cycling(help)

[farieslayer]

i am cycling the 55 gallons tanks,
about 7 lb of lr
big piece of coral
cc
wet/dry filter
200 watt heater
and lighting
i set up the tank, and put in 1 and half shrimp(the one people eat), and the next day, the ammonia and nitrite go up to .25 ppm, is it usual that nitrite go up with the ammonia? or the ammonia go up big and then nitrite go up?

 

[farieslayer]

ohhh, thanks, we tested right after we put in the lr, do we need to remove the shrimp, or just leave it to decay? the shrimp size is about the cap of the pen.

 

[jastim]

If your tests are valid then I would suspect that the ammonia spike was caused by some die off from the live rock and the shrimp you put in your tank. Your live rock (as long as it is in good condition) is ready as a bio-filter from the start. Therefore, once the ammonia was produced an adequate number of microbes were present in the live rock to convert the ammonia to nitrite. There would not have been enough time for that to happen in your wet/dry media. In a way the live rock may slow down the build up of bacteria in your wet/dry media. If your live rock is doing the bio-conversion it leaves less "food"/ammonia for bacteria to build in your wet/dry media. 7lbs is a very small amount, however.

 

[fshhub]

the ammonia spike is normal, and it should go much higher, unless, your lr has cycled the tank(and that little bit, may not have, unless it was in a while), but the typical cycle will go:
ammonia spikes and peaks, then starts to fall, while it is coming cown, the nitrites will rise, then peak and start to fall, then the nitrates will rise, and so on, until the ammonia and nitrites both reach zero, you are not cone cycling, then your trates will also fall, but they may not go to zero right away, at this point is when i woudl do a small water change, and start the skimmer, while making my final deision on specimens and start to shop(don't buy them all at once, you should stock slowly, over months or more)
<a href="http://home.gardenet.co.za/landman/Starting%20with%20Marines.htm" target="_blank">read this article</a>, there is a section, just on cycling, near the end of that page(in the link i have provided), it may help to explain it better
HTH

 

[farieslayer]

fshhub i did read that article u gave me yesterday. hehe, i was just asking is it normal to have both ammonia and nitrite go up at the same time.(baron vonklyff) answered my question. the other question i askingdo i need to remove the shrimp that i put to get ammonia up or just leave it to decay and go away?
did i making people confusing????

 

[fshhub]

normally the trites will go up once th ammonia starts to fall, but you may show some until then, i did misunderstand, i thought you said ammonia went up and the trites did't, normally it is one spikes, then the other(i believe ours showed some trites while the ammonia spiked, but not much), as for the shrimp, i would let it in, at least until after the ammonia comes down

 

[farieslayer]

thanks very much all for the info. <img src="graemlins//silly.gif" border="0" alt="[silly]" />