Well I had to open my big mouth...

[nubomb]

Just the other day I was saying I haven't had this so called new tank syndrome problem yet. Well today I noticed the start of a brown algea out break. My tank has been cycling for almost a month now with live rock. My levels are all good, indicating I'm finished with the cycle (Ammonia - 0, Nitirite - 0, Nitrate ~10, pH 8.0-8.2, Alk 8-10dKH).

Should I do a water change now and introduce a small cleanup crew for a FOWLR tank?

MY other concern is that just two days ago I added another piece of live rock (10 lbs) from my LFS, only 10 minutes away and introduced it to the tank right away. Absolutely no change in my water parameters. I also had a very small intial cycle ~20 lbs LR (extremly small spike in ammonia/nitrite). Is my tank just kicking ***, did I get great cured live rock, or are my test kits playing games with me? I must be abnormal, I'm dissapointed I have no traces of ammonia/nitrite.

 

[Andrew]

Brown algae is common in new tanks. I wouldn't add a clean up crew until you have added fish and they have something to clean up. You may have restarted your cycle but it shouldn't take that long for your water to back to normal and your cycle to be complete. Your test kits should be fine and giving you pretty good readings. Just keep on testing your water and keeping an eye on it.

 

[NeilPearson]

I think it is quite common to never see any ammonia with fully cured live rock that hasn't been out of the water very long. It sounds like the rock was only out of water maybe 1/2 hour. If it was pretty clean and cured at the lfs, I wouldn't expect much of a cycle.

You generally see much bigger cycles from the live rock ordered online that has been out of water for days.