Fast cycle?!

[Gryphon]

So I noticed on Wednesday the piece of shrimp (Good size raw piece from Safeway, had to peel it myself) I had placed in my 10gal tank ( I had it inside a media bag) was pretty much a few chunks in the bottom of the bag. So I tested my Ammonia then to get an idea of how the cycle was doing. My Saliferts test showed 0ppm. I left the shrimp chunks in the bag and went on my merry way.

So fast forward to today. I look in while doing my daily top off, there is hardly any shrimp "stuff" left in the bag. I test Ammonia again with the Saliferts...0ppm again. I pull out the API kit I had bought before learning API isn't so good in saltwater. I checked Ammonia, Nitrite and Nitrates and came up with between 0 and 0.25ppm ammonia (just a slight tinge of green to the yellow), same for Nitrites (barest tinge of darker blue than the 0, but not nearly as dark as 0.25) and 80ppm nitrates! :shock:

Holy crap, I think this is the fastest I've ever had a tank cycle ever! The rock has only been in my tank two weeks! Tank has been set up only 2 weeks I know the rock was "live-ish" as I want to say smoknreefr said it had been in the can for a day or two (was finding small brittle stars that hadn't started decaying yet), but it was without heat and pretty cold when I picked it. I would have figured the cold would have killed off the bacteria but maybe not....Even so, I'm still going to wait at least another week with the same measurements before I call it good.

Side note: anyone in the Federal Way area have a small live rock for sale / or borrow (if you don't mind losing a bit of coralline!) covered in purple Coralline? I've heard if you scrub the coralline off in front of a power head it'll spread it all over the place to grow.

 

[Terrance]

to confirm that your tank is cycled, drip a few drops of bottled ammonia and see if the ammonia AND nitrite are 0 (needs to be zero) within 24hrs. ace hardware has a good bottled ammonia without preservative.

 

[wes]

That's a good idea to add some pure ammonia to see what happens. I'll have to remember that for the future.

 

[Gryphon]

I'm just surprised on how much nitrate I had pop up in such a short time!

 

[wes]

I'm just surprised on how much nitrate I had pop up in such a short time!

Right, it can be surprising but two weeks with enough live rock can be enough time for the major cycling to be completed. Nitrate being the end product of the cycle.

 

[Gryphon]

Hmmm oops... What they told me was Ammonium Chloride, ended up being Ammonium Oxide XD

 

[Krish]

With a tank cycling, it all depends on the condition of the live rock you use and also, how much die off you experience. Generally, people say 6-8 weeks, but it is just "generally" speaking. Could be a lot less or a lot longer. Testing as you have been doing tells the tale.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Gryphon]

Ammonium Oxide, ok to use or no?

 

[Gryphon]

Correction, Ammonium Hydroxide