Paulie's Lagoon 25

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Pauliex77x

Pauliex77x

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Tested again today and STILL a nitrite reading of 1ppm. Added a bottle of Bio Spira to see if it speeds things along. Chalking the slow cycle time up to the weekly water changes i was doing. That plus the 3 water changes in 2 days i think set me back. Hopefully the Bacteria bottle speeds things up.
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RODI cart is working great after a few tweaks to the caster bolts and adding 2 more slats for stability. Nice to be able to make water and not worry about it overflowing lol. (Dont mind the mess on the counters)
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Picked up a 10g tank on sale for $1 per gallon to set up a QT tank that will eventually be a frag tank. The light is a Current Nova Extreme T5 with 2 10k white and 2 actinic blue bulbs that i got about 10 years ago. Its never been used so im hoping the bulbs dont expire from non use. I plan on quarantining corals as i get them as well as fish.

Hope the bottle of bacteria works because im getting impatient lol.
 
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Woke up this morning to a bacteria bloom. Fish were fine but tank was cloudy with a film all over the glass. The fine folks here at R2R responded quickly to my post about it and i think ive learned a few things. Took the opportunity to test for everything today. Param's seem pretty good.

Temp 78.4
Salinity 35 or 1.026
Ammonia <.15
Nitrites <.1ppm
Nitrates 5ppm
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Besides the cloudy water everything seems good. I added a fluval powerhead just to add some flow. Then Turned up both return nozzles to add more surface agitation. Trying to avoid buying the UV sterilizer for now but if i have to then i have to. Skimmer has been in overdrive today. Its still light but pulling out alot more foam.
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Debating on doing a water change but i may wait and see because those numbers arent that bad and i was told the water change wont stop the bloom. Just happy that it seems the cycle is finally done.
 
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I thought so as well.. ove never tested it over < .15 . I also havent done any water changes in about 3 weeks waiting for nitrites to come down. Only thing thats changed is im feeding the clowns 2x a day instead of just once. Its not high ammonia reading so im guessing its fine. Im actually ok with paramaters from todays tests
 
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I wonder why you’re still showing ammonia after this much time. Seems like your cycle should be long over at this point.
The only ammonia ive ever added to the tank has been the clowns. I have no idea why MrSaltwatertank's quick cycle method using the fritz 900 didnt work like it said on his youtube video. Maybe the clowns being so small there wasnt enough ammonia to properly cycle the tank? In any case in a few days when i set up this quarantine tank ill cycle it fishless with the bottle of ammonia and a bottle of bacteria. And probably all other future tanks the same.
 

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The only ammonia ive ever added to the tank has been the clowns. I have no idea why MrSaltwatertank's quick cycle method using the fritz 900 didnt work like it said on his youtube video. Maybe the clowns being so small there wasnt enough ammonia to properly cycle the tank? In any case in a few days when i set up this quarantine tank ill cycle it fishless with the bottle of ammonia and a bottle of bacteria. And probably all other future tanks the same.
Well that probably explains it if you haven’t done a water change in three weeks. But still, even with a low bioload the bacteria adjusts. It should be making pretty quick work of ammonia and nitrite at this point. It’s your nitrates that should be reading high if you have not done a water change in a while. Other than water changes I’m not sure what else you could do to get it to zero except to let it be. It will eventually work itself out. Maybe you got a bad bottle of bacteria so the cycle is just relying on fish waste and the natural blooming of bacteria without the help of the fritz 900. I can’t remember, How long has it been since the clowns went in?
 
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Well that probably explains it if you haven’t done a water change in three weeks. But still, even with a low bioload the bacteria adjusts. It should be making pretty quick work of ammonia and nitrite at this point. It’s your nitrates that should be reading high if you have not done a water change in a while. Other than water changes I’m not sure what else you could do to get it to zero except to let it be. It will eventually work itself out. Maybe you got a bad bottle of bacteria so the cycle is just relying on fish waste and the natural blooming of bacteria without the help of the fritz 900. I can’t remember, How long has it been since the clowns went in?
Its been about 6 weeks. Added a bottle lf bio spira about a week ago as well. December 13th i think was the exact date i added clowns.
 

