Hey shifty
Sounds perfectly normal to me too.
As you probably know already, when we set up a new saltwater tank using new saltwater and substrate ..... we have to allow some time to establish bacteria colonies before we can add any fish or other animals.
The live rock has some of those needed bacteria, and could possibly have other living creatures on it ( in it ) as well.
When live rock is shipped, some of the bacteria and creatures/plants die. Not all of them .. but some of them.
Shipped live rock almost always has an odor.
Depending on the length of time it was out of the water, how it was packaged, the surrounding temperature and whether the live rock was cured already, or uncured.
If uncured ... the amount of die off can be substantial and the live rock may stink pretty bad.
If cured ..... then the die off is often quite less, the rock may still have an odor, and often is described as smelling like the ocean.
Stink is a relative term
Adding the live rock to the tank initiates the nitrogen cycle.
It jump starts the entire process.
A text book scenerio would be for the ammonia to shoot up.
When this happens - bacteria begin to feed off of this ammonia.
These bacteria convert the ammonia to nitrite.
Naturally then the nitrite shoots up.
Another group of bacteria will begin to pop up, and start feeding off of this nitrite.
The first group is still processing the ammonia.
The second group is processing the nitrite.
Eventually - after a length of time, much of the ammonia has been converted to nitrite and the ammonia level begins to drop.
Eventually - after a length of time, much of the nitrite has been converted to nitrate, and the nitrite level begins to drop as well.
Eventually - after a length of time, both ammonia and nitrite levels will drop to ZERO.
Then you're left with "some" level of nitrate.
This level of nitrate can be different for each of our tanks.
When ammonia and nitrite are ZERO - you can be sure that there are sufficient colonies of bacteria now in the filtration, crushed coral substrate and live rock - to handle "some" additional ammonia/nitrite.
This is cycling the tank.
These bacteria colonies are still young.
Their numbers have increased dramatically compared to when you first filled up the tank and added the rock, but they are still limited to their numbers until the tank matures.
Adding a single fish after cycling is often recommended - to slowly allow the bacteria populations to continue to reproduce.
Going too fast and adding too many fish at once can create too much ammonia for the new bacteria colonies to handle - and you would see this with your test kit.
Unfortunately - some folks will see the result of this excess ammonia in fish/invert deaths.
Going very slow and adding fish one at a time over the next few months will insure better results and reduce the risk of fish deaths.
I've never run the protein skimmer until after my tanks complete the initial cycle - and I've performed my first series of water changes.
But I have always used cured live rock, or semi-cure it first in a separate tub before adding it to the tank.
If I used uncured live rock, that had a lot of dead sponge material or macro algae - I would probably run the skimmer during the initial cycle. You can pick off some of this dead decaying stuff if you see a lot just sort of hanging there.
The white stuff you see could be a couple of things.
It could be coralline algae, which is normally a pink/purple color - turning white. If it's smooth and covering the rock and doesn't fall off - it may be dead coralline.
If it's white, sort of a hazy loose material, flakes off easily - it could be dead sponges or some other plant life that is dead and decaying. I heard of some people getting some type of "fungus" ( for lack of a better word ) that grows over curing rock.
I've never had this so I don't know for sure.
A pic would be helpful.
I don't run the lights for more than a couple hours a day during a tank cycle either. Some light - but not 8-10 hours.
Good water circulation with powerheads is always a good thing.
Before - during - and after the tank cycles.
