Cycling for life!

[spanko]

A good number of posts that have to do with cycling are mostly concerned with things like “how can I start my cycle”, “Is my cycle over”, “I am reading nitrites and nitrates but never saw ammonia”, and a myriad of other questions related to the initial set up of a bio filtering system. While knowledge of what, why and how cycling is important, there are some other considerations that should go along with the set up of a new marine aquarium.
First what is cycling? “The nitrogen cycle of an aquarium is a chain reaction in nature resulting in the birth of various types of nitrifying and denitrifying bacteria, each with their own job to do. The three components involved to make this happen are ammonia (NH³ or NH³+4), nitrite (NO²), and nitrate (NO³). In general the nitrogen cycling process usually takes about 30 days, but there is no exact time frame for this process to complete its task, as each aquarium is different. Factors such as how many fish, other livestock, and organic matter is present in the tank can vary the completion time, one way or the other. Testing your aquarium water during cycling is very important, as this will tell you what phase the aquarium is in at any given time throughout the process.”
Okay so academia has told us what the cycle is. We will not get into the details of this anymore than that for this discussion. What is important to note however are the statements “Factors such as how many fish, other livestock, and organic matter is present in the tank can vary the completion time, one way or the other. Testing your aquarium water during cycling is very important, as this will tell you what phase the aquarium is in at any given time throughout the process.”
So what we will discuss here is the source of that organic matter and the actual process that we follow in cycling an aquarium. All inclusive, probably not, but at least a basis from which to make some decisions. So let’s start off with;

 

[spanko]

HARD CYCLING
If there is a standard in cycling a marine tank this is probably it. Get a glass box, put in some substrate, rockwork if you desire, saltwater and throw in a source of organic matter. This organic matter can range from live rock, fish, fish food, cocktail shrimp, ammonia, all the way up to someone urinating in the tank. (Please don’t pee in your tank) After the organic matter has been introduced the aquarist is advised to perform ammonia and nitrite testing to watch for the “cycle”. No filtering, no water changes, no skimmer, no lights, just let it rip. Without regard to the levels of ammonia or nitrite reached the aquarist was told that once the ammonia and nitrite spiked then went back to zero, low and behold your cycle is complete. Do a water change and begin to add critters, usually a small cleanup crew and over the course of the next few weeks they could start to add fish and or corals all the while watching for ammonia to spike again. If it did spike there were of course certain reactions that were needed along with the verbal abuse that sometimes came along with doing things too soon.
Over the history of starting a marine tank it became unpopular to use fish as the source of the organic matter because of the toxic or deadly levels of ammonia that occur in the tank during the cycle. Certainly this was inhumane and torturous to said fish and of course the bashing of new people for using fish began, even though this was the norm in the beginning. After a time It became common knowledge that there was in fact enough of the organic matter needed on live rock to facilitate the cycling process. This led to live rock becoming the standard by which most new people are instructed to start their tanks with.
So capitalism being what it is, retailers dealing in pet supplies see the opportunity here and start to get in large orders of rock from the ocean. Then in an effort to “help” the new aquarist along they begin to sell differing qualities of live rock. Where it comes from does not matter for this discussion but the fact is that you can purchase uncured live rock for one price and cured live rock for another higher price. The difference here being that the uncured live rock is “straight from the ocean, boxed up and shipped to the retailer and available to the aquarist fresh from the ocean water”. Then for some additional cost the retailer will perform some magic to the rock called curing. This entails the retailer keeping the live rock in bins at their facility, cleaning the rock of any decayed matter that has accumulated from the source through the delivery, water changes etc. etc. etc. so that the aquarist gets pure rock with no nasty die-off that may cause an ammonia spike in their tanks. This cured rock has the nitrifying and denitrifying bacteria already in place and can be used in a new setup as a ready to …..um……rock (hee hee) addition to the tank. Of course there is always some amount of die-off even in cured rock that will continue to deteriorate and produce ammonia, however there may be enough bacteria on the rock itself to take care of it. The only thing, in theory, that the aquarist needs to be concerned about is the additional bio load heshe puts into the tank and the subsequent increase in bacteria needed to convert it. All good, all nice using cured rock should help to reduce the amount of time that is necessary to have an up and running marine tank. We’ll just leave it like that for now. So on to the;

 

[spanko]

