Mistaken scheduling of cycling/sand critter delivery timeline..need suggestions.
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swiss1939
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With that said, the past 7-8 days since I added bacteria was very useful and necessary not to have livestock in it for the reasons I mentioned. I had never used a sump before, and spent a few days playing with the overflow valve to fine tune my flow which led me to understanding how it works to manage water levels in the wier vs the return pump section. It would have not been good to have livestock in during that time, because this fluctuation in water levels of the return pump section as I was playing with it all and learning about it led my ATO to dump FW into my mix causing my salinity to kinda jump around a few fractions of a ppt. So I learned not only how to set up the sump flow for ideal silence, but also that I need to close my ATO valve prior to doing anything that would affect water level in the sump!
Next week I am refining my water change process to make it easier and less messy to do by trying out a few different ways to do it aside from sucking on a tube and dumping into a bucket.
Next week I am refining my water change process to make it easier and less messy to do by trying out a few different ways to do it aside from sucking on a tube and dumping into a bucket.
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swiss1939
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@brandon429 This bottled bac topic brings me back to one of my initial questions in this thread that I was indirectly trying to get at..and to which I am currently more talking about if needed in the future. I assume using a home depot bucket with some combination of live rock or live sand with the additional usage of bottled bac in fresh SW would be fine to store small amounts of livestock for a week or two as long as I keep temps stable, add a little flow to break the surface and keep an eye on nitrites/nitrates? And possibly longer if water changes to that bucket are performed.
While some people might not be comfortable with this, as long as its got the bacteria on some substrate in the bucket and all elements are kept in check, it is technically fine to support life. This is no different than using a 300g rubbermade bin as a long term grow tank, but for short term storage. Or even as a temporary QT tank. Bucket or tank, its essentially just a no filter system, depending on wc only with seeded bacteria and any minimal water changes needed for this small 5 gal bucket half or even quarter filled. You could even call it a temporary frag tank for a frag swap if you wanted to with the addition of a light! Not sure how much you'd sell in that presentation but that is aside my point!
While some people might not be comfortable with this, as long as its got the bacteria on some substrate in the bucket and all elements are kept in check, it is technically fine to support life. This is no different than using a 300g rubbermade bin as a long term grow tank, but for short term storage. Or even as a temporary QT tank. Bucket or tank, its essentially just a no filter system, depending on wc only with seeded bacteria and any minimal water changes needed for this small 5 gal bucket half or even quarter filled. You could even call it a temporary frag tank for a frag swap if you wanted to with the addition of a light! Not sure how much you'd sell in that presentation but that is aside my point!
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agreed you can temp reef in buckets, we permanently reef in fishbowls all day long for decades. the nitrite and nitrate wont factor in any setup, only the ammonia. I recommend basing zero cycling decisions on nitrite and ammonia, especially since none of our testers when compared to other brands will lend the same reading for them.
its all ballparking, so you can skip the guessing we've found. even most ammonia tests are guesstimates, but given the universal timeframes stated on cycling charts for ammonia (doesnt range even when the cycling chart comes from various sites, its about 8-10 days) and the boosting bottle bac we can see reefs in one day, its impossible to mess up a cycle nowadays.
only readings of wastewater + test accuracy varies tank to tank, how ammonia functions in the clean condition analysis is already known, measured by seneye, and was being used to skip cycles in all pico reefs since 2001.
animals on hold will be controlled based on substrate pre conditioning agreed, plastic buckets are good holders
its all ballparking, so you can skip the guessing we've found. even most ammonia tests are guesstimates, but given the universal timeframes stated on cycling charts for ammonia (doesnt range even when the cycling chart comes from various sites, its about 8-10 days) and the boosting bottle bac we can see reefs in one day, its impossible to mess up a cycle nowadays.
only readings of wastewater + test accuracy varies tank to tank, how ammonia functions in the clean condition analysis is already known, measured by seneye, and was being used to skip cycles in all pico reefs since 2001.
animals on hold will be controlled based on substrate pre conditioning agreed, plastic buckets are good holders
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swiss1939
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I know the bottled bac works, but I really wanted to see a sizeable decrease in ammonia in 1 day before doing a water change. I finally got a second bottle of bac that was delayed in the mail two days ago and dumped it in the tank with all power heads and return pump off for 45 min then dosed to 2.4ppm ammonia again. Next day it went down 2/3 to 0.8 in like 12 hrs so I finally saw what I was looking for. I think I left my first bottle of bac sitting around in the heat for too long as I received it a month or so before using it and it sat in my living room in 85 degree weather for a month or more. Either that or the first dose of bac finally reached critical mass for the amount of ammonia I had initially dosed which unintentionally turned out to be more than twice as much as intended on day 1. Gues I over estimated actual water volume when dosing the 4 drops per gallon on day 1.
Long story short.. got the downward curve in short period of time I was looking for, and this morning it was at 0.4ppm ammonia. I am now finishing my 3rd of my 4th 5 gallon water changes today to get approx 43% total water change today.
My sand critters are shipping on the 9th for delivery on the 11th, and I also went to check out POTO (Pieces of the Ocean) yesterday, which turns out is only like 15 minutes from me.
Once I get this 20 gal water change done and test everything for reduced nitrates/nitrites I'll be heading to POTO for some clowns to start stocking this tank.
Next time I need to cycle a tank from scratch I will make sure to order bottled bac only when ready and use it immediately.
Long story short.. got the downward curve in short period of time I was looking for, and this morning it was at 0.4ppm ammonia. I am now finishing my 3rd of my 4th 5 gallon water changes today to get approx 43% total water change today.
My sand critters are shipping on the 9th for delivery on the 11th, and I also went to check out POTO (Pieces of the Ocean) yesterday, which turns out is only like 15 minutes from me.
Once I get this 20 gal water change done and test everything for reduced nitrates/nitrites I'll be heading to POTO for some clowns to start stocking this tank.
Next time I need to cycle a tank from scratch I will make sure to order bottled bac only when ready and use it immediately.
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swiss1939
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@Brandon42 I'd just like to point out that next time I need to do this, I will be using bottled bac and a slow stocking of fish from the start. The cost of fishless cycling this tank just in salt was approx half a $75 175 gal bucket of red sea salt or around $35 in salt just to fill the tank to start it 8x5 gal buckets, plus another round of 8x5 gal buckets once the ammonia was cleared in order to bring all the parameters back into safe range for fish/corals. My math for the total number of 5 gal bucket water changes for this full bucket of red sea salt is 26x5 gal water changes.
So basically I used half a bucket of salt to cycle and then prep the water for life again. One bucket without this just doing the bottled bac and slow stocking mixed at 35ppt would have lasted (EDIT) 6 months with weekly water changes. Instead it will last me 3 months barring any other major emergency water changes.
EDITED timeframe cause I wrote this in middle of working last night and wasn't paying attention. 6 mos for a 50 lbs bucket of salt, not 2 yrs with weekly 5 gal water changes at 35ppt.
So basically I used half a bucket of salt to cycle and then prep the water for life again. One bucket without this just doing the bottled bac and slow stocking mixed at 35ppt would have lasted (EDIT) 6 months with weekly water changes. Instead it will last me 3 months barring any other major emergency water changes.
EDITED timeframe cause I wrote this in middle of working last night and wasn't paying attention. 6 mos for a 50 lbs bucket of salt, not 2 yrs with weekly 5 gal water changes at 35ppt.
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