First 29 gallon sw tank

[ggoodwin]

Hello I have started getting my sw tank going I have crushed coral as my base and have my water mixed up it has been running for about a day now ..... To get the cycle started do I need to get some live rock and put it in there or are there other ways to do it ... Thanks

[carey]

Here is an excellent article on cycling
Cycle your salt tank

I would add all the rock you can at the start of the cycling, the live rock can assist in generating ammonia which is what you need to get it going. You can also use pure janitorial strength ammonia instead of the shrimp mentioned in the article. You just need an ammonia source for it to begin cycling.

[ggoodwin]

Ok thank you. Also I found 50 lbs of Fiji live rock for 100$ would this work to start out ?

[carey]

Yep, that would be a great deal!

[ggoodwin]

Thanks how long should I go before I start with the cycle

[carey]

Just by putting in the live rock you should be starting your cycle form the die off from the live rock. That will produce a certain amount of ammonia and you can go from there. Either adding a dead supermarket shrimp or dosing with pure ammonia will up your ammonia, I aim for 4ppm to start with. As your cycle progresses you should start to see the ammonia level drop and the nitrite levels rise. Keep dosing your ammonia though until your nitrites drop to 0 all by themselves. Thats probably the longest part in my opinion, waiting for the trites and then for them to go to 0.

If you are gonna add anymore rock when you start is the time to add it so it also can get the benefit of the bacteria base you will be building up. although 50lbs in a 29g is good pretty much in my opinion.

[ggoodwin]

I got my rock tonight not as much as I had hope but it will do ....started the cycle tonight