SOFT CYCLE
Now let’s talk a little about uncured rock. Rock taken right from the ocean, whether from an established reef or from an area that has had dry rock dropped into it with the goal of establishing it as live rock. This uncured rock comes to the retailer fresh from the ocean and is then shipped to local fish stores or in some cases direct to the aquarist with all of the life and the subsequent death on it. Some fish stores may turn it into cured rock hoping to get the higher price that cured rock demands. Or they may sell it as uncured rock. Some aquarists may put it directly into their aquarium to “cycle with” or they may cure it outside of the tank so that they can use it later. Some may cure or use it to cycle their tanks as noted above in a hard cycle where no consideration is given to how high the ammonia and nitrites get. This hard cycle kills off some if not most of the life on the rock they paid a premium to get. Remember it is less costly than cured live rock, however it is more expensive than dry rock that can be used in our tanks and just seeded with a pc. or two of live rock.
Soft cycling is a method by which the attempt is to retain as much life as possible on the nice live rock you paid a premium for. It starts the same as a hard cycle, get a glass box, add some substrate if desired, add the live rock and the saltwater. Here is where things change though. During a soft cycle the aquarist is advised to run the filters, skimmers, lights. Heshe is also to monitor ammonia on a daily if not twice per day basis and if the ammonia is shown to rise to a reading of .5 they are to immediately perform a water change. And every time thereafter when they see a reading of ammonia at .5 boom, another water change. Keep the skimmer cup emptied, Keep the filter floss, pads etc clean. Do everything they can to keep ammonia below that magic .5 reading. Because you see. Live rock contains ….. er…..well…..life. And in a soft cycle we are trying are hardest to keep that life……um……live! You would be amazed at the life that will flourish under these conditions. Sponges, feather dusters, snails, plant, corals, worms, pods etc. etc. etc. all of the things that we are trying to replicate in our small glass boxes. All for a little more work and a little more expense, to get closer to a small system that more resembles the ocean that it originated in.
Soft cycling is not for everyone. Some of us require a more antiseptic looking reef tank. But for those of us that wish to observe life as it exists, both the good and the bad, soft cycling may be something that you want to look into on your next, or even first setup.
Thank you for reading, I hope I have given some a little information to think about.

 

[pezenfuego]

This is great. I love this. I definitely recommend soft cycling. For freshwater tanks, hard cycling is better. The only thing you should be concerned about when cycling a freshwater tank, is the bacteria...which thrive on ammonia and nitrites.
This hole thread might be a tad confusing for the newbies, but once they read up on the nitrogen cycle, this is the thing that I will be linking them too. Excellent.

 

[uneverno]

It never occured to me to pee in my tank. Won't that add phosphates - humans are loaded w/ that stuff?

Seriously though - excellent post.

 

[pezenfuego]

Originally Posted by uneverno
http:///forum/post/3000861
It never occured to me to pee in my tank. Won't that add phosphates - humans are loaded w/ that stuff?

Seriously though - excellent post.

It will add ammonia and WILL start a cycle. However like you said who knows what else you are adding to your tank when you do it.
I tried to do a test by cycling a freshwater tank with my urine...but I lack the control to urinate in a teaspoon.

 

[soulsigma]

Originally Posted by PEZenfuego
http:///forum/post/3000872
It will add ammonia and WILL start a cycle. However like you said who knows what else you are adding to your tank when you do it.
I tried to do a test by cycling a freshwater tank with my urine...but I lack the control to urinate in a teaspoon.

 

[fishkid13]

Originally Posted by soulsigma
http:///forum/post/3001018

 

[posiden]

Originally Posted by PEZenfuego
http:///forum/post/3000872
It will add ammonia and WILL start a cycle. However like you said who knows what else you are adding to your tank when you do it.
I tried to do a test by cycling a freshwater tank with my urine...but I lack the control to urinate in a teaspoon.

Rookie.

 

[salt210]

nice info

 

[socal57che]

This deserves a sticky. Nice job, Henry.

 

[crabbychris]

OK, you all will probably think I am crazy but i have now cycled 3 tanks by urinating in them. Never had a problem but who know maybe my urine is just that clean LOL. I believe the best method is to add LR and sand run all of your stuff and cycle with fish food to get a quick ammonia spike and then do water changes to try and keep the ammonia under .50 ppm. I will never cure LR in a bucket because it kills everything. Not really LR anymore.
Good info! Good job!

 

[sntid241]

I'm one of the new people who might get confused. ( and that was before the urine talk

)
I'm not confused about the cycle, it is the LR that gets me.
Is "cured" LR meant to be used in established tanks, and "uncured" in new setups?
If I am setting up a new tank (soft cycle), should I get "uncured" LR, give it a quick scrub and rinse in SW when I get it, then arrange it in my new tank. Treat the tank as if it was already mature, housing fish run filters, water changes as mentioned above). This will "cure" the rock, and establish the cycle.
Is the the only benefit to "cured" live rock in a new tank a shorter cycle time?

