Some cycling questions.

[instantaquatics]

To start off with what I know, I have been working with reef tanks for many years and freshwater tanks for much longer. My knowledge on the cycle is pretty good, but my reef tanks were never great, and now I want to change that. I am starting out with dry sand and dry rock which is very controversial, but I weighed my options and this is what I want to go with. I am of course using RO/DI water.

The information I gathered:

Melevsreef reef timeline video, where he says after the nitrogen cycle is complete, you will get diatoms and once those are gone you can add fish and turn on your protein skimmer. The tank lights should not have been on at this point at all until around month three when you decide to add coral.
First Question: What if you don't see diatoms at all after the cycle?
Second Question: If you do see diatoms and they don't go away, what do you do? This is where I usually got stuck with my reefs: diatoms for years on end.

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The Supreme Guide To Setting Up A Saltwater Reef Aquarium, where it says you will go through the ammonia cycle, nitrite cycle, and finally anaerobic bacteria within the rock work? Which doesn't seem right to me, since that takes a very long time to develop and requires a good amount of feed to my knowledge. Either way, after that it says to turn on the lights and you will get diatoms, then cyanobacteria, then green/brown algae. Then you can finally add livestock.
First Question: What if you do not get any of these algae, or only one and not the other? When is it "fine" to go through with livestock and start doing more with your tank?

Cycling an Aquarium, where the post just goes over general information of the cycle. Basically says to me "add livestock after the nitrogen cycle is completed". No questions here.

Related Question: When do you add your protein skimmer? I feel like it's overkill with one fish and weekly water changes, asking to get dinos, no?

TLDR; What if I don't get diatoms, cyano, or green/brown algae like these guides say you should? When is it generally acceptable to add a fish (I was thinking after ammonia and nitrite are done and over with which I always thought was typical)? Coral? What do you do if these diatoms, cyanobacteria, or green/brown algae show up in your tank and stay for way too long? At what point is it acceptable to forget the "natural" aspect of this transition and use chemicals or manually remove? When do I add a protein skimmer so as to not get algae but also not get dinos?

Thanks in advance, and I apologize if I butchered melev's video or the articles.

 

[Lasse]

IMO - the whole discussion is going back to control nuisance organisms with help of low or zero inorganic nitrogen and phosphorous. I thought that this has been proven wrong a long time ago. IMO - the only way to control that nuisance photosynthetic organisms not take over the aquarium is to favour the types we can harvest with help of grazers. Dinoflagellates, cyanobacteria have few known grazers and can - in some case be toxic.

Diatoms - thats among aquarist often is connected to Si concentration in the water have a lot of organisms that eat them. IMO - the common thoughts that it is the Si levels that control diatoms is a bit of a myth. Yes - together with very low concentrations of phosphorous (so low that most competing organisms can´t use it) as it is in a start sequence you can control it with help of zeroing Si in the RO water but a normal aquarium will soon get Si levels around 100 µg/L. It leaks from sand and rock. The large use of ICP testening have shown that normal reef aquariums have a Si concentration around 100 - 300 µg/L without any diatome problems. My present aquarium had once 20 000 µg/L without any diatom problems. IMO - It is the combination of Si concentration above 0 and low dissolved PO4 concentration that favour a diatom bloom and holds back competitors (competition for space) who need a little more dissolved PO4 to grow fast.

Its right that it is important to use light as a controlling factor in the start, at least the intensity of light but it must be connected with the use of a decent and diverse CUC (Clean Up Crew). The CUC should be introduced before you see any algae and more or less in the same minute that you chose to turn the light on. This is because - if you see any algae - the biomass is already too large and you need a large crew. Microalgae is growing exponentially. Remember the chess table - 1 rice grain for the first square, 2 for the second, 4 for the third, 8 for the forth, 16 for the fifth and so on. Let us say you start with 1 cell of a microalgae that double its biomass every 24 hours - your growth will look like this. The thing you can control here is the energy input - read light intensity or amount of photons - it is your accelerator and brake pedal - if your CUC manage to have the aquarium "clean" . rise intensity slowly - if it looks like problems (green hue on stones and sand is not a problem - it shows that it works) lower the light intensity (or light period)

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Many people talks about living rocks and sand as input of diversity and that´s important - but IMO - it also bring in P and N into the system. PO4 as an organic compound and chemical bounded PO4 in the "living" rocks. NH4/NH3 and NO3 as metabolites when organic N compounds is broken down. The problems with "dry" rocks (often from ancient reefs mined on dry land) are - IMO - also that they lack bounded PO4 - no PO4 is leaked out during the start. What many people forget is that nitrification bacteria are autotrophic - it must get its P from dissolved PO4 in the water. IMO - the manny stalled cyclings between step 1 NH3/NH4 -> NO2 and step 2 NO2->NO3 that's often is reported here may be caused of too low inorganic PO4 in the water column.

