Nitrogen Cycle

[sam_always]

my sand bed is quite dirty. Should i siphon the dirt out?

[sam_always]

My gold tair damsel. gled that it can survive.

[Achilles Tang]

I think your LR is well cured enough (I don't see lots of dying stuff on it) to cope with the ammonia given out by that very tiny damsel... the danger will come when you think you can start stocking up and buy corals, a few fishes all at once.... and then there may be a ammonia spike! In a tiny tank like yours... it could be disastrous and there goes your 4ft dream.

Take it slow and buy one livestock a week. Monitor carefully to see if your filtration system can cope. Give your bacteria enough time to cope with the growing bioload.

It will reach a stage when your nitrates will build up and you'll need frequent water changes to maintain water quality.

[marcvelous]

Am I right to say that since he can't get any reading on the NH4 kit, might as well get the NO2 kit to see if he can get any reading. Given the cycle, after NH4 will be NO2 then NO3. Might as well go after the rest and see if he can get any reading, correct?

But what happens if he get zero for all?

Is it possible that the cycle stage never spiked? Or even more miraculously no need to cycle and can keep fish?!

[ryz]

There might be nitrifying bacteria already present in the LR or his filtration media. Since he said that there wasn't even ammonia prescence, There shouldn't be nitrite or nitrate. No ammonia to begin with = no nitrite or nitrate as by product of nitrifying bacteria's nutrition. Seems like he didn't have to cycle the tank. Maybe because there wasn't much bioload, maybe because the rocks were already sufficiently colonized by the nitrifying bacteria.

Correct me if I'm wrong. Just stating my view

[Achilles Tang]

IMO, he probably had a very tiny spike of ammonia... but it was quickly dealt with the bacteria in his tank. He only tested ammonia in the 2nd week of cycling!

He probably has some levels of NO2 now... he didn't say if he even bought any testkits for it.

There is no miracle in the cycling process... if you have good quality cured LR that is well colonized by the right bacteria, you can theoretically start having some hardy livestock in and not see any spikes because the pollutants are dealt with immediately. Of course, that is, if all other variables are favourable.

In reality, the typical newbie starts off with a brand new immature dead sandbed, inadequate amount of LR that is usually in poor shape and uncured and having little funds or knowledge in acquiring the right equipment/setup in the first place. Hence, the need to go through a proper duration of cycling.

[sam_always]

oic... Thanks alot... i started to test my amonia level since second day of cycling. I will get my no3 test kit today. BTW, If i get 0 also for nitrite, does it mean that my tank is cycle? so i can do water change by then?

plan to put in another fish after CNY. What fish can live hormony with damsel?