Cycling with ammonia and Nitrates

[ricwilli]

I'm currently cycling my rocks in a 55 gallon drum with ammonia. I have been keeping the amonia at 2.0 and now I am at the point where it goes to zero within 24 hours. Nitrates are off the chart.
I have a 300 gallon tank and I was woundering if I can move the rocks to the 300 gallon tank right from the 55 gallon drum or would you suggest I do a 100 percent water change in the 55 gallon drum to remove the nitrate and than put it in the 300.

Thanks

 

[keithhays]

I am assuming that nitrites are also zero in 24 hours, but I digress once they cycled and you are sure they are producing nitrate and not nitrite in 24 hours, you can just move them. Word of warning, it takes roughly 28 days for nitrite oxidizing bacteria to show up after nitrite is present, and your nitrate test kit will read nitrites as nitrates until nitrites are zero or close to it.

You definitely don't want to move them until then or you will be cycling in your tank which is fine if it is new, not so good if there are animals in it or about to be in it and they are relying on the rock to do the cycling.

 

[ricwilli]

Thanks Keithhays. Your response is very informative. The ammonia cycling has been going for aprox. two months now. I didn't bother buying a nitrite kit cause I knew I was going to take this long cycling it. Maybe I should just get one

 

[SPotter]

Rich I would do a 100% wc especially if you have live stock in your dt. nitrates over 100 can become toxic to livestock over a prolonged period of time. the only way to get rid of nitrates is by exporting them either mechanically (skimmer and reactors), macro or manually. as you know i did the ammonia cycling in my dt and my nitrates were off the charts. i ended up going about 800 gallons worth of wc's before getting the level below 5. that was a lot of work not to mention the cost. if you know you have a problem before putting the rocks in your dt you should take care of it before you put it in. just my .02

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[keithhays]

Rich I would do a 100% wc especially if you have live stock in your dt. nitrates over 100 can become toxic to livestock over a prolonged period of time. the only way to get rid of nitrates is by exporting them either mechanically (skimmer and reactors), macro or manually. as you know i did the ammonia cycling in my dt and my nitrates were off the charts. i ended up going about 800 gallons worth of wc's before getting the level below 5. that was a lot of work not to mention the cost. if you know you have a problem before putting the rocks in your dt you should take care of it before you put it in. just my .02

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He is actually telling us about his 55 gallon live rock cycling vats not the DT, but I did have one additional comment for the original thread. You will want to make sure that once you do have the live rock in the DT, that there is sufficient food for the bacteria so that they don't go dormant i.e. fish in the tank.

 

[SPotter]

He is actually telling us about his 55 gallon live rock cycling vats not the DT, but I did have one additional comment for the original thread. You will want to make sure that once you do have the live rock in the DT, that there is sufficient food for the bacteria so that they don't go dormant i.e. fish in the tank.

I realize that he is talking about the 55g drum and not the DT. I have seen his tank and know that at that time he had live stock in it and thats why I questioned if he still has livestock in it. Either way, I would much rather do water changes on a 55g drum to lower nitrates than do massive water changes on a 300g dt where it will be nearly impossible to do a 100% water change in the DT.

 

[keithhays]

I realize that he is talking about the 55g drum and not the DT. I have seen his tank and know that at that time he had live stock in it and thats why I questioned if he still has livestock in it. Either way, I would much rather do water changes on a 55g drum to lower nitrates than do massive water changes on a 300g dt where it will be nearly impossible to do a 100% water change in the DT.

gotcha, I am assuming he is only putting the live rock from the drum into the DT with near zero readings on everything in the DT. Why does a water change in the 55g affect whether or not he needs to do a water change in the 300? Just curious.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

If there is no substantial ammonia, there's no reason you cannot move the rocks directly. Tiny traces of ammonia or nitrite that may be in water that sticks to the rocks is insignificant.

 

[ricwilli]

Thanks everyone for the response.
Right now, all my fish (only 5) are in quarantine. I have to keep the 300 fallow for 10 weeks. There is only two large rocks in the 300 right right now. I would like to put all the rocks in the display while the fish are in quarantine. My corals, 95 percent of SPS, are not looking to good right now as I have not been feeding the tank since there is no fish in it.
I know what Steve (Spotter) means by doing the water change in the 55 gallon instead of bringing the nitrates into the 300. Someone else suggested that I make 4-5 separate 5 gallon bucket salt mix and dump each rock in each bucket and than putting the rocks in the display. Unfortunately some of the rocks are to big for the buckets.
If I go ahead and do the water change in the 55 gallon and than put the rocks in the display, can I keep the bacteria alive by dosing some Oyster Feast by Reef Nutrition to feed the SPS? I have about seven more weeks before I can put the fish back in the display.