Cycling with TBS start to finish

[landlord]

Greetings,

Being that I am new to the saltwater world and that I scored some killer TBS liverock, and have no idea when it'll be time to get the second shipment, I thought that maybe I'd let the pros out there watch my cycle and maybe provide some insight / advice. <-- Big run on sentence. hahaha.

I figure it would also give people an idea of how long it takes to cycle with TBS LR/LS.

As an added benefit, Richard will know when the phone calls from me are gonna start for my next load .

Anyhow I figure that I would post a daily log of the status of the tank conditions. I got this computer program to help track the cycle and since I got my rock yesterday I will have to post for yesterday. The tank is 75 gallons with approx 5 more gallons in the large canister filtration system. Let me dig up yesterday from the puter and I'll be back with the post.

-Landlord

 

[landlord]

11/22/03

Have had the LR/LS in the tank for about 6 hours now. Added the freebie bacteria (Thanks Richard) and turned on the canisters. Do not have the skimmer running, per Richards instruction. Will turn that on tomorrow.

Results:

Date/Time: 11/22/03 10:02 PM
Temp: 82 degrees
Ph: 8.4
Salinity: 1.021
Alkalinity: Normal (The RedSea test kit kinda blows for this test. No specific measurables just low, normal, and high).
Ammonia: 0.25
Nitrite: 0
Nitrate: 0

Notes:

Having difficulty getting the temperature to stay balanced. The darn halides increased the temp 5 degrees. Gonna try and add another big fan before I suck it up and get a chiller. My family is mesmerized by the mantis shrimp. Got Hy's trap in there with some holes drilled into the base to accomodate flow. Gotta get that odor moving.

-landlord

 

[landlord]

11/23/03 - Day 2

Results:

Date/Time: 11/23/03 8:14 PM
Temp: 79 degrees
Ph: 8.3
Salinity: 1.022
Alkalinity: Normal
Ammonia: .30
Nitrite: .15
Nitrate: 5

Notes:

Started the skimmer today. Overflowed it onto the floor, lame. Family still captivated by the little clicking dude in the tank. Never having gone through a cycle before, I'm not sure if the numbers look right? I will have to play it by ear.

-landlord

 

[OrchidMan]

11/22/03
Having difficulty getting the temperature to stay balanced. The darn halides increased the temp 5 degrees. Gonna try and add another big fan before I suck it up and get a chiller. My family is mesmerized by the mantis shrimp. Got Hy's trap in there with some holes drilled into the base to accomodate flow. Gotta get that odor moving.

-landlord

Since the TBS rock comes from a relatively deep depth, you may want to chill out with the MH's for some time. The rock you are getting right now is used to moderate lighting.
Did you talk to Richard about this?
We received an anemone with our second shipment and the poor thing has been having a heck of a time finding a place it likes and we have 190 VHO watts in a 50 gal tank.

Gary

 

[landlord]

I agree. Until I can find a solution (money for the chiller) it's just the PC's. I never did talk to Richard about the light intensity. Thanks for the info. Eventually I will need to get them acclimated but there is no rush. I have several weeks before I will need to come up with some sort of solution

-Kurt

 

[hdtran]

Ditto lights; if I remember TBS's web site, they say that they just run VHO's.

How close are your MH's to your water surface, and do you have any fans going? If you've got fans, you ought to have significant evaporative cooling, and shouldn't get that huge a temperature rise.

In any case you shouldn't run your lights more than 5 hrs/day while cycling (trying to avoid algae blooms, etc.)

The chemistry looks fine. Once your ammonia gets near 1.0, hit the panic button, and do a massive water change. (I wouldn't bother at 0.25 or 0.30; I might bother at 0.5, I would bother at 0.75). Your nitrites should also go away fairly quickly.

I seeded my tank with some gravel from my older FOwLR tank, and I undersized my package w/r/t the tank, so my ammonia never went above 0.25, and my nitrites/nitrates always remained undetectable. (Of course, that could also mean my test kit is screwed up )

Hy

 

[landlord]

Here is the low down on the lights. They are seated approximately 12 inches off of the water surface. The Tank does not have a glass lid it is completely open. The DIY canopy has no back. I have two Custom Sealife fans blowing against the lights. I was going to go out this weekend and get one of those clip on fans to try and get more air moving around. The SeaLife fans are not that great, or perhaps I have just mounted them in such a way as to not draw much air across the tank.

That is good news on the chemistry. I will continue to monitor an update the thread.

