First tank cycle help

  • We are currently upgrading MFK. thanks! -neo
Looks like these guys are giving you great advice. I agree with them, I would not add chemicals either but if you feel you have to.. prime would be the best call. Again I wouldn't. If your doing daily wc def. treat the water before adding it. I'm sure you know this. I treat new water with prime. Just letting the tank run it's course is the best idea. Looks like your on the right path man
 
K thanks everybody. I'm kinda just being impatient(my wife and daughter don't wanna stare at an empty ugly looking tank anymore) lol. I guess I should know that this stuff takes time. I just have never had to cycle a tank before. I was given my 75gal that I have in my sig

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cichlid_king said:
How long does it usually take for the diatoms to take over your tank? Its been 3 days now and I just have some spots on the rock and sand. I thought diatoms take over your tank quickly. Or does that just mean I have a low amount of silicates and phosphate. I also had a hitchiker pop out of the 5lbs of live rock that I bought from my LFS. Its a porcelain crab which I'm pretty excited about

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Your tanks alil' too new to worry about po4 - it's a by-product of the organic decomp stage, once you start feeding fish then you'll get a more accurate idea of how much po4 your tank produces or if using tapwater how much is added to the system. If your not doing stoney coral or ornimental clams po4 will only be an issue regarding the growth rate of algae.

It will take some time for silicates to leach from the sand usually takes about a year or so. Once you see Diatoms die off (turn really dark brown) in the sand your pretty much done with silicates. If you see the diatoms on the glass the issue is po4 not silicates exception being if you use tapwater with high levels of silicates.The obvious answer to both issues is time and r/o waterchanges and top-offs.

When I cycled my 210 the skimmer was off, I wanted the dissolved organics to fuel the B+B growth, the cycle isn't a once and done thing it's an everyday thing. Once I added fish and the tank itself produced the DS I turned on the skimmer. It only takes a day or two to "break in"which is a misleading phrase - it's actually pulling out tons of junk which slows down as the junk reduces. I also had the lights off but didn't have reef lighting at the time - I have the 12 bulb version of your light now - if I had it too again with that light I'd run the LEDS fulltime thru the intial cycle, like was suggested with actinic lights will help coraline growth, but LEDS won't fuel algae or diatoms. Not sure what LEDs you have in the 48" but the 72" has 12x 3w 420/480 LED's.
 
How often should I do a wc in the cycle?

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That's your choice - I just topped off til' nitrates were 40ppm, the longest part of the initial cycle is growing the de-nitrifying (anerobic) bacteria. I didn't want to get ahead of this stage as it comes back to haunt the system if it gets rushed.After 40ppm I started w/c's, did 20% the 1st couple weeks then backed off to 10% - 20% w/c's for me is like 50 gallons.
 
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