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rtoycrow

Aquarium Advice Regular
Joined
Apr 1, 2006
Messages
58
I got my 45 lbs of live rock on Wednesday and added it directly to my tank. I tested for ammonia yesterday and came up with a reading of about .25- .50. Do I need to add shrimp to get my ammonia level up and cycle started or will the dye-off from the live rock suffice and do I need to add anything to keep the liverock from dying or will it be ok as is? Also I have everything up and running, all powerheads, protein skimmer, and heaters. Temp is hovering around 75.6. salinity level is at 1.025 and I am keeping the lights off. Am I doing everything right so far?
 
For a 125 gal tank 45 lbs may not be enough to jump start your cycle. The .5 ppm isn't as high as I'd prefer it for a good cycle but it could have been slightly higher on Fri or Sat. Are you getting any no2/no3 readings at this point? IMO it couldn't hurt to add at least 1 or 2 good sized shrimp to get your nh3 closer to 2-3 ppm.

Alternately since you have such a large tank you could stock it very slowly once your cycle is done to give your tank time to build up bacteria.

Everything else is fine at this point.
 
I cycled my tank with only 3 jumbo shrimp and sand, it took nearly 9 weeks to cycle. I would look at adding the shrimp. You want the ammonia to peak (I'm not sure .5 is really high enough) higher than that.
 
tecwzrd said:
For a 125 gal tank 45 lbs may not be enough to jump start your cycle.

If this is the case then you really dont have enough LR in your tank. You really need 1.5-2 Lbs per gallon to have proper amount for biological filtration. You might want to think about adding some more and maybe even some Base rock that is cheaper and will become live over time.
 
I already have 100 lbs of base rock plus the 45lbs of live rock.
 
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