Is no cycle bad?

[scubaD]

We have had cured live rock for a week and "dead" sand that I just seeded with a friend's live sand yesterday. There has been no ammonia spike or nitirite. And some reef guys here at work say I probably won't have a cycle. Is that bad? Can I just roll with no cycle or should we force a cycle by dropping in a raw shrimp or something. This is in a 24 gallon Aquapod. 26# of live rock. A collection of pods (bugs) running around on the rock. Two aiptasia that I used Joe's juice on a few days ago and are no more. Nothing happening on the toxic front. So what is the deal? Are we good to go with no cycle? Or do we need to wait more, or force a cycle, or what?

Thank you,
David

[Sushi Academy]

If the live rock was cured before placing into the tank, then there probably isn't enough dead matter to get a major cycle going.

I would just drop in a dead raw shrimp to jump start the process, otherwise you may not have enough bio-filtration available to handle the bioload you put into the aquarium later on.

[MrsDorothy]

I started my 65g tank with 100# of cured lr and got no cycle at all. After 2 1/2 weeks, I added my first fish.

Since your rock was already cured, give it a few more days and if you do not get a spike, you can go ahead and add your first fish. Carefully choose your fish making sure they are compatiable. Start with your most peaceful fish first. Add them slowly, maybe 1-2 fish, then wait 2-3 weeks, testing your water, before adding another fish.

[scubaD]

any other thoughts on this?

[bertoni]

I would never put raw shrimp into a tank with live rock. If the live rock was clean, the tank won't show any ammonia. That's fine. I've set up at least three tanks that never showed any ammonia.

[kass03]

I would wait awhile yet before adding anything.
I started my 12 gal aquapod with live rock and live sand from my 150 gallon.
Mine did'nt cycle and it's been 5 weeks now.
The second week I added some corals from my other tanks but went slow in case it did cycle.
I now have snails and crabs and quite a few corals looking good so far.
I still did'nt add any fish though.
I'm lucky I have other tanks and can move the corals back if it did cycle.

Yours might have a small cycle and might not cycle at all but a week is'nt really long enough to tell. Especially if you just seeded the sand.
Also my live rock has been in my 150 for years where if you get it from the LFS it can still not be fully cured if they had it shipped to them recently.

kass