Ammonia cycle question

becky_e

becky_e

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Apr 21, 2004
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My 45 gallon tank has been up and running since May 6, so that's about 2.5 weeks so far. I just got my test kit in the mail today and my ammonia is very high. I thought that the ammonia spike should've already happened by now and I'm concerned we've done something wrong.

Should we add a small amount of LR or live sand to the tank to get the ammonia-eating bacteria, or is this usually how long it takes?

We have about 4 inches of sand in the bottom of the tank. We used the raw shrimp and I found one in the tank today, hiding very well for a dead shrimp.
 
Oh, I hate it when those dead shrimp come to life again :D

It is perfectly normal to have the high amonia at your time frame. Take a test to see if you have any nitrites as that is the next stage. BTW, It is not uncommon to take 8 weeks to cycle a tank. I have had them take 3 months to get somewhat stable in some instances.
 
OK, I'll try to be patient ;)

I tested the nitrites and they came up to maybe 0.05 mg/L. I hope that means something is starting in that regards.

I feel that these test kits are why I took chemistry in college. It hadn't been useful until now.
 
Oh, I hate it when those dead shrimp come to life again

Actually, one has been incredibly lively. We've had to mess up the tank three times. At first, it was right up agaist the front glass, waving it's spinnerets pretty regularly. Then I adjusted the direction of the powerheads to account for the fact that they are unequal strengths, and it started dancing in the back of the tank (up about 3 inches and back down to the sand bed in graceful circles). Then, when we added some base rock, it wedged itself into the rubble pile I'm setting up for copepods and such. It did each activity for a goodly number of days before switching to the next. :D

I had been somewhat hopeful that the fresh shrimp would have a few marine bacteria still attached, but I guess the grocery washed them... I suppose that should be encouraging. ;)
 
yes, it will help your cycle if you can add either a small amount of live rock or ," even better IMO" a cup or two of sand out of an established tank. The more you add the quicker it can go. Just remember with the live rock that your cycle will kill a lot of the stuff living on it. Don't end up like me with a real quick cycle ," lasted about 3 weeks", and having to buy more live rock to reintroduce all the dead inverts. Ended up taking about 3 more weeks to stabalise after that one so... :rolleyes: didn't speed things up too much after all.
hth
chris
 
We bought a little bit of LR from our LFS. We don't need to worry about killing anything cool on it. I just has the bacteria. They called it Fiji LR, but it really just looked like rock. I hope it helps! We don't have any friends with SW aquariums to get sand from so I guess we'll have to wait!

Thanks for the info and thanks for helping me with my tank worries!
 
Irish Micky,

Becky's tank was completely cycled last week. I was setting up the protien skimmer on it last night. It appears that adding less than a pound of live rock rubble really sped up the process.
 
Looking at the date of your first post I think that I am 3 weeks behind you. I do mine some different. I start the system get the SG, PH correct and all the other parameters. I start the protein skimmer and bio-filter running. Now I added 15 LBS LR and 6 damsels and let it go. 2 to 4 days the ammonia’s jump to max. It will stay there several weeks (3) and then start to fall. To night my ammonia is down to .25 no2 is also coming down. I have lost 3 of the 6 fish but they are cheep. I like them better than shrimp anyway. The LR is starting to grow again, a small clam looking fellow showed up today. I am expecting an algae bloom sometime in the next week. Once the waste levels are down I will add a clean up crew.
What do think? Works for me.
Mike
:D
 
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