Well, I forgot how much of a pain in the butt it is to baby sit a cycling tank. Its been ages since I had to do this. In about 12 hours the ammonia went to .5 . I forgot how fast things can go bad. Did two 30% to get it knocked down to just detectable, by the math it should be .045, this was last night. I am sure this morning its going to need it again as well. I have two 3 gallon buckets warming up right now so I am prepared. I even took 3 objects out of my cycled tank(four days ago and feed the tank some food to get it rolling) to help this tank along but I do not think its working very well.
Anyway I can get past the cycle I just wanted to mention to everyone how humbling it can be to be in the newbies situation of a tank cycling/crashing. I forget how easy it is to advise someone new but, I forget how frustrating it must be to a new hobbyist as its a little frustrating to me thinking that I might loose some Mollies as I have lost one in the first couple hours after an hour acclimation. She was the big pregnant one, I was not sure if she was swimming funny at the pet store because she was huge or not doing well. I think it may be the later seeing she passed and the other 7 are OK.
This tank is slowly be weened onto Saltwater. I have talked about doing this in the past so my Saltwater fish will have pray (fry) to feed on. I am hoping this will bring out some natural instinct in them and maybe have some happier/healthier fish. I thought about this one day while watching my dogs track down a rabbit in the back forty. They are always happy dogs and get a ton of attention but, when they hunt and track a scent they are all SO MUCH MORE EXCITED!!!! They come back just beaming with joy even if they didn't get what they tracked and hunted. I hope to see this in my Saltwater fish.
Anyhow the tank is up to 1.004 salinity and I plan to raise it about .004-.006 per week until its to 1.024 which is when I will acclimate them to the reef 10G and 40G tanks then eventually to the 150G SW tank that is waiting for my live rock shipment to come in this week. YES, another tank to cycle and this one scares me a little.
Here is a pic, its got SW at 1.022 and it waiting on live rock.
Anyway I can get past the cycle I just wanted to mention to everyone how humbling it can be to be in the newbies situation of a tank cycling/crashing. I forget how easy it is to advise someone new but, I forget how frustrating it must be to a new hobbyist as its a little frustrating to me thinking that I might loose some Mollies as I have lost one in the first couple hours after an hour acclimation. She was the big pregnant one, I was not sure if she was swimming funny at the pet store because she was huge or not doing well. I think it may be the later seeing she passed and the other 7 are OK.
This tank is slowly be weened onto Saltwater. I have talked about doing this in the past so my Saltwater fish will have pray (fry) to feed on. I am hoping this will bring out some natural instinct in them and maybe have some happier/healthier fish. I thought about this one day while watching my dogs track down a rabbit in the back forty. They are always happy dogs and get a ton of attention but, when they hunt and track a scent they are all SO MUCH MORE EXCITED!!!! They come back just beaming with joy even if they didn't get what they tracked and hunted. I hope to see this in my Saltwater fish.
Anyhow the tank is up to 1.004 salinity and I plan to raise it about .004-.006 per week until its to 1.024 which is when I will acclimate them to the reef 10G and 40G tanks then eventually to the 150G SW tank that is waiting for my live rock shipment to come in this week. YES, another tank to cycle and this one scares me a little.
Here is a pic, its got SW at 1.022 and it waiting on live rock.
