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foboiax
09/30/2009, 03:01 PM
Hi all,

Please bare with me, for I am a newbie to salt water tanks.

I've had a fresh water tank for years now and this past birthday, my girlfriend decided to buy me a 28g nano cube so I can set up my first salt water tank. Very excited, I started reading tons of forums and blogs and after a week I went out and bought all the necessary equipment to start cycling my tank.

Here's what I bought: Reef Crystals for my Salt, 40 lbs of Ocean Direct Caribbean Live Sand, about 25 lbs of Live Fiji Premium Rocks, Nitrifying Bacteria, and dechlorinator of course. I also bought a test kit for pH, ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, and calcium.

Before adding anything to the tank I cleaned the new tank with a little bit of bleach and water. After setting up the water in the tank with declorinator and the reef crystals, I pre-cleaned my rocks. After a few hours with the water in the tank, I added my live sand and live rocks and then turned on the filter and pump. After a few days I decided I wanted to use fish to cycle the tank for ammonia so I picked up a couple cheap damsels. I waited about a week and a half before I ran my first water test and its been 3 weeks since then my readings have came out to:

Temp: 78-80 Degrees
Calcium: 420-440 ppm
pH:8.2
Ammonia: 0-.25
Nitrite: 0
Nitrate: 0
Salinity: 1.024

Why hasn't it started cycling? Am I just being impatient or did the tank miraculously cycle in the week and a half I didn't test it? Should I add ammonia?

bertoni
09/30/2009, 03:46 PM
[welcome]

If live rock is very clean, the tank won't show an ammonia spike. I wouldn't worry much, but you could feed a tiny amount of fish food each day to check for any signs of ammonia.

foboiax
09/30/2009, 04:24 PM
Can do! Thanks, I'll probably just wait it out. I am feeding my damsel pellets every day too.