[mortman]

HI,

I have had my liverock in my 90 gallon tank for 6
days now. The ammonia level is near 0 tonight
but, the nitrites are off the map. I am also starting
to detect nitrates.

The rock that I got was uncured 135lbs. of it. I guess
that is the reason for the long cycle time.

The first time that I had this system running I also opted
for uncured rock. The only difference was that I first cycled the
tank with damsels. My cycle after putting the rock in that time
only lasted for 3 days. I had all kinds of life crawling out
of the rock after ! week.

This setup has not changed except that I have a DSB this
time instead of a plenum.

What I really want to know is will this extended cycle kill
off my corraline alge??? thanks -------> Mortman

[eses]

It won't bother the corraline algae. It may however kill off anything else alive in the tank, or in the rocks. So if you have any inverts or fish in the tank, they may end up dead.

Also I wouldn't consider 6 days a long cycle time, 6 weeks, or months yes. 6 days, no. It all depends on how "uncured" the live rock was to begin with. The more die off, the longer your cycle.

[dattack]

3 and 6 day cycles! Why are you complaining about that? You must have had little dieoff if it was only 6 days for uncured live rock.

[Ltspd]

6 days is great! Where did you get the LR from?

[mortman]

Thanks for the replies,

To answer your ? The rock came from
FlyingFishexpress. My cycle is not over.
The nitrite level is still at the max reading.
I am however reading more nitrates everyday.
I never thought I'd be wishing for more
nitrates. lol.

mortman

P.S. This site rocks. I am sending this message on
our brand new puter. 2gig cpu, 80gig HD.
500 TI GB. Yipeeeeeeeeeeeee!

[Bojinx]

Glad to see that your new computer is 'in-hand' and set-up. How's the tank doing? That big rock full of Christmas tree worms still alive?

[mortman]

Hey BOJINX,

Good to here from you.
My new rig is up and running.
Awesome dude. I 've been running benchmarks
all day. Overclocked the new graphics card a little.

I'm gunna run a small PLC from one of my comm ports.
This will control all the stuff for my tank. Timing
for the lights, Powerhead switching, auto water/kalk
dosing. I can even monitor some of the chemistry.
o Yeah, and a temp. controller.

I am still reading high levels of nitrites. Am not
sure if the worms will make it.

CYA @ work----------------------------> mortman

[hllywd]

FYI the last batch of Rock I bought took the better part of a month to complete the cycle. 6 days sounds kind of early to me...
Tim

[icemark]

Yes, as everyone is saying 6 days is not sufficent for curing any live rock that has been out of the water for more than 24 hours (i/e shipping from Fiji, then sitting in LAX for a day, then shipped to you).

I would expect at least 2 or 3 weeks as a bare absolute minimum to properly cycle and start a tank, and would not rule out 6 months before everything is fully functional and cycled properly.

I see a lot of newer people on the board lately so I will post my first rule of saltwater:

Nothing good ever happens overnight.

What that means is have patience. Never try and force something. taking short cuts with a tank now will end up with dead animals or worse a few months from now.

[hllywd]

I picked mine from holding tanks at a good sized suplier in Florida late afternoon, helped box the rock,flew back to Ohio the next day and had the stuff back in the water within 24 hrs. I say this because I know the exact time frame and treatment of the rock once I purchased it. The rock I got was "cured" and I felt I was extremely careful with the whole process. Being out of the water (still quite wet the way it was packed) for even the time it was caused a significant die off and a complete curing process that lasted the better part of a month until things started to settle down. I don't know how, if you're mail ordering rock, you could have any better timeline than I accomplished.
To my way of thinking even if you order "cured" rock you cannot avoid the die off and curing process that follows and it will only be worse the more biological stuff on the rock. I probably could have saved myself some big headaches by having a good skimmer at the time but the one I had was really insufficient for the task so I relied on frequent major water changes through the process.
Tim

[mortman]

Hi all,

I never said that I had a 6 day cycle. Only that the ammonia was gone after 6. Today is 3 weeks since putting the rock in. I still have nitrite reading in the midrange of my test kit.

Yesterday, one of the xmas tree worms stuck it's head/butt
out. Not sure which end it was lol. Pure red, I took this as a good sign.

I am doing water changes. 30 % at a time and I'm hoping that these will help.

Thanks for the advice and I will try to be PATIENT.

J Mort.