cycling the tank

[underthesea33]

i had this tank set up for about two weeks. and after i had it setup for a week i put 2 fish in a clown fish and a honey damsel also i put the water in after i put the crushed coral in so i had gravel in the tank and on friday i tested the water and it was fine. ammonia low and nitrites low. but my ph was a lttle high.

so is it possible that the tank was cycled in a week that i had the cc in?

 

[kraze3]

its possible but unlikely. Any ammonia at all is harmful to fish, Ammonia should be at 0. IMO you should keep monitoring your levels and do water changes as needed. Any free time should be put into reading up on the hobby a bit because i think you may have rushed it. from my experience as well as others, nothing good happens in this hobby from rushing.

 

[Sk8r]

You rushed it. You were pretty lucky, but get test kits and monitor that situation closely. Don't just get the strips that say "ok." Get the Salifert tests that tell you precise numbers so you can spot trends and head off disaster---You're ok, but the moment you start getting problems, do a 10% water change with ro/di, and have salt handy to enable that measure. I note you're a 100 gallon. I hope you have a sump and skimmer and a cleaning crew. You may have to do waterchange more than once to keep those fish well. Your tank may actually be settling toward stability, but it may also do a lot of hiccuping little cycles, and if the three critical levels get up, (ammonia, nitrite/nitrate) even if the fish survive, it may shorten their lives. I ran a short cycle myself, and I know it is possible, but feed very sparingly now, above all else. Fish often go two weeks without any food during shipping and sale: they will survive a little hunger much better than they will survive an ammonia spike.

 

[Reefski's]

what do you mean by set up? just water running through the filter. what type of setup do you have. you have not really given enough info.

how long after you added the fish did you do the water tests?

i don't think your cycle has even begun.

Carl

 

[underthesea33]

on sunday the 7, i put it all together then addedcc and water waited till friday the12 to put the two fish in. and i just tested the water and it is all fine. so i dpn tknow if it didnt start yet or wat

 

[Amy83820]

What did you do to start the cycle? Live rock? Seeded it? If you didn't do anything, that means your cycle didn't actually start until you put the fish in. If that is the case, you need to get the fish out until it has fully cycled!