cycle question

[JKDMan]

Im wondering where i am at in my tanks cycle.. im using live rock from a old tank i had set up which was fairly dirty which i transfered from the old tank to the new tank directly. There is no fish in the system currently just a few hermits and snails.

my ammonia levels vary between 0/.25 - 1.0 ppm , no detectable nitrite and 20-40ppm nitrate..
im dosing with a biological booster daily.

wondering why i havent seen nitrite spike yet, but there is ammonia and nitrate.. im thinkning te ammonia is leeching from the old live rock but idk for sure.

im wondering if i have a colony of bacteria generating the nitrate, or if its leeching from the rocks as well.

has anyone had parameters like this during there cycle? what can these parameters mean in terms of the cycling process?

thanks

 

[bertoni]

With live rock, you might never see any nitrite. I would get a second opinion on the ammonia kit, if that's easy to do, because they sometimes fail. Other than that, I'd just wait. Those numbers are fairly typical.

 

[mcgyvr]

Yes the whole point of using live rock is to avoid a cycle.. The point of a cycle is to establish a bacterial colony capable of processing any ammonia into its lesser forms quickly.. The "live" in live rock implies it already has colonized bacteria living on it..

I'm not sure what that "biological booster" is but it could be the source of your ammonia..

You should expect little to no cycle at all..

 

[Dr. Reef]

i agree with above statements.
moving live rock from one tank to another will most likely will cause a very minor mini cycle that might last few hours to a day at most after transferring.
I suspect the ammonia kit.

 

[JKDMan]

i think the ammonia kit is good. I had my LFS test my water, and im getting same results. . i also had an ammoina spike out of nowhere which killed my clownfish.brought parametes back in order with water changes. paramaters have been stable last few days, with 0 - 0.25 ammonia. 0 nitrite and 40-80 nitrate.

i got a pair of frostbite clownfish at my LFS that hes holding for me till i want to put them in my tank, but im nervous to put them in now. been dosing with api quick start, and ghost feeding for a few days supposedly shortens cycle .

 

[bertoni]

I personally would wait for a week of zero ammonia before adding clownfish. The nitrate doesn't matter to the fish, so you can ignore that.