Water Change After Cycle?

leighla wolf

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I don’t remember who, but I wholeheartedly agree that you should eventually set up a fuge in the future but for thirty gallon even a 50% water change will significantly lower nitrates. If it helps, my fiancé got COVID and tested positive for two months so I moved out for a bit (I have major heart and lung damage). He didn’t do a water change (just topped off with rodi) when the tank got really low and nitrates were in the high 40s - 50s and my fish managed to survive for two months.... I was not very happy about the state of the tank.... but they did survive.
 

ScubaFish802

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I just want to add that on my 32.5g tank my initial cycle had much higher nitrates, I purposefully over did it a bit. Nothing wrong with what you did, your tank will start off with a nice strong bio filter ;) . A good sized water change, re-test and verify a safe range and never look back :D
 

cshouston

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It's just a 30 gallon. I bought a skimmer today to go with all the other equipment I'm accumulating...
If it’s just a 30gal, then go ahead and do 70-90%. You don’t need to do a smaller one and retest to decide if you need to do more. That’d be a waste of time. It’s pretty simple math to know how much you’ll reduce the nitrates by volume.
 

KrisReef

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Fresh water allows for more fish/gallon because there are many small freshies that can be housed in a tiny tank.
A 30 marine tank will do best with slower, planned additions of fish -& pre-thinking about bioload, territory & habitat limits in your 30 gallons.

After your water change you will be good to start adding fish?
Here is how that can go wrong quickly:
Typical 1st marine tank additions;
Week -1 pair of clownfish
Week -2 Pretty goby, jawfish, or dottyback
Week -3 (No big Fish issues yet) Random Tang, dwarf angelfish , or Beautiful Butterfly fish
Weekend -3.5 “Help! My Clownfish are fighting, hiding, or dead.”

Not saying you are that guy, just trying to get out front and check how far forward you have planned your next moves?

Everything looks well done thus far. Move forward carefully and steady. HTH
 

TanksJB

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one of the best benefits of being cycled is no degree of water changing, literally no degree can uncycle it.

stopping feeding your tank wouldnt uncycle it, bacteria feed via natural means long before us when hydrated


doing a 100% water change twice a day for a year would not uncycle it.

doing a 100% water change, waiting an hour to refill the system lol, still would not uncycle it.

these claims would seem outlandish were they not already action threads and videos posted in our cycling threads. post-cycle is this tough, cannot be undone unless you dose and measure and maintain antibiotics or boil the setup.

I would bet 100 virtual dollars lol that even doing a 100% water change, filling with distilled water for half a day, then changing it all back for saltwater would not uncycle it (bioslick osmolarity regulation) but that's a guess, nobody has tested that yet
in all online cycles ever posted I have never seen a single cycle get undone, I dont think its possible in a home environment.


You literally dont have to consider your filtration bacteria for the rest of the life of the tank, even if you removed all your sand out in one of the 100% water changes (which we do for 40 pages in the sand rinse thread)

Knowing how tough filter bacteria can certainly save your reef from future loss, you have intervention and management options in play that someone fearful of bacteria would not, and the hesitation from that causes loss for sure.
Brandon, I am learning a lot from your posts. Thanks. I am about to pull the trigger on adding water and rocks.
Here is a question I have as I don't want to change out 150 gallons of water just to prevent an algae event when I turn on the lights. What if, after I add live rock from the ocean, everything is fine except I have a high nitrate reading.
1) Can you give guidance on how long it will take to process high nitrates out naturally without a water change?
2) And, when and how long to run my lights when I start things back up if nitrates are down to acceptable levels?
3) And again, what is the acceptable nitrate level for me to turn on lights?
TanksJB
 

brandon429

why did you put a reef in that
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we can customize such a job for sure.

is this wet or dry shipped KP aquatics rock

asking because we can cure them in brutes vs the big tank, doing small water change guiding off tapwater dechlor saltwater if needed

how will the rock get to you
 

TanksJB

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we can customize such a job for sure.

is this wet or dry shipped KP aquatics rock

asking because we can cure them in brutes vs the big tank, doing small water change guiding off tapwater dechlor saltwater if needed

how will the rock get to you
I plan on cycling about 30 pounds of live rock from KP aquatics shipped in wet paper in a 30 gallon plastic tub. I will change water as needed in the tub until it is safe to transfer to the tank. Then, I will buy some rock from them shipped in water and put directly into the tank. That's the plan anyway.
 

brandon429

why did you put a reef in that
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that will work, the going rate for the paper ship is about ten days or less and a few water changes to guide it until it doesn't smell and also many people will pre-score off tunicates and sponges, expected cures, even before initial set in

after that's ready it will handle light curing in the system from the other rocks mailed nicer Ill bet

its all about the smell, if any of these shipments don't smell horrible the cure w be fast
 

brandon429

why did you put a reef in that
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thank you for posting! your feedback when its all set is critical shaping for our recommends, thanks for letting us work in a customized cycle run here its so fun
 

TanksJB

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Thanks Brandon, I will update you when it gets going.
So I guess I am disposing of nitrate when I do the water changes in the first batch of rocks. I am talking about nitrate sufficient enough to cause the uglies as you say. I will do the smell test on everything as you suggested.
 

brandon429

why did you put a reef in that
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these kits we use for nitrate detection range fifty ppm differences among testers in comparison threads, I don't even measure nitrate or po4 in my reef tank as I find the guesswork not worth the reaction.

I don't think the wet shipped ones will have as much dieoff and resulting nitrate its a good plan.

even when we start these tanks totally clean on 100% change like you've seen, we check back in 3 mos and they've allowed gha takeover anyway lol not due to nitrates but because they bought rock with no coralline and algae is the second depositional group after filter bac

well maybe the third, after early scum layers lol

your plan is solid
 

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