 

[reeftanker84]

no that will not work you use the cured rock to soft cycle with pumps and lights and skimmers,not the uncured, do not add any fish or critters as your tank will go threw a cycle unless you have an existing tank that already has cured rock for more then one month at least

 

[tfolke1]

Originally Posted by sntid241
http:///forum/post/3023074
I'm one of the new people who might get confused. ( and that was before the urine talk

)
I'm not confused about the cycle, it is the LR that gets me.
Is "cured" LR meant to be used in established tanks, and "uncured" in new setups?
If I am setting up a new tank (soft cycle), should I get "uncured" LR, give it a quick scrub and rinse in SW when I get it, then arrange it in my new tank. Treat the tank as if it was already mature, housing fish run filters, water changes as mentioned above). This will "cure" the rock, and establish the cycle.
Is the the only benefit to "cured" live rock in a new tank a shorter cycle time?

I actually think that a soft cycle would take longer than a hard cycle to prepare a new aquarium to handle fish.
By Changing the water out and working to keep the ammonia levels under control, you are trying to save any live that may have come in on your uncured rock. But you are doing so at the expense of the 2nd and third stages of the cycle. If you remove ammonia via waterchanges, you are taking food away from the bacteria that break ammonia down into Nitrites and Nitrates. These are the same bacteria that you are trying to establish. The goal afterall is to end up with a system that is capable of handling all the waste products from the animals that you put into it. In order for this to occur, you need to let the food cycle all the way down the chain, you can't cheat and remove it in the middle. Soft Cycling will allow for the build up of some of the bacteria, but it may not provide enough to handle all the waste that your chosen livestock will produce. No matter what method you use to cycle, you need to add livestock slowly so that the tank can build up the capacity to handle the increased waste without spiking.
And I've never done a soft cycle, but I wouldn't add any fish to a soft cycle until I was certain that the cycle was completed. Then slowly add livestock so that the capacity of the system increases.
The big difference between Cured and uncured rock is with cured rock, the beneficial bacteria have had a chance to catch up to the amount of death that resulted from the rock being taken out of the water, packed in wet towels, mud, newspaper, a bucket of water etc. and shipped either 2 blocks in the back of your car, or 2 days on a jet, or 1 week on a cargo ship.
Anytime you take that rock out of the water, something is going to die. It may not be big enough for you to see, but something is going to expire.
Uncured rock will not have enough beneficial bacteria to counter its own death, but if it was shipped fast enough, it may have unique life left on it from the ocean. If you work your butt off and try and soft cycle it, you may be able to save some of it.
Cured Rock may have enough bacteria to balance out its own death. Any unique life that survived the cycle has most likely been sold by the LFS.
Very Cured rock, or rock in an established tank, will have enough bacteria to balance out its own death, plus help overcome some of the ammonia created by your livestock.
It is not recommended to put uncured rock into an established aquarium because it is basically full of death from the shipping process. If your tank does not have enough bacteria to absorb the resulting ammonia, the levels in your water will spike and possible cause the death of your livestock.

 

[spanko]

Originally Posted by tfolke1
http:///forum/post/3029218
I actually think that a soft cycle would take longer than a hard cycle to prepare a new aquarium to handle fish.I am not really sure this is a true statement, only because the bacteria will colonize to the available nutrient level of the tank. If you take into account that at the end of the "cycle" without any additional bioload you would actually have bacteria dieing off because of available nutrient and balancing to the tank. By removing the part of the ammonia source you are not stopping colonization, as long as ammonia exists it needs bacteria to convert it. Take it a step further and you may actually be hastening the cycle as you dilute the ammonia to it's "end point" when the die off has been "completed".
By Changing the water out and working to keep the ammonia levels under control, you are trying to save any live that may have come in on your uncured rock. But you are doing so at the expense of the 2nd and third stages of the cycle. Again with the statement above the bacteria will balance to the "end point" nutrient available. As long as there is nitrite and nitrate in the water the bacteria eill colonize to what is available and die off in necessary when there is not enough. If you remove ammonia via water changes, you are taking food away from the bacteria that break ammonia down into Nitrites and Nitrates. These are the same bacteria that you are trying to establish. The goal after all is to end up with a system that is capable of handling all the waste products from the animals that you put into it. In order for this to occur, you need to let the food cycle all the way down the chain, you can't cheat and remove it in the middle. Soft Cycling will allow for the build up of some of the bacteria, but it may not provide enough to handle all the waste that your chosen livestock will produce. This is correct and your nitrifying bacteria will wax and wane with the nutrient available to it. Wen you add a critter to your "cycled" tank there is not enough bacteria to handle the additional bio load and new bacteria must be added to the colony. This is one of the reasons it is important not to add too many things at once, if you do you will overburden the colony and cause a spike that could be in fact detrimental to the tank. You said this in your next sentence but it also applys to your previous statements. No matter what method you use to cycle, you need to add livestock slowly so that the tank can build up the capacity to handle the increased waste without spiking.
And I've never done a soft cycle, but I wouldn't add any fish to a soft cycle until I was certain that the cycle was completed. Then slowly add livestock so that the capacity of the system increases.

