable, never grows coraline and is a constant uphill battle.

I love when they tell you bristle worms are bad...

 

[Mellotang]

Did Ryan use any product that BRS doesn’t sell??

maybe that’s why he used dry rock

BRS does not sell live rock

 

[Augus7us]

In all fairness BRS doesn't make videos out of the kindness of their hearts... I understand they need to sell products and youtube is a business.

That said, what I don't like is how it affects the reefing community. I've seen several threads on here where guys post a clearly biased BRS sales video and refer to it as fact.

I've been watching and enjoying the videos on Ryan's tank. And if it gets filled with GHA and Dino's I think he'll keep posting it, which is cool in my book. When I set up the new tank, I won't be doing everything the way he is.

 

[fishybizzness]

I'm currently going through some algea phases with my carisea rock. I added a few pieces of live rock in my sump and a piece in the display. The first photo is the carisea and the second is the live rock. The carisea is just started to get small patches of coraline but the live rock has big areas of it covered in coraline. My first tank was started with live rock. The photo is under a year. Everything was covered in coraline of several colors. I never had any ugly stage and spent many hours in the evenings staring at the rock to see what new life forms would appear! I didn't have that experience with the carisea rock. I have no doubt that the carisea will look great eventually but I would never again start a tank with dry rock again because I feel like I am missing out on a whole other aspect of having a reef aquarium!

 

[codee]

I'm currently going through some algea phases with my carisea rock. I added a few pieces of live rock in my sump and a piece in the display. The first photo is the carisea and the second is the live rock. The carisea is just started to get small patches of coraline but the live rock has big areas of it covered in coraline. My first tank was started with live rock. The photo is under a year. Everything was covered in coraline of several colors. I never had any ugly stage and spent many hours in the evenings staring at the rock to see what new life forms would appear! I didn't have that experience with the carisea rock. I have no doubt that the carisea will look great eventually but I would never again start a tank with dry rock again because I feel like I am missing out on a whole other aspect of having a reef aquarium!

Cool to see the side by side comparison!

 

[RobB'z Reef]

take what that guy (ryan) says with a grain of salt. He is a business man but I think he does mean well and he's contributed greatly to the hobby. Being a successful business man doesn't make him the best reefer out there tho. Unfortunately I'm neither haha.
That being said I've never been a fan of their cycling philosophy in general and just tune them out on that spectrum. I stood up a 180 a few months ago and went with 50/50 marco/KP aquatics live rock. Like another poster mentioned earlier, brute trash can that thing and cycle it out (live rock so no bottled brew needed) and swap it out a time or two and you won't have those phosphate issues some people talk about. Day 1 lights go on and bob's your uncle. Never went through the uglies ever. I'd advocate going with 100% live rock but that depends on a guy's budget. I didn't feel like investing that much so I traded a bit of time for $$ going the 50/50 route. By that I mean it'll take a bit of time to catch the marco up to the coralline growth you'll have on purchased live rock. The cycling time is really no different in the trash cans. Just my experience is all.

 

[Acros]

I am a week away from being 4 months in to the WWC/BRS bare bottom cycle. I really like this method and will follow this for any future tanks. Here is how I did the cycle.

1. Added dry rock + fritz turbo start. Tank cycled in 5 days and I started adding fish.
2. I added some live rock (30% of all rocks) at 1 month mark.
3. Initially I had my lights on, which lead to an algae bloom. I got a cheap UV from petco that took care of it and switch off my lights until 2.5 months mark.
4. I kept my UV running until just after the 3 month mark. The tank is running with out the UV. I have no algae or bacteria blooms. No diatoms either. Very little to non existent algae in the display tank.
5. I lowered my alk to 7.7 and all my new LPS frags are going great. I added an acro and a digitata yesterday, which did not do well.
6. I will wait for another month and try adding a test acro frag.

EDIT: I will use 100% live rock and skip the bottled bacteria next time. In my opinion that helps a lot.

 

[fishybizzness]

Cool to see the side by side comparison!

Completely different experience

 

[Sarcazian]

Either/or IMHO. Personally I am a huge fan of ispf.com. Their live sand is great, you only get about a cups worth. Everything they send can also reproduce in the tank unlike MB products. They give a great product that helps a tank mature that only has dry rock.

I just took a look and I really like how they sell bristle's and spaghetti worms! I may have to purchase for those alone since I always found spaghetti works super interesting with their yellow/black coloring. At least the ones I had.

I just wonder how clean their tanks are and if algae barn is a better place to purchase pods and macro from?

