[bguile]

Ok. Help me to understand. In this postWhen can I add fish? , Scott recommended that the user cycle the tank using raw shrimp from the grocery store to cycle the tank. Two questions arise for me in understanding the hobby more.
1. When you place the shrimp in the tank, do you leave it there until it disappears from decay? Or is it removed once your ammonia levels have receded?

2. When I setup my tank I got LR that was partialy cured. So I let it cure in a 5 gallon bucket until the ammonia levels went down THEN placed it in my tank that already had fresh saltwater in it (none of the curing SW was placed in the tank). I waited two weeks to make sure all parameters were settled before I placed my clowns in it. Does this mean that my tank was not properly cycled to promote healthy bacterial growth? Could this had been the reason for my algae problems?

[Meric]

Is there anything living (Fish, Corals) in the tank now or is there just live rock?

If you are going to cycle the tank new and all you have in there is just live rock. Put (3) or (4) whole shrimp in the tank and do nothing until they dissolve to powder.

If you already have fish in the tank do not put the shrimp in there as it will probally overload the tank and kill the fish.

To be honest if you have cured live rock in a 90 Gallon tank and all you have is just one small clown fish it should not be to large of a bio load on the tank. You might just want to watch your water paramenters and wait several weeks before adding the next fish instead of trying to start all over again.

[bguile]

Thanks for the reply Meric. I just have a 12g Nano cube with 2 clowns and have just added a few "hardy" corals (zoo's, mushrooms) to start developing some community in my tank. I asked so that when I do decide to step up to the 90 gallon tank, that I do it right from the beginning. I did a lot of reading before I got started in the hobby and had read a suggestion to "cure" LR in a seperate basin or bucket (The New Marine Aquarium-M.Paletta. pg 64) Nowhere in there did it mention that curing the rock in the aquarium would help to grow beneficial bacteria. In fact, he recommended against even having a substrate in a tank curing live rock b/c of the detritus that would fall off and accumulate in the substrate. Right now Im just considering changing my current substrate from CC to Argonite sand. All the other questions is for the understanding of future plans. So would you recommend next time cycling the LR in a new tank?