Maintaining cycled rock

[b2smoov]

I'm really looking forward to the upgrade. It's been a long drawn out process between buying a house, moving career changes etc. But I'm close. All that's left is a stand and canopy, sand and plumbing. Still tying to sort out the set up and transfer but I think I have a pretty good idea of how I'll accomplish it.

 

[b2smoov]

It looks to me that ammonia is at .5ppm. I'm not good with the color comparison tests. Yesterday I was at 2.0ppm so I think it's safe to say I'm cycled. What do y'all think?

 

[b2smoov]

Tested water again. Ammonia had the slightest green tint. Nitrates are 62.3ppm. I'm going to say my rock is cycled. Going to do a 100% water change and patiently wait a couple months to dose ammonia and test again. On another note I tested phosphate and got a 0.0 reading. I guessed it's safe to say my dry rock doesn't leach phosphates so that's good news.

 

[Garf]

my dry rock doesn't leach phosphates so that's good news

Maybe. Bacteria under carbon limitation have a very low phosphate content, although they do require a tiny bit (probably undetectable).

 

[b2smoov]

Well the tank is set up and it appears the bacteria survived. Was able to bring 2 ppm ammonia down to 0 ppm within 24 hours.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

Thanks for the update!

 

[b2smoov]

Thanks for the update!

I feel a little giddy knowing reef royalty has responded to my post. Happy to help.

 

[brandon429]

in secret I was wanting him to post 1 ppm ammonia remaining so we could all go round and round about whether or not the reading is true

 

[brandon429]

just joking I was not wanting that lol

getting off that wheel occasionally is so calming

2 mos= not much of an endurance test

but 14 mos would be, since you have nicely calibrated testing procedures for bacterial starvation assessment, in my opinion you should run some experiments that test out the longer waits and let us know.



there's a void in all reef aquarium science for that info. Nobody can tell us how long cycled bacteria remain viable in home settings when not directly fed by humans, it hasn't been studied yet in home/hobby settings. if someone on google scholar once tested it in a university setting on a cold dead steel slide, that isn't the same context.

the context is knurled rock from a reef tank, typical reef tank surface area rock plus inclusions from a completed and verified common reef tank cycle. there's a void for that specific info

with a simple paint bucket test setup you can have a side tank to do cycling experiments with.