Today - it is often recommended to use external NH3/NH4 sources in the start. Often in concentrations above 2 ppm. This will create - IMO - a to high NO3 concentration when the cycle is done (every ppm of NH4 added will end up as around 3.4 ppm NO3 after a complete cycle) I prefer much, much lower NH3/NH4 input and on a daily base. That's the reason why I always use a fish as my NH3/NH4 producer and manage the output of NH3/NH4 with help of the amount of feeding.

I will once again recommend to read the article I referred to earlier In that article I have try to combine must of the problems you will see in a start and show steps thats is proactive

Sincerely Lasse

 

[instantaquatics]

That's the reason why I always use a fish as my NH3/NH4 producer and manage the output of NH3/NH4 with help of the amount of feeding.

I read the article, but it went against a few of the norms such as this. I can't justify making a fish go through ammonia just to cycle my tank the "right way". Thankfully I have found other ways to do this, but the main takeaway from the article that I got was adding CUC right when you turn lights on as you said.

Thank you for the input!

 

[Lasse]

I can't justify making a fish go through ammonia just to cycle my tank the "right way"

You miss the point. The way I cycle - there is never, ever any toxic levels of NH3 as long as you follow the feed instructions. The fish is in no danger at all. I feed with Ocean Nutritions frozen adult artemia thats content around 5 % (wet weight) proteins - proteins in general content around 16 % N. I recommend 2 - 4 adult frozen artemia day 1, 3, 6. 8. 10, 12,14,15,16,17,18,19,20 and 21 Total during 21 days around 80 frozen artemia. Dry weight of an adult artemia is around 0.5*10 ‾⁵ g - wet weight will be around 0.5*10 ‾⁴ g. 80 artemia will be 4*10 ‾³ g -> 4 mg. Totally during 21 days - 4 mg food as frozen artemia. It means - 0.2 mg proteins -> 0.032 mg N - -> around 0.041 mg NH4 had been added during 21 days. It means that 0.041 mg NH4 is in the water. If the tank is 10 L - it is 0.0041 ppm, 100L -> 0.00041 ppm NH4/NH3. Yes total NH34/NH3 concentrations is 0.00041 ppm for 100 L and if the pH is around 8.5 - the toxic part (NH3) is around 15 % of the total - it means that - in worse scenario will end up with around 0.0000615 mg/L toxic NH3 after 21 days. I promise you , my mature tank runs much higher than that.

Instead it is a more natural and "human" way of cycling - taking all involved organism into the system without any suffering of any of them.

Sincerely Lasse

 

[instantaquatics]

You miss the point. The way I cycle - there is never, ever any toxic levels of NH3 as long as you follow the feed instructions. The fish is in no danger at all. I feed with Ocean Nutritions frozen adult artemia thats content around 5 % (wet weight) proteins - proteins in general content around 16 % N. I recommend 2 - 4 adult frozen artemia day 1, 3, 6. 8. 10, 12,14,15,16,17,18,19,20 and 21 Total during 21 days around 80 frozen artemia. Dry weight of an adult artemia is around 0.5*10 ‾⁵ g - wet weight will be around 0.5*10 ‾⁴ g. 80 artemia will be 4*10 ‾³ g -> 4 mg. Totally during 21 days - 4 mg food as frozen artemia. It means - 0.2 mg proteins -> 0.032 mg N - -> around 0.041 mg NH4 had been added during 21 days. It means that 0.041 mg NH4 is in the water. If the tank is 10 L - it is 0.0041 ppm, 100L -> 0.00041 ppm NH4/NH3. Yes total NH34/NH3 concentrations is 0.00041 ppm for 100 L and if the pH is around 8.5 - the toxic part (NH3) is around 15 % of the total - it means that - in worse scenario will end up with around 0.0000615 mg/L toxic NH3 after 21 days. I promise you , my mature tank runs much higher than that.

Instead it is a more natural and "human" way of cycling - taking all involved organism into the system without any suffering of any of them.

Sincerely Lasse

I did not see that information anywhere in your article. I'll take it to heart - thanks for the input.

 

[Lasse]

I did not see that information anywhere in your article

From the article - my bold - i did not do the math but the principles is there

5) Introduce a healthy, well fed, lively fish that is not shy.

In a large aquarium start with 2 - 3 fish. The reason for introducing fish as early as this is that you need something that produces ammonium (NH4) in order to get the vital nitrification process to start. In a newly started aquarium, there is no bacteria-related production of ammonium and the production of ammonium from the fish(es) is controlled by how you feed the fish. With this method, you will have full control over the NH4 production the first few weeks.

