Live Rock/Live Sand Questions

[CLeadfootS]

Now I'm kinda confused because I have one person saying to feed the tank (everyday???) for a week and I have two people saying to put a couple shrimp in there. Like I said before I am very new to live rock and live sand so I'm trying to understand the nitrogen cycle. So is there any harm in doing both? Maybe feed the tank for a week and check my levels and if all is good then put a shrimp or two in there? I don't want to pollute my tank. After all, I spent a lot of money to get this tank to where I am now. I really appreciate everybody taking time out of your day to help me.

 

[thegrun]

No, the difference is your advice and Salty's advice both make assumptions about information you don't have. Throwing a whole shrimp in a tank with 130 lbs of live rock is old school.

I am old so you don't need to throw it in my face!!!:lolspin: I still stand by the practice however. Adding a dead shrimp in my opinion is a good way to determine if live rock is fully cured (no ammonia after the addition) or still needs to cycle.

 

[Angel*Fish]

Now I'm kinda confused because I have one person saying to feed the tank (everyday???) for a week and I have two people saying to put a couple shrimp in there. Like I said before I am very new to live rock and live sand so I'm trying to understand the nitrogen cycle. So is there any harm in doing both? Maybe feed the tank for a week and check my levels and if all is good then put a shrimp or two in there? I don't want to pollute my tank. After all, I spent a lot of money to get this tank to where I am now. I really appreciate everybody taking time out of your day to help me.

What's being disputed is the quantity of dead stuff that needs to be added to the tank.

You expressed an interest in the life on your rock. You spent all that money on live sand. I'm assuming that means you want to preserve as much of it as possible. High ammonia levels in your water with kill some things. I don't know the condition of your LR, how it's been handled or where it came from. There is a range of possibilities depending on your rock. It could be fully cycled, clean and ready to go, it could be covered with life that's already rotting and producing a cycle on it's own or it could be something in between. The denitrifying bacteria populations could be high or low, but you would not expect them to be zero.

If you add a whole dead shrimp to the tank, different things can happen depending on your rock. It could just handle the bioload, it could cause a small cycle (ammonia), it could cause a hard cycle (very high ammonia).

If you add a bit of fish food every day or even a teeny bit of that big shrimp, finely chopped - the issue is not what is added to the tank, but how much -- you can test your tank to see if it's cycled without causing an unnecessary ammonia spike, or you can cycle it more gently.

If you don't care about the life on the LR, there's no need to bother.

I am old so you don't need to throw it in my face!!!:lolspin: I still stand by the practice however. Adding a dead shrimp in my opinion is a good way to determine if live rock is fully cured (no ammonia after the addition) or still needs to cycle.

Lol - I was going to edit "old school" to "not necessary" but I had to answer the phone. You don't have to add a whole dead shrimp. The bacteria can be nudged into increasing, the same way they do when you add a new fish to your tank. Live rock should already have some bacteria to work with, totally different from dry rock.

 

[Uncle Salty 05]

The "reasons" you give for not adding a shrimp are precisely why I told CLeadfootS to test ammonia daily. If they do so there will not be time enough for ammonia to reach a high level.
Feeding an empty tank food daily which you cannot remove, will accomplish the same goal as adding a shrimp or two except the shrimp can be removed and will not "pollute" the water as much.
I am old school and proud of it.

 

[CLeadfootS]

Ok, now it's making a lot more sense to me. I thought it was a debate about fish food vs shrimp but it's a quantity thing. Thank you for clearing that up for me.

 

[Angel*Fish]

The "reasons" you give for not adding a shrimp are precisely why I told CLeadfootS to test ammonia daily. If they do so there will not be time enough for ammonia to reach a high level.
Feeding an empty tank food daily which you cannot remove, will accomplish the same goal as adding a shrimp or two except the shrimp can be removed and will not "pollute" the water as much.
I am old school and proud of it.

I would argue just the opposite - what a surprise, right? You can precisely control what you add to the tank by adding a bit at a time, but that shrimp doesn't put a controlled set amount of rot into the tank every day. Blech -it can even release a whole lot of nastiness when you disturb it while you're pulling it out of the tank. (Even in it's little mesh bag)

I'm still talking about a different quantity regardless of when you remove the shrimp.

