Need some help with cycling.

[cbringe316]

so i started a new saltwater tank75 gal hex for the first time 25 days ago, I used the fritz turbo 900 and Dr Tim's ammonia, I did exactly how the instructions said online, I let it go.... last week I started testing and my ammonia was still little high I have all Hanna digital test equipment, I am new too saltwater let me add, I was at like .09ppm my nitrites were high around 2.5-5.0 but my nitrates are at 0 have been at zero Evey night, so last week I read to add some prime I added prime my nitrites were maybe a tad lower but not much so I let it sit a week, I tested it yesterday was still high so I did a 30 percent water change that helped I am down to .5 on my nitrite and .01ppm on my ammonia and 0 on nitrate my ph. is 8.1 and my salinity is 35.8 , I did add some ceopodes last week, I added like 4 jars its driving me crazy because I think I may have killed them I don't see any movement at night with lights off i do have 50 lbs. of rock in my tank so they possible can be hiding way inside the rock, My rock wasn't live it was dry when I started it, I added 1.5 bags of live sand, hoping that would kick it off ,I am just in thought on this, any help or pointers would be greatly appreciated do I just leave it and add more fritz turbo 900 to be safe??? I just turned the light on in the tank last night!!!!

 

[brandon429]

Your cycle is long done

the ammonia is nh4 you’re reading, nh3 is for reefing, once you apply the directions from the kit to estimate your nh3 levels you can see that’s in reefing spec. Ammonia is no longer expected to be zero in reefing thats a test artifact your kit renders at these trace levels, this is more time than those two bottle bac require to cycle a set of rocks. Your pods arent dead they’re in hiding. Begin reefing

nitrite no longer factors in reef cycling, disregard the levels altogether. Nitrate does not matter: hundreds of reefs on the site are nitrate zero and are cycled.

you are at the fish disease prevention stage. Read the disease forum, select a fallow and quarantine protocol for everything you’ll add to the tank. If you skip that part, within six months you’ll be posting there about fish loss. This cycle is long done, by twenty days.

 

[brandon429]

the reason your reading materials said ammonia must be zero and nitrite mattered, and nitrate must be above zero to be cycled is because that’s the old info. The new info is new, fully different from the old as all things evolve in reefing, and is designed to replace false stall worries with the real and valid worry that is fish disease preps for dry start systems, the cycle is long long since done.

 

[EeyoreIsMySpiritAnimal]

so i started a new saltwater tank75 gal hex for the first time 25 days ago, I used the fritz turbo 900 and Dr Tim's ammonia, I did exactly how the instructions said online, I let it go.... last week I started testing and my ammonia was still little high I have all Hanna digital test equipment, I am new too saltwater let me add, I was at like .09ppm my nitrites were high around 2.5-5.0 but my nitrates are at 0 have been at zero Evey night, so last week I read to add some prime I added prime my nitrites were maybe a tad lower but not much so I let it sit a week, I tested it yesterday was still high so I did a 30 percent water change that helped I am down to .5 on my nitrite and .01ppm on my ammonia and 0 on nitrate my ph. is 8.1 and my salinity is 35.8 , I did add some ceopodes last week, I added like 4 jars its driving me crazy because I think I may have killed them I don't see any movement at night with lights off i do have 50 lbs. of rock in my tank so they possible can be hiding way inside the rock, My rock wasn't live it was dry when I started it, I added 1.5 bags of live sand, hoping that would kick it off ,I am just in thought on this, any help or pointers would be greatly appreciated do I just leave it and add more fritz turbo 900 to be safe??? I just turned the light on in the tank last night!!!!

Do you have a photo?
Don't add any more Prime!!
You should have some nitrATES by now unless you got a bad bottle of bacteria. Was it the Turbo Start?

 

[brandon429]

there is no setting nor condition in which this tank isn’t cycled, even the hint it might not be implies that a cycle ump has seen and can link an instance of a one month Fritz + dr Tims bottle bac, that’s two different brands dead, being not cycled and they for sure have not ever seen that nor can link a single example.

the ammonia dropped from high levels to .009 nh3 in 25 days, thats cycled. Ammonia control is all that matters in cycling, if nitrate matters then a cycle ump must go around to any three year old tank on the site dosing for zero nitrates and tell them they aren’t cycled, even though the reef with no nitrates is fully stocked with fish and corals. Nitrate no longer factors in reef tank cycling. Old cycling science has now been injected into the thread, to the total avoidance of fish disease discussions.

 

[cbringe316]

Yes i added fritz turbo start 900 i have another bottle on the way, do you think it be good idea to add ? I have a quarantine tank set up and am reading up how to do this ,so i want to do it right, not loose fish… the only down fall to my set up is i do not have a sump!! i havr a fx4 canister filter, if i could a fit a sump underneath i would have but i just couldn't get one under, i do have a ato under there witch is tight and i have a hang on back hob skimmer should i fire that up now?

 

[brandon429]

The main display is fully cycled and doesn’t need more bac. It doesn’t do any good to add more and your tank didn’t need the second bottle already added much less a third one

Save the bottle for cycling the quarantine tank. Whether or not you use a canister filter on a reef tank doesn’t matter, the live rock is all the surface area you need, save the canister filter for the quarantine tank. Yes can turn on the skimmer and let it be running, getting wet and dialed in. Be sure and read the disease forum stickies: quarantining your fish and then adding non prepped corals and clean up crews is the same thing as not prepping fish, you need to fallow prep everything that goes in the tank to do it right