Water Quality
 

I set up my nano 1 week ago and still waiting for the ammonia/nitrite/nitrate to go up... but nothing so far! (0 ppm for ammonia and nitrite and between 0 - 5 ppm for nitrate).

Could it be that it will not go up at all as I started off with fully cured live rock? (18 pounds of the live rock were taken from an established tank and didn't leave the water for longer than 5 minutes.)

by they way..my water change last week with quality salt brought my ph up from 7.9 to 8.2 :razz:

Ang

With well-cured LR from an existing system, you will probably not experience a cycle at all in your new tank, especially since the rock was out of water for such a short period of time.

Now that you know your water quality is pretty good, now is the time to bone up on water chemistry, i.e. calcium, magnesium, alkalinity and pH levels. Here's a link from Christy's great Reference Library.....

http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2006-06/rhf/index.php

There are a load of links at the bottom of the article for further reading to help you better understand the complexities of reef chemistry.

Good luck with your new nano :)

I started my reef the same way, cured LR, short transport time. NO CYCLE. I was adding fish and coral in the first week. Two months later and the tank is nearly full. Be carefull in the second and third week, that's when I got my only Ammonia spike (overfeeding).

BTW, you're getting Nitrate, so there was Nitrite and Ammonia, just was converted quickly to Nitrate, as it should be. Keep up the water changes, you're off to a flying start!

this is weird. remember how I complaint about too low ph (7.8-7.9) due to low quality salt....

now I suddenly have a ph of 8.8. :sad:

after a water change last Thursday I had top water over the whole weekend (0 ammonia and nitrite, 0-5 nitrate, 8.1 ph). I took another meassurement on Monday and ammonia, nitrite and nitrate still were great but ph was up to 8.4. Did another waterchange yesterday to make sure that quality stays good and ph doesn't go up... but today the ph is at 8.8. (ammonia, nitrate and nitrite still reamins 0).

Why? How can I get it down? what is the cause?

I'm going to try finding some articles about that but I'm sure you experts out there know exactly what's wrong - don't you?

let me know if you need more info.

thanks,
Ang

well don't buy low quality salt, silly! that's the most important part! :P i might suspect your test kit. make sure to rinse your test tubes well...

How is the air flow in the room with the tank? A small room,or one with no fresh air can cause your ph to go up.If so an open window will help.

ang,

Here is the link to Canreef's Library's Chemistry page....

http://www.canreef.com/vbulletin/forumdisplay.php?f=41

IME, when a tank is experiencing pH swings, you need to be concerned about alkalinity most of all, but also magnesium and calcium levels.

Quagmire,

When a room isn't getting enough fresh air, CO2 builds up and you tend to get lower pH.

I know,sorry read the thread wrong.And my brain was on vacation

What kind of test kits are you using?

What do you mean when you are saying "low quality" salt?