Cycled???

[Icewing726]

First fish is doing well, after 24 hours its starting to explore and nibbled on some food.

That being said I had dosed the tank with bio spira before adding it and tested the water today.
Ammonia-0
Nitrite-0
Nitrate-20PPM??!?

This is a 150 DT with a 55 gallon sump, with the only living things being the clean up crew an anemone and a fox face.

I do have some chato in the sump but I don't know how fast it'll grab nitrates.

Is there anything that could be causing a false positive? I tested Nitrates 3 times from different locations to confirm.

 

[mcgyvr]

What is it you are expecting?...Nitrates of 20ppm on a new tank is totally normal...

 

[Icewing726]

Well with nitrates being the last part of the process I expected them to build but slower... and not by that quantity. I mean, right now the only way I can get rid of the nitrates is to do a water change since the refugium obviously isn't reducing it out. If it took 1 day with 1 fish to make 20 ppm then this is going to be ridiculous if I stock this the way I plan too.

What am I missing?

 

[Tastee]

I run Marine Pure balls in the first inlet chamber of my sump and are keeping Nitrates at 0 ppm (as tested by my API kit, so possibly not quite 0). Tank is six months old and still reading zero. 65g, 7 fish, 4 corals, 4 inverts.

So at this point I am a Marine Pure convert.


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[homer1475]

Your 1 fish did not make 20ppm nitrates in 24 hours. It's the end product of the cycle that created it. Did you not check on the cycle before adding livestock? Or did you fill the tank, dump a bottle of crap in, add livestock and hope for the best? Sounds like to me someone got some really bad advice from an LFS.

Seeing as your tank is so new, and your so new I would be taking that anemone back. We typically tell people to wait till the tank is mature(think 6months minimum) before purchasing a nem. They are to finicky on water parameters, and in a new tank with a new owner, the water parameters will not remain steady. A dying nem can nuke the entire tank.

 

[Icewing726]

Maybe if I ask in a different way.

My understanding:
Fish and detritus make ammonia
Aerobic bacteria make nitrites
Anaerobic bacteria make nitrates
Plants, media, and water changes remove nitrates

When you say thats the end product of the cycle, I'm hearing you refer to that process. Are you actually saying something different that im missing? If not, then I'm failing to see how I hit 20 ppm so fast.

Not trying to be difficult.

 

[Icewing726]

[MENTION=369785]Tastee[/MENTION] , how are the marine pure balls removing nitrates? I have double the recommended amount at the start of my sump as well but figured they would kill ammonia while the plate and rock would kill nitrites.

 

[Icewing726]

Ok, I think I understand now. I wasn't aware that the anaerobic bacteria handled nitrates.

 

[mcgyvr]

Suitable nitrifying bacterial (convert ammonia to nitrites/nitrates) colonies are quite easy/fast to establish..
Denitrifying bacteria (converts nitrates to gas,etc..) is not and tends to take time and usually happens in low oxygen areas which again can take a bit to get established..
This to me is 100% why people mention a tank takes time to "mature".. I find that around the 8 month mark or so that a tank gets easier to maintain and nitrate issues start to become easier to manage.. I attribute that to the time it takes to establish a sufficient denitrifying bacterial colony..

Converting stuff to nitrates is very simple/fast/easy.. Getting rid of those nitrates is not..
Nitrates can quickly become elevated in new tanks.. Some (many) are in the 100+ppm range just because of the initial cycle partly due to how they excessively dose ammonia or add excessive amounts of matter to break down..

Its getting easier to maintain low nitrate levels in tanks but its certainly not "easy" for the most part.. And there really isn't one product that excels at doing so either... If there was we would all know about and just buy that and nothing else would exist.. Marinepure/Siporax/bioballs,etc... media is no different than regular rock.. Its just providing surface area for bacterial colonies to grow..nothing else.. some just have more surface area than others..

Water changes are still a great way (in smaller systems) because you are simply replacing water with "X" in it with water without.. In general replace 50% of the water and you cut nitrates by 50%.. On a 150+ gallon system though thats a lot of water.. Algae (plants) can help provided you grow enough and are removing/exporting it from the system.. Corals use nitrate too.. Many joke that "got a nitrate problem.. just add more corals".. Skimmers can help remove compounds before they have a chance to break down into ammonia,etc... but they are really only 30% or so effective at best.. Carbon dosing helps to fuel/increase bacterial colonies,etc... its pretty effective and one of the best ways now IMO to help manage nitrate and phosphate levels..

There is absolutely nothing out of the ordinary with seeing 20ppm of nitrates.. In fact if anything is a little low if I just was told that number BUT you have a larger system so that number is totally believable/acceptable to me..

 

[Icewing726]

Thank you for the details.

 

[Tastee]

[MENTION=369785]Tastee[/MENTION] , how are the marine pure balls removing nitrates? I have double the recommended amount at the start of my sump as well but figured they would kill ammonia while the plate and rock would kill nitrites.

As Mcgyvr said Marine Pure hosts de-nitrifying bacteria. This media has an absolutely huge amount of bacteria due to it's composition. I haven't tried any other media options so can't comment on the comparison to them but there is lots of positive information in all the forums.

I cycled my 65g tank using live rock and some bacterial culture. I saw the standard cycle, Ammonia leading Nitrite leading Nitrate. By day 10 I had 10 ppm Nitrates. Day 12 Nitrates were 3 ppm, day 15 zero and have stayed zero (or close to) since then. I have around 30-40 balls in the first chamber of my sump that my overflow empty's into.

I didn't start adding inverts until day 16 and fish on day 29.

I have tried 6 Marine Pure balls in my 10g FW tank but so far I am not seeing them impact Nitrates much if at all (6 months now), so it appears they are more effective in SW.


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[Tastee]

Sorry meant to say Marine Pure has an enormous amount of surface area due to its composition.

 

[mcgyvr]

I would actually say marinepure is far more likely to support higher levels of nitrifying bacteria than it is at allowing colonization of denitrifying.. All of their test data shows that too.. They left that out of the scope of their test for some reason (maybe on purpose)..
Its all about the ammonia to nitrates process and nothing about denitrifiction..

 

[Trigger Tough]

Try vinegar dosing

http://reefkeeping.com/joomla/index.php/current-issue/article/116-vinegar-dosing-methodology-for-the-marine-aquarium

 

[mcgyvr]

Try vinegar dosing

http://reefkeeping.com/joomla/index.php/current-issue/article/116-vinegar-dosing-methodology-for-the-marine-aquarium

I'd say try letting your take mature first... But yes carbon dosing has been proven to be quite effective/useful.. In general though it would be fine to start it at anytime of a tanks life..