Second day cycling .. readings ok?

[fishlips12]

I recall seeing someone making an excel chart that tracked their parameters during their cycling. Could anyone point me out to where that might be. I am doing the same thing and want to make sure my conditions are ok.

Here is what I have for day 2
Temp 80
sg 1.021
Ammonia 4
PH8.2
Nitirite 2
Nitrate 20

Does this look alright

Does >>this<< work for you ?

Keep in mind that it is a loose guide at best and should not really be used to determine how well your new tank is doing. Only to give you some indication of possible timing of the different changes in the water parameters.

Cheers
Steve

[fishfreek]

What are you cycling with?

[fishlips12]

Thanks, what am I cycling with. Not sure what you mean byt his but. I have;
55g
70 pounds of LR
4 Inch DSB
16 gal sump


Protein skimmer is up and running produced a little bit of light brown gunk.The "cured" live rock ( I guess being my primary biological filtration ) I got online. The rock smelled okay did not smell anything nasty. I did NOT scrub any of the rock though just added it to the tank and added the DSB after the fact. Today I am going to pick up a little LS to add.

[fishfreek]

Ok. I was seeking your ammonia sorce. At 4.0 of ammonia on day two that implyed there was a rather good source of ammonia in the tank.

My gut feeling is that 'cured' live rock is not cured at all. You said you got the rock online so that means they have to ship it to you. Shipping live rock will produce dieoff and that dieoff is what your seeing now as ammonia and nitrite.

[fishlips12]

Thanks for your help I will test again in the morn and let you know what my parameters are. I just posted two pics of my tank in my gallery. There may be a time lag in the post pending administrators approval but for now it was not there.

Thanks all.

Fishfreek for the future should I have brushed of the live rock prior to?

[cmor1701d]

No need to scrub the LR especially when you are using it to cycle a new tank. Do not additional LR after the tank is cycled or you will start a new cycle.

There is a good article on curing LR here.