My LR

lecithin

Member
I recently set up my tank and have added approx 45 lbs of LR. There is also 60 lbs of LS in there and 50lbs of base rock. The equipment has been running for a few days now (the skimmer is just hitting its stride).
What do you think of the LR? Most of it is from my LFS's display tanks and as such its fully cured. The other stuff is from their premium LR tank and is in pretty darn good condition as well.
With LR like this is my tank going to cycle? The LR is fully cured and because of that won't the ammonia get switched to nitrite and then to nitrate pretty much on its own? Will I notice the typical spikes I'm supposed to see?
Sorry for the pic quality, my GFs camera isn't quite as nice as mine so the pics have a yellowish hue, I'll take some with mine once I get it back from my mother.
One last note, the camera wouldn't take the pictures well so the pieces pictured are not the best pieces, these are the ones out of the LR tank, not the ones in the display tank. The display ones are covered in coraline algae much like the piece of LR that is closest to the camera in the first pic.



 

mie

Active Member
Looking good, and it will cycle.
If you want to you can toss in a cocktail shrimp to speed the cycle up.
just remove it when you see the spike in your ammonia.
 

lecithin

Member
I have a raw shrimp in there, been in there for three days. What # am I looking for for an ammonia spike?
 

mcbdz

Active Member
with cured lr you may not go that high. Any amm. showing is your cycle. Take shrimp out and watch your levels. When you think it's done ghost feed for at least a week to make sure you are done.
 

lecithin

Member
when I tested yesterday it said ammonia of 1 and nitrite of .05
should the skimmer be off while it cycles? I had it on originally so I could make sure it was working.... now its pulling out disgusting brown juice.
 

mcbdz

Active Member
It really doesn't matter until you are through with the cycle. Just check your levels every couple of days til they go back to 0. Don't let amm. go higher then one so you don't kill off you good critters. Have some water mixing for that change if needed.
 
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