 

[Uncle Salty 05]

I see this as a discussion not an argument, one I hope the OP, both of us and those tagging along can bennefit from.
I think you are talikng about chopped or ground shrimp (which I would never use). I am talking about a whole raw shrimp, peel, legs and all.
This can be removed intact when and if an ammonia spike occurs. Little bits of fish food cannot, once they are in the tank, they are in to stay.

 

[Angel*Fish]

I'm talking about a whole shrimp. The little bits are so small you're not waiting days for them to disintegrate.

 

[Uncle Salty 05]

Why do want anything to disintegrate?
If you are talking about a whole shrimp what is the mesh bag you mentioned for?

 

[Angel*Fish]

Why do want anything to disintegrate?
If you are talking about a whole shrimp what is the mesh bag you mentioned for?

I want it to break down in the water so it can feed the bacteria in the rocks. Personally I like using flake food for this. I've read a lot of people use a stocking or mesh bag so that it doesn't fall apart on them when they try to remove it.

 

[Uncle Salty 05]

A whole shrimp can accomplish the production of ammonia without
disintegrating.
I just don't like putting anything into a tank that won't be consumed. Detritus builds up fast enough without helping it along.
I wouldn't add fish food unless there was CUC present to consume it.
The shrimp can be removed in its entirety.

 

[ahud]

For both reasons being "discussed" I use pure ammonia. I know how much I am adding (precisely) and there is nothing to clean up or remove. Not to mention its cheap

Dr. Tim aquatics sells pure ammonia, its cheap and I have cycled two or three tanks with it (fresh and salt)

 

[Uncle Salty 05]

So then Angel*Fish and myself are both "old school" I guess.:beer:
How cheap is cheap?
I tried an ammonia additive a long, long time ago along with a bacterial additive to "jump start" your cycle and was less than impressed with the results but I am sure things have changed since then.
Does the Dr. Tim's product have instructions for someone in CLeadfootS's situation?

 

[Angel*Fish]

Detritus build up? I don't know anything in terms of pros and cons of using plain ammonia, but concern about detritus build up doesn't sound like a worthwhile reason to do it unless you can use the stuff you get at the grocery store for a dollar.

 

[Uncle Salty 05]

Detritus build up? I don't know anything in terms of pros and cons of using plain ammonia, but concern about detritus build up doesn't sound like a worthwhile reason to do it unless you can use the stuff you get at the grocery store for a dollar.

Oh, that poor dead horse.
Have a good weekend y'all.

 

[ahud]

The Ammonium Chloride Solution (pure ammonia) is $2.99, but like I said, I have been using mine for a while now, I can't see to many people having to buy more than one bottle. Now this is not a bacteria additive, its simply an ammonia source.

Pro's
ammonia source that is measurable
easy to add, directions are on the back of the bottle.
stores easy
does not stink
No waiting on decay

Cons
? I'm not sure if I can think of any?

Angelfish, $2.99 is not too far off. You can use the stuff from the grocery store, but you must be very careful about other additives. Personally, I like Dr. Tims ammonia because it clearly tells you X drops per gallon. The fish food is fine, but I think that is more old school than the shrimp .

I have also used this to setup QT tanks. Just grab your sponge filter from the main tank, drop a few drops of ammonia..wait...and measure for nitrates.

Here is a link:
http://drtimsaquatics.3dcartstores.com/Ammonium-Chloride-Solution_p_190.html

 

[CLeadfootS]

Thank you all for your suggestions. I will do some more research and check out uncle tim aquatics as well. If anybody else has suggestions please feel free to post them.

 

[ahud]

CLeadFootS,

Just to sum it all up, all we are doing is talking about an ammonia source. How you add that ammonia is not really important in the big picture. Any method would work. I just think the bottled product would work in your situation because you could add a small amount of ammonia and not put any of the life on your rock in harms way.

 

[CLeadfootS]

Thanks for posting that link ahud. Guess we were writing at the same time. I checked it out and it says 1 drop per gallon. I have a 150 gallon tank. Seems like a lot of drops. You think 1 bottle will do for me?

 

[ahud]

Yeah, I think you would have over half the bottle leftover too lol. Remember, it says 1 drop per gallon for 2ppm of ammonia. We don't want ammonia that high in your tank, so you won't need nearly as many drops.75 drops would give you 1ppm, 38 drops would give you roughly .5ppm. As you can see, its pretty easy to figure out how much you need to add. Honestly,

As far as how much ammonia you would want to add, I will wait for another member to help you out. I'm not what levels of ammonia would be dangerous to the small life on the rock.