Pods = new tank cycled?

XLReefer525

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I just set up a new Reefer and at almost the same time, a friend also set up a smaller Red Sea. He is only a week into his cycle with no readings of ammonia, nitrites or nitrates but last night, noticed an explosion of pods in his tank. I went and saw it myself and they are everywhere on the glass. This would not be possible if his tank wasn't cycled correct?? At start up he used Araq Alive and rock from a different tank that was "live", but to me it was very clean looking, and it sat in a cooler without water for at least a week in his garage before he set back up. I can't believe it still had any good bacteria stored in it, but maybe it did and he had a quick or almost no cycle. I brought my test kit over to double check and everything tested zero. So back to my question, could you have pods everywhere if your tank hadn't cycled yet? I would assume not...
 

Storm Trooper Reefer

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Pods can survive a lot. Reefers had a good video on YouTube from last summer about it. Bacteria can go dormant. Cooking live rock is to let bacteria eat the dead organics. If it was very clean, I guess it could do the initial cycle quickly and provide pods. But pods need to eat also
 

brandon429

why did you put a reef in that
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That is agreed above, pods and benthic creatures equals a skip cycle just like how they set up reef conventions, the bacteria would survive a week out of water, much less in it.
not a crazy claim, in one study thread we have on skip cycles some live rock set on tarps for a month was still active when tested, could oxidize ammonia. A month out of water but not outside, kept inside sitting on a tarp.


if there’s one takeaway from the thread below I hope that it is when doubting the status of a cycle, defer to it being ready vs stalled or harmed. aquarists are sure they control the start or stop of a cycle by natural bacteria if they merely withhold fish food; there is no length we don’t go to assume that our whims control what water bacteria do in water. Your pods are weaker than bacteria. Can those pods survive 2:10 peroxide dose teased out in a petri dish? No, 100% loss. But your live rock can be subjected to 5+:10 peroxide ratios, five plus mils per ten gallons, and not recycle if you dosed it twice a day.

They’re insulated and a week in cold water is nothing but a slowing event, one day back in heated water = back to norm and the clean rock didn’t have tons of jerky to rehydrate and leak ammonia for days, all lucks lined up here. We need pics of the tank to make this a great reference thread for skip cycles.
 
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brandon429

why did you put a reef in that
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Also wanted to add: this is why we don’t add handfuls of old sand to new tanks when we do tank transfers (the risk of poison compounds being casted compared to saving five pods isn’t worth it) as we know the live rock has all the goodies and they migrate back down. This is a pretty important post actually, has implications for tank transfers jobs and skip cycle jobs we need a pic of this tank in question pretty pls.


this thread is 20+ pages of cycling tanks only by visual verification such as has occurred here. The 30 day out of water post is buried in here somewhere:



that’s twenty pages of study, the tank is fully cycled because what you did isn’t antibiotic in the least. For the rock out of water a month, they didn’t have to sit it in water for days to bring it back, it oxidized ammonia and passed a cycling test immediately. His was out of water, yours was in for 1/4th the wait.
 
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Alexopora

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I just set up a new Reefer and at almost the same time, a friend also set up a smaller Red Sea. He is only a week into his cycle with no readings of ammonia, nitrites or nitrates but last night, noticed an explosion of pods in his tank. I went and saw it myself and they are everywhere on the glass. This would not be possible if his tank wasn't cycled correct?? At start up he used Araq Alive and rock from a different tank that was "live", but to me it was very clean looking, and it sat in a cooler without water for at least a week in his garage before he set back up. I can't believe it still had any good bacteria stored in it, but maybe it did and he had a quick or almost no cycle. I brought my test kit over to double check and everything tested zero. So back to my question, could you have pods everywhere if your tank hadn't cycled yet? I would assume not...
I wouldn’t assume that the presence and explosion pods indicates that the tank is fully cycled but it is a good sign that your tank is heading in the right direction. Pods esp copepods are quite resilient and can withstand less than ideal water conditions for other sealife. I would not exactly say having zero readings for ammonia, nitrites and nitrates equals to cycling being completed. It doesn’t hurt to be patient a give the tank a couple more weeks before introducing any livestock.
 
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XLReefer525

XLReefer525

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Thanks everyone. I will let him know and as requested, I will get him to send me some pics so I can post them here. there is not much see - it's just sand, rock and water...
 

brandon429

why did you put a reef in that
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agreed guess it won’t be a neon sign heh without some test or some life in it, how about a basic starting bioload and a pic two days after


we wouldnt ammonia test it because that’s harmful to the bugs to drive levels above norm. A few days with some starting life is a fine proofing run, uncycled tanks will not last 48 hours with bioload in place. A few big margarita snails and two feed pellets is a fine start. Smell the water, it will smell normal because it’s not rotting, make sure it’s been changed into clean heated reef water not the holding water and he can add fish as well.
 
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