\Clownfish/ 29 Gallon BioCube Tank

[\Clownfish/]

Hello everyone
Today I finally set up my tank and I am beyond excited to finally start. I currently have 27 pounds of cured live rock, now sure how much sand (2 bags), and 20 gallons of saltwater. I used instant ocean reef crystals for my salt mix and RO water as well. I am planning on taking my first test tomorrow to see what my parameters are, and will wait a about two weeks to make sure nothing spikes. Below I will attach a few pictures from this morning. :dance:

 

[\Clownfish/]

Playing around with the live rock


Filled with water


Clearing up after a couple of hours

 

[Nor_Cal_Guy]

nice start. Looking forward to your progress.

 

[Zwickm]

Excellent! Keep us up to date.

 

[fritzz1111]

Here's what I do during this phase:

Monitor only ammonia (I save my other test kits (and your $$$) for later on) in beginning - once in morning, once at night and make sure my levels are at or below 1.00 ppm. If, at anytime, the levels are higher... I will replace enough volume of water to get back to 1.00 ppm.

Example: If my reading comes in at 1.25 ppm in the morning, I would do a 25% water change. If by some chance it creeps back up during the day (say back to 1.25 ppm) I'd do another 25% water change. If you let it stay above 1.00 ppm for any extended period of time you chance die off, and that will only set you back.

Keep enough water on hand to be prepared to do a 100% change all at once if necessary, and remember to never use "hot water" in your replacements. Replacement water needs to be mixed up at least 24hrs in advance.

You may be surprised to see how quickly you will cycle with the cured life rock in the tank!

 

[\Clownfish/]

Here are the readings for today

PH - 8.1
Ammonia - 0 ppm
Nitrite - 0 ppm
Nitrate - 5.0 ppm (this is only day two, do I need a water change?)
Phosphate - 0 ppm
Salinity - 1.026 (Instant Ocean Reef Crystals)

What do you guys think?



Tank Today

 

[Nor_Cal_Guy]

I would wait a few days for a water change. From the looks of things you are off to the right start. Test, test, test.

 

[\Clownfish/]

I currently have the lights off in the tank since there is nothing in there. Also how can I raise the Ph and is it to early to add things to raise the PH?

 

[soulpatch]

Here's what I do during this phase:

Monitor only ammonia (I save my other test kits (and your $$$) for later on) in beginning - once in morning, once at night and make sure my levels are at or below 1.00 ppm. If, at anytime, the levels are higher... I will replace enough volume of water to get back to 1.00 ppm.

Example: If my reading comes in at 1.25 ppm in the morning, I would do a 25% water change. If by some chance it creeps back up during the day (say back to 1.25 ppm) I'd do another 25% water change. If you let it stay above 1.00 ppm for any extended period of time you chance die off, and that will only set you back.

Keep enough water on hand to be prepared to do a 100% change all at once if necessary, and remember to never use "hot water" in your replacements. Replacement water needs to be mixed up at least 24hrs in advance.

You may be surprised to see how quickly you will cycle with the cured life rock in the tank!

I disagree with this. You typically want the ammonia to build up to the 2ppm or so to encourage the bacteria to build up in prep for your enhanced bioload. Sure you have some die off but that is the purpose as that die off also feeds some of the bacteria in the tank. You dont want to do a water change till you are closer to the end of the cycle.

This is a good article:

http://www.drtimsaquatics.com/resources/fishless-cycling

Changing the water only removes those items that are encouraging the growth of bacteria and slows your cycle.

The only reason you would swap water and try to keep ammonia down a bit is if you were doing a fish cycle or had other live stock so as to not damage them.

 

[KorD]

I disagree with this. You typically want the ammonia to build up to the 2ppm or so to encourage the bacteria to build up in prep for your enhanced bioload. Sure you have some die off but that is the purpose as that die off also feeds some of the bacteria in the tank. You dont want to do a water change till you are closer to the end of the cycle.