The big difference between Cured and uncured rock is with cured rock, the beneficial bacteria have had a chance to catch up to the amount of death that resulted from the rock being taken out of the water, packed in wet towels, mud, newspaper, a bucket of water etc. and shipped either 2 blocks in the back of your car, or 2 days on a jet, or 1 week on a cargo ship.
Anytime you take that rock out of the water, something is going to die. It may not be big enough for you to see, but something is going to expire.
Uncured rock will not have enough beneficial bacteria to counter its own death, but if it was shipped fast enough, it may have unique life left on it from the ocean. If you work your butt off and try and soft cycle it, you may be able to save some of it.
Cured Rock may have enough bacteria to balance out its own death. Any unique life that survived the cycle has most likely been sold by the LFS.If that life is large enough to been seen and removed. I would suggest that a lot of life will come out afterwards if it is not killed during cycling.
Very Cured rock, or rock in an established tank, will have enough bacteria to balance out its own death, plus help overcome some of the ammonia created by your livestock.It will not have enough to overcome some of the ammonia created by your livestock, only what is available to it. It will need to adjust to the new environment.
It is not recommended to put uncured rock into an established aquarium because it is basically full of death from the shipping process.True that! If your tank does not have enough bacteria to absorb the resulting ammonia, the levels in your water will spike and possible cause the death of your livestock.
Thank you for joining in the discussion tfolke1 and resurrecting this thread. I truly enjoy these types of banter back and forth.

 

[sntid241]

Thanks, This is great information

, cycling for marine is a bit more involved then FW (which I am used to). I really love using live rock, it is really neat seeing all the little "critters" that come with it. Almost as interesting as the fish themselves.

 

[tfolke1]

Originally Posted by spanko
http:///forum/post/3029713
Thank you for joining in the discussion tfolke1 and resurrecting this thread. I truly enjoy these types of banter back and forth.
Hey glad to chime in. Although I feel like I'm back in school with all the red text on my Essay

It is merely my opinion that a hard cycle will leave you with a higher quantity of benefitial bacteria than a soft cycle. And obviously you need to closely monitor each to get the livestock added before the newly grown bacteria depletes the available ammonia and causes its own population to drop as a result. I picture the Bacteria levels Yo-Yoing up and down until they come back into balance each time a new creature is added.
I do firmly believe that for most beginners, they should just buy cured rock from the LFS, and then treat it like Uncured Rock and do it the slow way anyway. So many people seem to rush thru it and kill livestock as a result. They Read the posts, interpret them to mean whatever suites their purposes, go too fast, let advice from their LFS override everything that they have learned and then post their confusion when stuff dies. Then they blame the LFS that may or may not have sold them a less than healthy fish.
I probably would have done the same thing, but I got sent out of town by work for a month shortly after my Rock arrived. By the time that I got back, I had no Idea what the cycle had done, but all my levels where reading great. The tank was cycled, but it still did not have the capacity to support a lot of livestock. Both of the Domino Damsels that I had bought before I knew better had survived. I decided that I wanted more rock and ordered another batch. The Knucklehead at work signed for it even though somebody had put forks thru the styrofoam shipping container. The rock was dry, dead, and deadly. I cleaned it up as best I could and added it to the tank because now I was in a hurry because I lost a month to work. One of the Damsels survived this process, one did not. I knew better, but I did it anyway. Although I will admit that at that point, I had read probably 250 posts about how nasty Damsels where and what a pain it was to get rid of them. There were no tears shed when it didn't make it.
its a hobby that requires a lot of learning, and its a lot more affordable if you have the ability to learn from the mistakes of others.

 

[spanko]

Well said!

 

[nissan577]

reading this henry is such great info bro! great job! this one is bookmark!