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Its been about 6 weeks. Added a bottle lf bio spira about a week ago as well. December 13th i think was the exact date i added clowns.
At this point I would just keep testing and not add anything else until you consistently show 0 for Ammonia and Nitrite. I would probably also do a water change because that’s almost always beneficial on our smaller tanks. You usually cannot go wrong with fresh mixed clean water. No need to let Nitrate rise too much while you’re waiting.
 
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Tested again today at lunch. Ammonia was at 0, nitrites were at .25 and nitrates still at 5 ppm. The little ammonia i had yesterday is gone. Gonna test nitrites the next few days to see how long it takes to get to 0. I was gonna do a water change today but i may just wait until saturday or sunday to resume a normal weekly change schedule.
 

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Its the salifert kit.

It should say on the test information sheet which one it's for. With my API master test kit there's two different ways to do the test for free vs total ammonia if I remember correctly.

From the description of the test online it looks like it's a total ammonia/ammonium and not free which is fine, free ammonia is what will kill the fish.

"The Salifert Ammonia test is very straightforward and measures the sum of toxic ammonia and ammonium in just a few minutes."
 

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Depends if the test is free ammonia or total ammonia. You can have total ammonia without being in a cycle.
True, but with his bioload I’m surprised to see any 6 weeks after adding 2 fish. I’ve never seen any reading other than zero for ammonia on my Salifert test kit since my cycle was completed but I stopped testing for it a long time ago. I just thought it was interesting, I don't think there is an actual problem to solve.
 
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Good to know. The test has never registered anything over a reading of <.15 and the majority of my tests it was always at 0. Its my nitrites and nitrates i was having an issue with but apparently with the salifert kits a nitrite reading gives a false reading on the nitrates. The last 3 weeks ive just been testing nitrite waiting for it to drop. Got impatient and used a bottle of bio spira. Seems to have sped things up more than the fritz 900 i used at the start.
 

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I'm not one to recommend something, but I was not overly optimistic regarding the Dr Tim's and it definitely proved me wrong. Hope for the best, plan for the worst type situation. It did take about 1.5 weeks for it to fully cycle with dead rock, "live sand", and ghost feedings. Had a mini cycle about 1.5 weeks after that with some total ammonia showing up and nitrite.
 
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Im definately not doing a cycle with fish again. The Bio Spira seems to have worked but i may just get a bottle of DR tims and the ammonium chloride to cycle my qt tank. Either way the lagoon will be as is for at least a month or two livestock wise because everything else that gets added is spending that long in observation including corals.
 
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5 gallon water change yesterday. Tested today. 0 ammonia. .25 nitrites. Nitrates at 25. Lol

Something has to be wrong with the way im doing the test for nitrates to go from 5-25 AFTER a water change. Gonna take a sample to the LFS sometime tomorrow or saturday just to double check but im pretty sure my paramaters are where they should be even if tests are telling me otherwise
 
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Im chasing numbers now but it was bugging me that i may be using the tests wrong. So i cleaned out the test vials with RO water and did nitrite and nitrates again. Came up .25 and 25 ppm. Only thing i can think to do is another water change. Baffling me how im still reading nitrite
 
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Might have had a mini cycle with that ammonia/ammonium from the other day. It's gotta go through the nitrogen cycle.
True. But a .15 ammonia reading gets converted into 20ppm nitrate? Idk how that works but that seems excessive.

I had a moment of frustration before but im just gonna be patient and go with the flow. Nothing is being added anytime soon so im done driving myself nuts with numbers. I ordered some marine pure bio media to add underneath the filter floss holder and for the QT tank to cycle with. By the time im ready to add livestock it should sort itself out. Ill just keep an eye on nitrates and phosphates from now on and do water changes when they tell me to.

Gonna turn my attention to the QT tank for a bit to get it up and running.
 
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