This is a good article:

http://www.drtimsaquatics.com/resources/fishless-cycling

Changing the water only removes those items that are encouraging the growth of bacteria and slows your cycle.

The only reason you would swap water and try to keep ammonia down a bit is if you were doing a fish cycle or had other live stock so as to not damage them.

I agree with this... but then again I am known to not test anything for the first two weeks, and just do a 10% water change each week. I will start testing water at the end of week two to see where I am at to get my cuc into the tank.

The reasons I do this is because in this hobby i am notorious for wanting to stick my hands in the tank and keep aquascaping everything.. it just keeps dirt and grime from being introduced into the water throughout the cycle.

 

[Mishri]

I never thought the fishless cycle worked very well. Reading that article it does make sense that it will work as long as you keep adding ammonia. I was assuming people were stopping once it "cycled" (Like with the shrimp method). Because that bacteria without ammonia will eventually die off. You'd need to add a fish right away.

I still prefer the natural method, I haven't lost a fish from it in years since I figured out how to do it correctly(Slowly, and regular water changes)-most of the time through the whole process they don't look stressed at all. I don't like adding anything to my tank unless i have to.

 

[soulpatch]

I still prefer the natural method, I haven't lost a fish from it in years since I figured out how to do it correctly(Slowly, and regular water changes)-most of the time through the whole process they don't look stressed at all. I don't like adding anything to my tank unless i have to.

Actually the fishless is closer to the natural method then dropping fish into a toxic environment and having them pull through while the water parameters stabilize.

 

[\Clownfish/]

Parameters for today

PH - 7.8 (Low than yesterday) How can I raise this up to 8.3?
Ammonia - 0 ppm
Nitrite - 0 ppm
Nitrate - 0 ppm (Lowered Overnight )
Phosphate - 0 ppm



Noticed something maroon is growing on one of my rocks, what could it be?


Salinity for the day is 1.025 (lower from yesterday which was 1.026)


Tank today

 

[soulpatch]

I wouldn't worry about ph or such for right now. Save those tests for when you have live stock or are about to add in some livestock.

Are you dosing ammonia or feedingt the tank to produce ammonia?

You goal should be to get ammonia up to like 2ppm and then have it zero out in 24 hours. You can do this by either straight ammonia or putting food/shrimp in there.

 

[\Clownfish/]

At the moment all I have in the tank is cured live rock and live sand.

 

[soulpatch]

Which is all you should have in there but you need to dose ammonia to build up your bacteria levels through either straight ammonia or seeding the tank with food/shrimp as is popular here.

I seeded with straight ammonia I got from Ace Hardware.

 

[KorD]

Which is all you should have in there but you need to dose ammonia to build up your bacteria levels through either straight ammonia or seeding the tank with food/shrimp as is popular here.

I seeded with straight ammonia I got from Ace Hardware.

I have never done anything two my tanks except all a hunk of live rock and let it work it's magic.. I just set up a frag tank this way and had LPS/SPS/Softies in there within a week and a half.

it has now been going for a month and a half with no issues.

 

[soulpatch]

Live rock speeds things but are directly impacting your bacteria in a negative fashion doing so. You need bacteria to die of to give ammonia for others to feed on.

Your tank will cycle without doing anything you have a smaller bioload. Not a concern for frag tanks since you do not have fish and such producing ammonia and they need small bacteria but for tank with fish not adding anything to build up your bio level bacteria in a way defeats purpose of fishless cycle

 

[\Clownfish/]

Day #3 Today I will be adding raw shrimp to get my ammonia up and start a cycle :bdaysmile: going to leave in take until it starts dissolving.

 

[soulpatch]

if you havent bought it yet I would recommend getting straight ammonia instead.

This way you can put in an exact amount of ammonia and not need to wait for the shrimp to break down. Plus when you want to increase the ammonia to test the completion of the cycle you can use a dropper and get right back tot he level you want to be at for testing.