Thanks for the info

-landlord

 

[hdtran]

(a) make sure your thermometer isn't directly under the lights. You're trying to measure the water temperature, and you don't want radiative transfer from the lights to the thermometer!
(b) I don't know what the Sealife fans are, but if you can reposition them to point at the water surface, that really should get you lots of evaporative cooling (of course, you'll have to add more make up water).

Being both conscientious with testing your water and reporting it is great!

Oh, and show us some pictures

 

[kaiyokanman28]

Your salinity looks to be just a tad low at 1.021. It should hover right around the 1.024 or 1.025 range. Otherwise, the rest of your params look fine.

Cheers!

Andy :wildone:

 

[Dazz]

oooo... hmmm....
Ok, so the first 2 days I had the lights on only 5 hours a day, but the 3rd day I had them on all day...

I only have PC lights (96w, 1 white tube, 1 blue tube), but also have had 0 ammonia increase and negligable nitrate increase. (I did have some live rock and some critters in the tank for a month before putting the TBS in there so in my wet/dry I think there is plenty of established bacteria)...

Do you think the lights being on would be a bad thing... I turned them on after seeing that my PH had decreased from normal (I know when the lights are on the PH will increase) so I put the lights back on a 12 hour schedual.

 

[landlord]

Thanks for the info

HDTran - I will be repositioning the lights more towards the location of the water. I check the tank so much I shouldn't have a problem adding a bit more water here and there. This may be a good time for that DIY top of kit with the float valve. The thermometer is one of those (sticky tape me on the outside of the tank) kind and it is a the bottom of the glass. I think repositioning the fans would be very helpful. The are blowing horizontally without hitting the water surface.

Kaiyokanman28 - Not to question the wise and not to offend, but the hydromters that I have two of them. Accidental double birthday present both have an "ideal zone" nidicated on them and 1.025 is towards the upper end of that zone. What have I missed. The middle of the zone is 1.0215. I think I may have missed this important bit. Can you give me more info on salinity that I might not be getting. Any info would be greatly appreciated because maintaining salinity is about the only think I can do pretty good right now and it would be pretty easy top bring it up.

Dazz - I think that the freebie bacteria that Richard at TBS gave me really got the cycle off to a bang. The whole light problem I am having is getting confusing. Not really sure what I should do. In the meantime I came up with an inventive solution to keep the temp under control. Believe it or not it involves my LEGO's. I have the Mindstorm kit, which if you haven't heard of them, is like PC controlled legos. I have an infrared tower which can beam commands to a control unit (all LEGO). The control unit is running to the temperature sensor (also LEGO). The PC send commands to check the temp and when it reaches 82 it engages a motor (once again LEGO) to switch of the light. It is pretty MacGyver but I needed a solution and this one popped up. It is actually more reliable than my kids or wofe for that matter! LOL.

Thanks Everyone!

 

[hdtran]

Dump the sticky-tape-thermometer, and replace it with an in-tank thermometer.

The sticky-on-the-outside thermometers measure some combination of tank wall temperature and air temperature, which is a lousy way of measuring water temperature.

The "float in the tank" thermometers are a bit of a pain because they never face you, but they are much more reliable.

Normal Sea Water (NSW), if I recall correctly, is on the order of 1.024-1.026 (too lazy to go upstairs & check CMA book). Many folks who run FOwLR run a bit light on the specific gravity, and many (most) LFS's run very light on the SG. Specific gravity also is a function of temperature, but that gets very complicated. Your SG will read a bit low if your temperature is high.

I run my saltwater at 1.024 SG.

Hy

 

[Bruddah Chrispy]

Thanks for the info
Kaiyokanman28 - Not to question the wise and not to offend, but the hydromters that I have two of them. Accidental double birthday present both have an "ideal zone" nidicated on them and 1.025 is towards the upper end of that zone. What have I missed. The middle of the zone is 1.0215. I think I may have missed this important bit. Can you give me more info on salinity that I might not be getting. Any info would be greatly appreciated because maintaining salinity is about the only think I can do pretty good right now and it would be pretty easy top bring it up.
Thanks Everyone!

I also aim for a SG of 1.025 at a temperature of 79-82. Unfortunately I can't remember the original source for this. It was either Fenner's book or an on-line article concerning the average salinity and temperature of the world's coral reefs.

 

[landlord]

Suprise

Well what would the day be if it weren't for suprises. My girlfriend with a keen eye for pretty things decided that the kinda ugly rock stuff, as she sees it, needed a bit of sprucing up. I came home from work and to my amazement, out of a cave in the liverock popped a bouncing baby Koran Angel followed in tow by some sorta half blue half gold damsels. So I am off to the pet store to either take them back or purchase another tank. Hopefully this only added to the cycle and did no permanent damage (except for the liverock munchies had by the Angel).

