Cycling oddities

[FishAddict74]

Hi, just curious if anyone knows why ponds cycle so funky.
Here’s what I mean. I recently set up a 59x40x24” stock tank pond and I seeded it with lots of established media from a few of my other large-ish tanks. I have a 13” Midas, 15” spotted gar, and a 9” bala. The ammonia is bouncing around from .25 to .5. Nitrites are doing the same. No nitrates It’s been up for a 3 weeks. I’ve used this same method on many traditional aquariums ranging from 2g-180g without even a hint of a cycle. A friend of mine with a couple of large ponds said he experienced this same phenomenon with ponds as well.
The fish are fine since I’m keeping it detoxified with prime, but does anyone know what’s different about ponds that the seeding doesn’t work as well?
Here’s a pic of the filter I’m using,there’s a ton of media in the box from a couple of FX2s that have been running on heavily stocked tanks for quite a while.

 

[TwoTankAmin]

It is the sun. The nitrifying bacteria are somewhat photophobic and they prefer to be where things are darker. Here are Dr. Hovanec's directions for doing a fishless cycle using his bacteria which are actually the ones we want in out tanks and ponds.

Day 1 – dose ammonia to 2 ppm ammonia-nitrogen [NH3-N] using our ammonium chloride (1 drop per gallon [After Nov 2016 when using Dr. Tim’s ammonium chloride use 4 drops per gallon]) [NOTE: do not expect your test kit to exactly read 2 ppm and it is not critical to get exactly 2 ppm. The key is to not add too much ammonia]. If using DrTim’s Aquatics One & Only Live Nitrifying bacteria add it now (turn skimmer, UV and ozone off and remove filter socks for 48 hours).

I think the sun shines UV into the pond as well as light.

I do a lot of cycling though not in ponds which I do not have. I usually have to cycle a number of tanks at the same time. But I do not cycle tanks, I cycle filters in a bio-farm I set up for that purpose. I then dose lots of ammonia in a controlled way and I also have to add a bag or two of crushed coral. The bacteria need inorganic carbon which mean carbonates and bicarbonates. In tanks these are what makes up KH. The bacteria can also use CO2. So to jump start the bio-farm I add both Dr. Tim's One and Only and I also squeeze/rinse filter media from established tanks into the bio-farm. I black-out the bio-farm for the next 24 hours. This allows the bacteria to settle into substrate (if you have any) and to be sucked into the filter media. There they attach themselves out of the light.

So I would suggest there could be two things slowing your cycle- UV and light from the sun and then you may not have sufficient KH, so test for that also.

One thing that would help would be to add the bacteria/filter squeezing to the pond close to sunset. That would give the bacteria some time out of the light to colonize. Even better would be to cover the pond to keep out light so the pond is dark for at least a day after you seed it.

Also, Dr, Hovanec has bacteria specifically for fresh water, salt water, brackish water and ponds. Each product is designed for a specific type of water including ponds.

Also, some dechlors will detoxify ammonia by converting it to ammonium, this will make cycling go more slowly as the bacteria can not use ammonium as efficiently as ammonia.

 

[FishAddict74]

It is the sun. The nitrifying bacteria are somewhat photophobic and they prefer to be where things are darker. Here are Dr. Hovanec's directions for doing a fishless cycle using his bacteria which are actually the ones we want in out tanks and ponds.



I think the sun shines UV into the pond as well as light.

I do a lot of cycling though not in ponds which I do not have. I usually have to cycle a number of tanks at the same time. But I do not cycle tanks, I cycle filters in a bio-farm I set up for that purpose. I then dose lots of ammonia in a controlled way and I also have to add a bag or two of crushed coral. The bacteria need inorganic carbon which mean carbonates and bicarbonates. In tanks these are what makes up KH. The bacteria can also use CO2. So to jump start the bio-farm I add both Dr. Tim's One and Only and I also squeeze/rinse filter media from established tanks into the bio-farm. I black-out the bio-farm for the next 24 hours. This allows the bacteria to settle into substrate (if you have any) and to be sucked into the filter media. There they attach themselves out of the light.

So I would suggest there could be two things slowing your cycle- UV and light from the sun and then you may not have sufficient KH, so test for that also.

One thing that would help would be to add the bacteria/filter squeezing to the pond close to sunset. That would give the bacteria some time out of the light to colonize. Even better would be to cover the pond to keep out light so the pond is dark for at least a day after you seed it.

Also, Dr, Hovanec has bacteria specifically for fresh water, salt water, brackish water and ponds. Each product is designed for a specific type of water including ponds.

Also, some dechlors will detoxify ammonia by converting it to ammonium, this will make cycling go more slowly as the bacteria can not use ammonium as efficiently as ammonia.

