Tank Cycle

[The Cat Burglar]

Set up a 5 gallon 7 days ago. 5 kg live rock (2.5kg live rock from LFS and 2.5 kg from my 29g tank 1 year old). I have 5 or 6 lbs of live sand and am running1 X bag of JBL Nitrax, 1X bag of JBL phos-ex and small bag of JBL carbon in the back filter chamber. No livestock in the tank bar a small piece of GSP that was on the rock from my 29g.

I did my first test tonight and got 0 readings for Amonia, Nitrate and Nitrite.Just wondering does this mean my cycle is finished or maybe has it not started yet??

 

[thegrun]

It's hard to predict if you will have a cycle or not. The rock from your established tank may have enough bacteria to prevent a cycle, it really depends if there is much die-off from the LFS rock. My guess is that you will not see a cycle, but it is only a guess.

 

[The Cat Burglar]

I was thinking I might stick a few snails and crabs in to see if they survive, but without a food source to scavenge on I was thinking the crabs might not make it due to starvation so I'm toying with the idea of sticking in a clownfish. I plan on keeping 2 ocellaris and a few LPS and softies. Any comments on this idea would be appreciated.

 

[carrots]

In the past I upgraded from a 20gal to a 55 and moved all the live rock and fish over and to my surprise the tank cycled again. I noticed just in time to save my fish. So IMO keep a close eye on the tank for at least the first couple of weeks.

 

[thegrun]

The safest thing to do would be to dose enough pure ammonia to bring the ammonia level up to 2ppm. If the tank is cycled the ammonia should disappear overnight, if it hasn't cycled simply wait for it to drop back to zero. Use pure ammonia without surfactants (available at most hardware stores, I got mine at Ace Hardware) or perfumes. To be sure the ammonia does not contain surfactants shake the bottle and if it bubbles up like dish soap it has surfactants in it, pure ammonia will not have bubbles. To raise 100 gallons of water from 0 to 2 ppm ammonia you would need to add 0.8 grams (8 ml) of standard 10% pure ammonia.

 

[robertsk]

Here is another interesting question on cycle. Have live rock, live sand, i put in 2 dead shrimps, ammonia went up to 1.2, removed them.
Ammonia level went to 0 on day 10
Nitrites were kinda low (0.2, 0,5, 0,3, 0,2 and 0)
Nitrates 10

Could it be that my cycle has finished in 10 days?

 

[The Cat Burglar]

The safest thing to do would be to dose enough pure ammonia to bring the ammonia level up to 2ppm. If the tank is cycled the ammonia should disappear overnight, if it hasn't cycled simply wait for it to drop back to zero. Use pure ammonia without surfactants (available at most hardware stores, I got mine at Ace Hardware) or perfumes. To be sure the ammonia does not contain surfactants shake the bottle and if it bubbles up like dish soap it has surfactants in it, pure ammonia will not have bubbles. To raise 100 gallons of water from 0 to 2 ppm ammonia you would need to add 0.8 grams (8 ml) of standard 10% pure ammonia.

Cheers I'll look into this method I'm in no rush to have the tank cycled it was just a case that I was expecting to find some readings of either 3 elements after a week of cycling. Below is a picture of the tank ill update when cycle is finished and fish and corals are added. Thank you for the advice.