- Bless her heart, see did mean well.

 

[hdtran]

Are you absolutely sure the angel & damsels (probably yellow-tailed blue damsels) aren't hitchhikers with the live rock?

 

[landlord]

No they came from the LFS. She told me so. She was so very happy.

 

[landlord]

11/24/03 - Day 4

Results:

Date/Time: 11/24/03 9:15 PM
Temp: 82 degrees
Ph: 8.2
Salinity: 1.024
Alkalinity: Normal / High
Ammonia: .30
Nitrite: .2
Nitrate: 5

Notes:

Aside from the suprise fish which I cannot capture nor do I have a home for yet, all seems to be going smooth. If all else fails these puppies could be up for grabs. The LFS they were purchased from is going out of business and isn't being cooperative with a return. They will do a trade but there is nothing left in their inventory of dry goods that I could even use. They seem to have plenty of ferret costumes and kitty litter but these don't help the cause.

-landlord

 

[landlord]

Finally captured all of the suprise fish and now have them in their temporary 10 gal holding tank. Had to remove all of the liverock to get them. Since I had the liverock outta the tank, I figured I'd go after my little clicking friend, a.k.a. daMantis. I tried placing the LR in tub of highly saline water. All this did was root out a dozen or so crabs and starfish. I imagine daMantis holed up in the rock giving my the middle claw or something. I'd really really like to get the guy out. If anyone has any success stories or suggestions on this topic please let me know.

-landlord

 

[kaiyokanman28]

Hello again, Landlord!

Nope, you didn't offend, nor do I consider myself a guru. I was just told long ago that for a reef tank you should have your salinity right around 1.025 or so. So I took the advice to heart, and was never sorry that I did. Also, just as my Big Kahuna Bruddah Chrispy pointed out, natural seawater has a salinity of 1.025 - 1.026. As it's directly from the Gulf of Mexico that TBS rock comes from, I thought it best to keep the salinity right around that level.

I chuckled when you mentioned that your girlfriend, bless her heart, went out and bought you all those fish. She's a keeper, as any girlfriend would be who understands and supports our reefkeeping hobby. Though...three days into your initial cycle, as you already figured out, is definitely too soon to introduce fish into the new reef system. The Koran Angel is a gorgeous fish, especially when it's a juvenile, which is what I'm sure your girlfriend was thinking and probably bought you a juvenile. Unfortunately, even with a 75 gallon, it's a tight fit for a Koran Angel. They recommend that you have at least a 100 gallon. Since your LFS won't take the fish back, put out the call to any of the local reefers in your area and see if any of them want the Angel and the Damselfish she bought. I've found from experience that there's ALWAYS someone in the area who will take fish and corals off your hands if you want to part with them.

Finally, I winced when I read that you did a hyper-salinity dip with your live rock to get out the hitch-hikers. I hope you didn't do too much damage when you did that. When I bought my TBS Package, Rich and Mary specifically told me I should never do that as it would kill the sponges and other beneficial life. I have also found that the 2 or 3 mantis shrimp that came in as hitch-hikers have not been nearly the terror that everyone makes them out to be. I've even caught one of them when I saw him crawl into a tunnel in a small piece of rock that I could easily remove and just prod him with a probe to get him to come out the other side and into a separate holding container. I've tried traps and they haven't worked all that well so far. But I ended up sending the captured mantis to a guy who wanted him out in Iowa, so everyone was happy and I didn't have to squash the mantis.

But try to avoid doing the hyper-salinity or hypo-salinity dips. You run the risk of losing your sponges.

Cheers!

Andy :wildone:

 

[landlord]

11/25/03 - Day 4 (I goofed on the last one and put the wrong day)

Results:

Date/Time: 11/25/03 7:39 PM
Temp: 80 degrees
Ph: 7.8
Salinity: 1.022
Alkalinity: High
Ammonia: .25
Nitrite: .3
Nitrate: 7.5

Notes:

Tank seems to be gettfing lower on Ph and higher in Alkalinity. This has me a bit disturbed. Advise or commentary would be welcomed, or at the very least calming. After yesterdays incident with the suprise fish, who now have their own tank, I am nervous that the disturbance I placed on the tank could be very harmful. I guess with anything time will tell. Everyone have a great evening, keep reefin'.

Thanks for the info andy! I am slowly raising the SG athough the stats don't show it. Should be up their in short order. All of the comments received have been greatly appreciated and welcome. I think on my own, I would screw with things so much I would never be able to just sit around and just stare.

-landlord