cycling a new tank?

Skimmer Juice · #1 04-03-2006, 02:02 AM

I just set up a 125g tank and iwas wondering what the amonia level had to be at before you should do your first water change.The tank has been running for a week, now I used filter media from my existing coral tank ,quit a bit, all ro water, and I used cycle the amonia reads today 20 the second color down on the chart.So iwas just wondering if I had to wait longer to do the first water change.I also have my sump filled with live rock and a bed of A.R.M Argonite reactor media I belive

Ruth · #2 04-03-2006, 02:48 AM

When I have cycled my tanks I have let the ammonia run it course until it turned to nitrite and then nitrate and then did a 25-50% water change. I know there are different schools of thought on this but my way of thinking is that the purpose of letting it cycle is to allow the build up of benificial bacteria and this occurs during this cycle. I realize that you may lose more of the stuff living on your rock that cannot take a large ammonia spike so this is just what I have done with my systems and still have lots of stuff growing on my live rock. And the ammonia spike also appears to make those pesty red eyed crabs grow! I got a whole whack of them on the live rock I bought for my 190 and I'm still trapping the SOB's.
Why are you using ARM calcium reactor media in your sump. It is my understanding that this needs to react with CO2 in order to be of any benifit to your tanks as far as keeping your calcium and Alk/DKH in balance. I've never heard of this before so perhaps there is a reason and I can learn something.
When my large systems were cyling I also skimmed very wet and did a lot of turkey basting of the rock to get the crap into the water column and let the skimmer pull it out.

Skimmer Juice · #3 04-03-2006, 03:02 AM

the guy I buy all my stuff from told me to use that in my sump.So I will ask him why tommorow thanks for your input.

golfbomber · #4 04-03-2006, 04:41 AM

i didnt do mine for 2 months. but it was from scratch, curing live rock!

hawaiiguy · #5 04-03-2006, 05:20 AM

I waited about a month, but the rock that I started with was dry so I didn't need to worry about die off. After a month a changed about 10% and I seeded the dead rock with a bit of live rock. The only draw back to starting with dry rock is that it takes way longer for your tank to get where you want it. It's been 3 months and I'm finally starting to see some coralline algae growth.

Willow · #6 04-03-2006, 02:35 PM

my 90 never did cycle. the benifit of using cured live rock i guess.