Thanks for the detailed explanation, I like the the farming idea, I might have to give that a shot.
But my bad, I should have mentioned my pond is indoors-in the garage - and it’s pretty dark and I’m running a very dim light on the pond. I’ll try to find a KH test, I’ve never tested that.

 

[FishAddict74]

Well, this pond still isn’t cycled. I’m still reading 3-ish ppm ammonia and very low nitrites and zero nitrates. This is bizarre, especially since I seeded it heavily. It’s an indoor pond. It’s been up about 8 weeks now. I’m using Seachem safe to keep things from being toxic but I’m at a loss, I’ve never seen this happen in all my years. Any ideas?

 

[TwoTankAmin]

I think your "pond" is close to 245 gallons. The fish you have in it at this early stage are too big and are creating ammonia too fast. Here is what Dr. Hovanec who created the One and Only Nitrifying Bacteria products says about cycling ponds,

DrTim's Aquatics Koi products are designed with koi and koi owners in mind. Product formulations take into account the fact that most ponds have heavier bio-loads and organic levels than tropical aquaria.

Furthermore, ponds are subject to a wide range of environmental variables that can affect fish health and water quality. The DrTim's Aquatics product line allows one to easily and successfully set up a koi pond and maintain the highest possible water quality to ensure a safe environment for all aquatic creatures.

For your pond he would suggest using a 16 oz bottle of his bacteria. This is a product I have used with great success over 2 decades. I highly doubt the amount of bacteria you added was enough for the ammonia output of the fish.

I would have suggested at the outset that you set things up with no fish. I would then have added enough ammonium chloride to produce 3 ppm of ammonia and then tested from there. Unless the tank tested 0/0 for ammonia and nitrite after 24 hours, the pond was not ready for the fish load you added. In that case I would have done a mini-fishless cycle to reproduce the bacteria to numbers to where they could pass the dose and test described.

And here is what Dr. Him says about using dechlors which detoxify ammonia like Prime,

7. Overdosing with Ammonia-Removing Chemicals - It makes little sense to add an ammonia-removing chemical to your aquarium water when you are then going to add ammonium chloride drops. So don’t! Just use a ‘simple’ dechlorinating agent like our First Defense to remove any chloramines or chlorine. Some popular brands of ammonia-removers advertise that they do not affect the nitrifying bacteria even at high doses - this is wrong. The overuse of ammonia-removing chemicals will stall the cycle.

 

[FishAddict74]

I think your "pond" is close to 245 gallons. The fish you have in it at this early stage are too big and are creating ammonia too fast. Here is what Dr. Hovanec who created the One and Only Nitrifying Bacteria products says about cycling ponds,



For your pond he would suggest using a 16 oz bottle of his bacteria. This is a product I have used with great success over 2 decades. I highly doubt the amount of bacteria you added was enough for the ammonia output of the fish.

I would have suggested at the outset that you set things up with no fish. I would then have added enough ammonium chloride to produce 3 ppm of ammonia and then tested from there. Unless the tank tested 0/0 for ammonia and nitrite after 24 hours, the pond was not ready for the fish load you added. In that case I would have done a mini-fishless cycle to reproduce the bacteria to numbers to where they could pass the dose and test described.

And here is what Dr. Him says about using dechlors which detoxify ammonia like Prime,

Thanks, I’ll definitely look into that product tonight. I was actually thinking ammonia may be being produced too quickly. The media I used to seed it came from a heavily stocked mbuna tank and figured that along with bottled bacteria would be enough, but I’d probably do things differently looking back.
So tge Seachem maybe stalling the cycle? Weird, I always thought it bonded to ammonia to make it nontoxic, not remove it.
Hopefuly that Dr Tim’s works, I’m spending a small fortune on prime/safe lol

 

[FishAddict74]

I think your "pond" is close to 245 gallons. The fish you have in it at this early stage are too big and are creating ammonia too fast. Here is what Dr. Hovanec who created the One and Only Nitrifying Bacteria products says about cycling ponds,



For your pond he would suggest using a 16 oz bottle of his bacteria. This is a product I have used with great success over 2 decades. I highly doubt the amount of bacteria you added was enough for the ammonia output of the fish.

I would have suggested at the outset that you set things up with no fish. I would then have added enough ammonium chloride to produce 3 ppm of ammonia and then tested from there. Unless the tank tested 0/0 for ammonia and nitrite after 24 hours, the pond was not ready for the fish load you added. In that case I would have done a mini-fishless cycle to reproduce the bacteria to numbers to where they could pass the dose and test described.

And here is what Dr. Him says about using dechlors which detoxify ammonia like Prime,

Well it’s finally starting to get near the end of the cycle. Thanks for all the info!