Please Help With Nitrogen Cycle

[Alpha Fishstick]

Hi Everyone,

Please help me understand my 75 Gallon Nitrogen Cycle.

I setup my first tank, a 75 Gallon and have been "Phantom Feeding" Brine Shrimp and Feaze Dried Shrimp as a way to introduce ammonia to start my tank cycle.

The tank has Dry Marco Rock and Carribsea Fiji Pink live sand. I used RO/DI water with new filters and DI Resin. Its Salinity is 1.026 and 79 deg. temperature. I also added Fluval Beneficial Bacteria on day 1. The T5 lights have been left off.

It has been 10 days and I have not seen any rise in Ammonia, Nitrite, and Nitrate. What should I do?

Thanks

 

[ladynavyvet]

Hi Everyone,

Please help me understand my 75 Gallon Nitrogen Cycle.

I setup my first tank, a 75 Gallon and have been "Phantom Feeding" Brine Shrimp and Feaze Dried Shrimp as a way to introduce ammonia to start my tank cycle.

The tank has Dry Marco Rock and Carribsea Fiji Pink live sand. I used RO/DI water with new filters and DI Resin. Its Salinity is 1.026 and 79 deg. temperature. I also added Fluval Beneficial Bacteria on day 1. The T5 lights have been left off.

It has been 10 days and I have not seen any rise in Ammonia, Nitrite, and Nitrate. What should I do?

Thanks

This can take some time, I'd suggest giving your system more.

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[ahuaia]

For my tank I used bio spira a beneficial bacteria additive and my tank Cycled in a week. However if you are unsure just sit on it longer and watch your peramiters you won't hurt anything bye waiting but you could mess them up by going too fast.

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[neoh74]

When I cycled my tank I never had any readings of ammonia or nitrites. I got my dinos at week 2 and green hair at week 2.5. 1st thing I kept reading and now understand is this hobby requires an undeserving amount of patience

 

[hecterma]

Steady as she goes.

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[gffpm1247]

My 75 gal tank has 30 lbs of live rock 35 lbs of dry rock and 40lbs of live sand and it took me just under 4 weeks

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[Lsufan]

I always use pure ammonia to cycle my tanks with. It takes out any guessing & u can control exactly how much ammonia u put into the tank. U have to make sure u use pure ammonia with nothing else in it. I use the ace janitorial ammonia . If your not sure the pure stuff will be clear & if u shake the bottle it won't bubble up like soap is in the bottle.

If u went this route then I would dose it to 1 ppm ammonia & test it 24 hrs later & see what u have. If it is cycled then u will have 0 ammonia & nitrite & should be registering nitrate on the test.

They have a calculator online that will tell u how much to use. If I search for ammonia cycling calculator u should be able to find it

 

[Alpha Fishstick]

Thanks all for your suggestions. I gave the tank a few more days of phantom feeding and I'm getting readings of Ammonia (0.5), Nitrite (2), and Nitrate (50).

I will keep taking measurements and when the Ammonia and Nitrite are 0 I should be good for my first fish.

 

[Dr. Reef]

Only ammonia is dangerous so I'll wait till it hits 0 then u can start adding livestock. Nitrites are not harmful at such low range.

 

[Frank H]

I always use pure ammonia to cycle my tanks with. It takes out any guessing & u can control exactly how much ammonia u put into the tank. U have to make sure u use pure ammonia with nothing else in it. I use the ace janitorial ammonia . If your not sure the pure stuff will be clear & if u shake the bottle it won't bubble up like soap is in the bottle.

If u went this route then I would dose it to 1 ppm ammonia & test it 24 hrs later & see what u have. If it is cycled then u will have 0 ammonia & nitrite & should be registering nitrate on the test.

They have a calculator online that will tell u how much to use. If I search for ammonia cycling calculator u should be able to find it

I use the same stuff. Does it have expiration date? My bottle is 4 years old and dosing my new tank with it, I cant seem to get my ammonia to rise. Maybe the skimmer is doing too good of a job. I dont know

 

[Alpha Fishstick]

I tested the water tonight as I do every two days. After 12 days I'm now at:

Ammonia (0.5)
Nitrite (4)
Nitrate (100)

Nitrite and Nitrate have doubled. Should I do a water change now or wait till Ammonia goes down to 0?