Trying to be a productive noob

[Irishman360]

My DT has been cycling for about 2.5 weeks now and my levels have dropped, ammonia is at 0, Nitrite is at .01 and Nitrate is at 10 (Red Sea Kit), so I'm sure my tank will be done cycling towards then end of the week or middle of next week. I plan on ghost feeding the DT to see if it actually completely cycled. My question is that we have a 30 gallon FW tank, would I be able to use the food from the FW to achieve the same results as far as being able to see if my tank levels spike and decline with in 24hrs? How soon could I test to make sure my levels did actually spike?

I also built a 20 gallon high sump that I will be placing a skimmer and refugium in it (pic below). I have it underneath my tank already with a filter sock for the water to flow through it and then water returning up to my DT. My guess is to start adding the skimmer and refugium would be when I start to get fish in there, would I be correct on this? I talked to one of my LFS and they said that when I get a clean up crew I don't necessarily need to have a filtration in place yet because the rock and sand should be able to handle the small bio-load. What are everyone's take on this? Is that all depending on how much CUC I get? I plan on getting 4 snails, 2 shrimp and maybe a crustacean. Is that too small or too big for my DT?

I will start my QT tank once I get the CUC in the DT.

 

[thegrun]

Yes you can use fresh water fish food to feed the bacteria, although I like to use pure ammonia without surfactants to both start a cycle and then test to be sure the bacteria can handle your fish load. If you use pure ammonia add enough to take the ammonia level up to 2ppm. If your cycle is complete the ammonia shod drop back to zero within 24 hours. I would start the skimmer as soon as the cycle is complete but wait until you add fish to introduce macro Algae to the refugium. If you are going to use a filter sock you need to clean it every 3-4 days or it will start to increase your nitrate levels.

 

[Irishman360]

Yes you can use fresh water fish food to feed the bacteria, although I like to use pure ammonia without surfactants to both start a cycle and then test to be sure the bacteria can handle your fish load. If you use pure ammonia add enough to take the ammonia level up to 2ppm. If your cycle is complete the ammonia shod drop back to zero within 24 hours. I would start the skimmer as soon as the cycle is complete but wait until you add fish to introduce macro Algae to the refugium. If you are going to use a filter sock you need to clean it every 3-4 days or it will start to increase your nitrate levels.

Sweet looks like I'll be looking for some ammonia at my LFS next time I go. Is there another mechanic filter I can use besides a sock? Or would it be better to just not use a mechanical filter since I will be using a skimmer and Refugium?

 

[Dkuhlmann]

Your local hardware store is more likely to have the ammonia than the lfs. Even your grocery store "might" have it but I'd first check hardware store.

 

[gone fishin]

I got ammonia at the grocery store in the cleaners section.