Help! HARD CYCLE!

bonebrake

bonebrake

Active Member
:help:
I am on day 16 of my cycle. I began with 40 lbs. of live rock in a 24 gal. tank. The live rock was held up in shipping and spent 7 days out of water. It was still damp when it arrived and did not stink. I scrubbed it and placed it in the tank. Since day 1 the ammonia has been off the chart greater than 5.0 ppm. Yesterday (day 15) nitrites and nitrates appeared simultaneously with nitrites being off the chart greater than 1.0 ppm and nitrates registering at 15.0 ppm. Today, day 16, ammonia is still off the chart greater than 5.0 ppm, nitrites are off the chart greater than 1.0 ppm, and nitrates are off the chart greater than 250 ppm!
:scared:
Amazingly the denitrifying bacteria surrived the high ammonia, but for nitrates to increase 20 fold over night and to still have all levels off the chart my live rock must have some serious die off.
What should I do?!
Parameters:
Salinity 1.0255 (Red Sea Salt with distilled water)
Temp. 82.0 degrees F
pH 8.3
Alk 3.2 meq/L
ammonia > 5.0 ppm
nitrite > 1.0 ppm
nitrate > 250 ppm
calcium 450 ppm
phosphate 0.1 ppm
:help:
 
birdy

birdy

Active Member
you have a couple choices
1. do nothing, eventually it will all come down to normal levels, running your skimmer may help.
2. Start doing water changes, this will bring your levels to more normal condition, this will not prolong or upset you cycle even though many on this board will tell it it will (I have done it both ways and I will tell you it doesn't), It does cost more money but you will be saving more life on the rock (although if your ammonia levels were as high as you said it may be a moot point anyway).
If it were me I would do 20% water changes every three days or so until the levels come down to normal.
Also- do not worry about pH, alk and Ca during the cycle these will get all screwy typically but will normalize after the cycle and the water changes.
 
J

jdragunas

Guest
i agree 100% with birdy. It would actually reduce the time of your cycle if you did water changes.
 
buzzword

buzzword

Member
I will agree with Birdy and jd. I thought that doing water changes would prolong your cycle as well until Bang Guy set me straight. Change the water and preserve your micro organisms.
 
bonebrake

bonebrake

Active Member
One last question: should I rescrub the rocks when I do the water change? They have a pretty good covering of diatom brown algae as well as the sand.
 
birdy

birdy

Active Member
I wouldn't worry about scrubbing them, but you can take the end of your siphon hose and suck some of the junk off the rocks.
 
pfitz44

pfitz44

Active Member
OOOO!!! me too!!!! i did the same... just syphoned it off my cc... i lef --- on my rocks for my crabs and snails to eat
 
bonebrake

bonebrake

Active Member
Here is an update folks.
Today, day 18, I performed a 15 gallon water change (~60%) to get the concentrations of nitrogenous compounds lower. Here is the new readout:
Salinity: 1.0255
Temp: 79.0
Ammonia: 0.5 ppm
Nitrite: 1.0 ppm
Nitrate 100.0 ppm
Will the nitrates go down by any natural means? Or do I need to add some sort of plant material? I do not have a deep sand bed or a refugium yet.
Thanks again for all of your help!
:joy:
 
J

jdragunas

Guest
nitrates only reduce on their own in a DSB. The DSB provides and oxygen-deprived area for the anaerobic bacteria (that changes nitrates to nitrogen gas) to grow. The only other way to lower nitrates is to do water changes.
 
J

jdragunas

Guest
or just one really big one... but i would do it in a bunch of little ones to be on the safe side...
 
birdy

birdy

Active Member
As the cycle ends the nitrates will go down on their own some, you will probably be left with something around 40. Water changes, a refugium with macro algae (you remove the algae you remove the nitrates), a DSB and LR will all convert nitrates.
My personal fave for nitrate removal is the refugium with macro algae.
 
oozy

oozy

Member
I agree, with the agreeing to agree to do nothing.
this is your cycle, this is what happens post stocking.
no worries!
-oozy-
 
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