 

[codee]

take what that guy (ryan) says with a grain of salt. He is a business man but I think he does mean well and he's contributed greatly to the hobby. Being a successful business man doesn't make him the best reefer out there tho. Unfortunately I'm neither haha.
That being said I've never been a fan of their cycling philosophy in general and just tune them out on that spectrum. I stood up a 180 a few months ago and went with 50/50 marco/KP aquatics live rock. Like another poster mentioned earlier, brute trash can that thing and cycle it out (live rock so no bottled brew needed) and swap it out a time or two and you won't have those phosphate issues some people talk about. Day 1 lights go on and bob's your uncle. Never went through the uglies ever. I'd advocate going with 100% live rock but that depends on a guy's budget. I didn't feel like investing that much so I traded a bit of time for $$ going the 50/50 route. By that I mean it'll take a bit of time to catch the marco up to the coralline growth you'll have on purchased live rock. The cycling time is really no different in the trash cans. Just my experience is all.

I think it’s a fair criticism: BRS doesn’t sell aquacultured rock, so they don’t include it in their builds and videos.

By that same token, BRS is highly motivated to help people launch successful tanks, as they want a customer buying supplies for years (vs someone flaming out after 5 months and putting all their gear in a box in the garage).

It probably *is* shortsighted for BRS to not advocate more for aquacultured rock. I don’t think I’ve ever seen them include any live rock in a build, at least not in anything recent. It’s often mentioned as an option, but I don’t think I’ve seen them open a box from KP Aquatics (or whomever).

 

[RobB'z Reef]

I think it’s a fair criticism: BRS doesn’t sell aquacultured rock, so they don’t include it in their builds and videos.

By that same token, BRS is highly motivated to help people launch successful tanks, as they want a customer buying supplies for years (vs someone flaming out after 5 months and putting all their gear in a box in the garage).

It probably *is* shortsighted for BRS to not advocate more for aquacultured rock. I don’t think I’ve ever seen them include any live rock in a build, at least not in anything recent. It’s often mentioned as an option, but I don’t think I’ve seen them open a box from KP Aquatics (or whomever).

I agree, long term success is a win for everyone.

 

[kenchilada]

I think it’s a fair criticism: BRS doesn’t sell aquacultured rock, so they don’t include it in their builds and videos.

By that same token, BRS is highly motivated to help people launch successful tanks, as they want a customer buying supplies for years (vs someone flaming out after 5 months and putting all their gear in a box in the garage).

It probably *is* shortsighted for BRS to not advocate more for aquacultured rock. I don’t think I’ve ever seen them include any live rock in a build, at least not in anything recent. It’s often mentioned as an option, but I don’t think I’ve seen them open a box from KP Aquatics (or whomever).

In their defense, they have frequently encouraged using live rock. They comment often that they think there is a business opportunity for local stores to sell more conditioned wet rock. They also admit that dry rock comes with its own set of problems. So while I do find their format to reek heavily of infomercial, I don’t consider them deceitful or unethical. They are catering to market demand, which at the moment is dry rock.

 

[Ippyroy]

I just took a look and I really like how they sell bristle's and spaghetti worms! I may have to purchase for those alone since I always found spaghetti works super interesting with their yellow/black coloring. At least the ones I had.

I just wonder how clean their tanks are and if algae barn is a better place to purchase pods and macro from?

They use ocean water. There stuff is not clean like Algae Barn, but I haven't heard of anyone getting something bad.

 

[Ippyroy]

I think it’s a fair criticism: BRS doesn’t sell aquacultured rock, so they don’t include it in their builds and videos.

By that same token, BRS is highly motivated to help people launch successful tanks, as they want a customer buying supplies for years (vs someone flaming out after 5 months and putting all their gear in a box in the garage).

It probably *is* shortsighted for BRS to not advocate more for aquacultured rock. I don’t think I’ve ever seen them include any live rock in a build, at least not in anything recent. It’s often mentioned as an option, but I don’t think I’ve seen them open a box from KP Aquatics (or whomever).

They are not the end all be all but they have made multiple successful tanks. They use rocks that have been sitting in other systems usually.
The reason Ryan only puts stuff in his tanks that he sales is because he only sales stuff he believes in. If it is not a proven or widely accepted product, he and his team will not carry it. Other online vendors carry anything they can make a buck off of.
I personally watch many different YouTube channels and I try to use multiple parts of different methods. BRS succeeded in the WWC/BRS hybrid in one tank and did a lot worse on the other. His current tank is a dream build with basically no budget. I am not following it because I could never dream of purchasing half of the stuff he has for it and I don't know a ton of people that can do half if not most of the hard work. No one I know is gonna come and plumb my tank for me.
With that said I can't really say a bad thing about him. He has done more positive things for the hobby than just about anyone else. He also shows and talks about his failures which is a million times better than half of the YouTubers out there that have other people do all the work for them or they never show their tanks. Mark Levenson is the only other person whom I totally trust.