6) Add some nitrifying bacteria every day for three weeks or inoculate with detritus from an already functioning aquarium every day. There are many special bacterial strains available to buy, including a mixture of nitrification and break-down bacteria--avoid them in the beginning--only the nitrifying bacteria are of interest. I normally use a freshwater product--Sera NitriVeck--and dose 20 ml per 100 liters/day. Do you have an old aquarium running? Then take and turn out the filter in a few liters of water--fresh or salt--does not matter. Put it in the refrigerator, and then pour in an appropriate amount every day into your new aquarium. At the start of an aquarium it can be a good method to use an internal foam filter, which helps the nitrification to start. It can later be removed if you want.

7) Feed extremely sparingly at the beginning. I usually only use frozen large brine shrimp for the first 3 weeks and only give three to four shrimp per fish. The first week I feed every third day (this small amount) and the second week every other day (the same small amount) and the third week, every day (the same small amount). On Week 4, I start to increase the amount.

Sincerely Lasse

 

[instantaquatics]

You miss the point. The way I cycle - there is never, ever any toxic levels of NH3 as long as you follow the feed instructions. The fish is in no danger at all. I feed with Ocean Nutritions frozen adult artemia thats content around 5 % (wet weight) proteins - proteins in general content around 16 % N. I recommend 2 - 4 adult frozen artemia day 1, 3, 6. 8. 10, 12,14,15,16,17,18,19,20 and 21 Total during 21 days around 80 frozen artemia. Dry weight of an adult artemia is around 0.5*10 ‾⁵ g - wet weight will be around 0.5*10 ‾⁴ g. 80 artemia will be 4*10 ‾³ g -> 4 mg. Totally during 21 days - 4 mg food as frozen artemia. It means - 0.2 mg proteins -> 0.032 mg N - -> around 0.041 mg NH4 had been added during 21 days. It means that 0.041 mg NH4 is in the water. If the tank is 10 L - it is 0.0041 ppm, 100L -> 0.00041 ppm NH4/NH3. Yes total NH34/NH3 concentrations is 0.00041 ppm for 100 L and if the pH is around 8.5 - the toxic part (NH3) is around 15 % of the total - it means that - in worse scenario will end up with around 0.0000615 mg/L toxic NH3 after 21 days. I promise you , my mature tank runs much higher than that.

Instead it is a more natural and "human" way of cycling - taking all involved organism into the system without any suffering of any of them.

Sincerely Lasse

All this accounts for is ammonia caused by if the artemia is being left to sit and rot in the tank. Even if those numbers were true, and a fish eating that amount of artemia produced only 0.00041ppm of ammonia in 100L, the amount of bacteria living off of that would be so little that it's not even really worth the time. It would take a lot longer to produce a cycle like this than just throwing in some live rock rubble or sand with a cocktail shrimp.

 

[Lasse]

You still not get it. When fish eat - they they secrete excess nitrogen as NH3 / NH4 through the gills. This happens during the first hours after feeding. This NH3/NH4 will be nitrified by bacteria - the method is build on low amount secreted NH3/NH4 when it is a low population of bacteria - allow the few to process the NH3/NH4 and build new biomass. Because you slowly rise the feeding and adding bacteria - you slowly rise the amount of nitrification bacteria and how much NH3/NH4 they process.

If you through in a cocktail shrimp and wait for bacteria to break down its organic nitrogen into NH3/NH4 - you have to wait 3-5 days before any NH3/NH4 will be produced and you have no control of the amount that will be produced. With feeding a fish - you will have around 80 % of the excess NH3/NH4 in the water in 2 hours and your feeding regime decides how much NH3/NH4 that will be added.

Sincerely Lasse

 

[ReefGeezer]

I had always started tanks with old school fishless cycles. However, one day I found out that I really didn't know what I thought I knew. Knowing what I know now, I will never again start a marine tank by driving ammonia levels up in the old school manner. @Lasse has outlined a solid method of starting a reef tank without requiring that the tank go through an ugly period. I would start my tank a little different than Lasse, but the theory would be the same... Add organisms that use nutrients and those that produce them in a strategic way to maintain a balance so that nutrient levels are never elevated. But if you must do it old school... Don't overthink the process.

1. Get the tank running with stable temp and salinity;
2. Add any one of the bacteria in a bottle products just to speed the process a little;
3. Add an ammonia source (I use ammonium chloride) to 2 ppm;
4. Wait until ammonia test 0. This could take a day or a month. You can wait for nitrite to drop to 0 if you wish. I would, but I can't tell you it is required. Nitrite at the level produced by 2 ppm of ammonia is not toxic a marine pH levels; and
5. Do a small water change, add a fish, turn on the lights, start the skimmer, and you are on your way... well except for the coming algae battles.