Thread: Cleanup Crew
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Unread 03/09/2018, 08:56 PM   #11
jlmawp
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To me, the fact that you say your tank has cycled, but your nitrates are at 0, and you have never added ammonia are statements that are at odds with one-another. If you are only now contemplating adding a raw shrimp to the tank (which is basically the same as dosing ammonia to force a cycle), then there is a good chance that your tank is not truly cycled.

When you say you have added live rock, does that mean you bought the lock in a "live" state? Or did you buy dry rock that you are trying to turn into live rock? The presence of ammonia and nitrite in a new tank are what build up the necessary bacteria on the rock surface to make it "live", so it's pretty important that you feed that bacteria in some shape or fashion.

If your nitrates are truly zero, that means you never had ammonia or nitrites in there to be converted by the bacteria, since a detectable nitrate level is expected at the end of a cycle, it being a byproduct of bacteria's processing of ammonia and nitrite.


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