Cycling my salt water tank?

Question

I started my first salt water tank about a week ago and im waiting for it to finish cycling. If i put fish in it to help the cycle process with that hurt the cylce process because i read somewhere that the fish create ammoina which helps the process. The guy i bought the tank from gave me some Bio Media from his tank to help start mine. please tell me if i should take the black mollys out of my tank. o ya also in the week ive had the tank i have not seen any spike in ammonia Nitrate or Nitrene ( Not sure if thats spelled right) shouldnt i see some sort of spike by now?

I have black mollys in my tank right now since they can survive in salt walter. Im hoping they will help the cycling process as i was told they would have i been miss informed?

Answer 1

Whether you use fish or go with a fishless cycle is all the same to the bacteria in your tank - all these need is a source of ammonia, and that's the same regardless of whether the source is fish wastes, pure ammonia, or decomposing fish food.

Where the fish make a difference is in the need to do water changes until the cycling process has completed. Ammonia, and nitrite, which is the next step in the cycle are both toxic to fish in relatively small amounts (stress begins around 0.5 ppm). So if you add a fish or two, you need to do partial water changes to keep the ammonia below this level. Without the fish, there's no need to do a water change until the cycle has completed to lower the amount of nitrate (third step in the cycle) present in your tank, so this can speed the cycle a little when a larger amount of ammonia is present.

If you have live sand, live rock, or other biological source of bacteria (which the used media will provide), the time it takes for your tank to cycle will be less. Mollies are fairly hardy, but depending on how large the tank is, they might not be producing a high enough amount of ammonia to really show a definite spike. A pair of mollies should be okay in a tank up to aroun 55 gallons, but I don't know how apparent their wastes would be in a larger tank. (I'll assume these mollies are already acclimated to saltwater - you can't just add mollies that have been in freshwater to a saltwater tank! If not, add small portions of salt at intervals till the salinity is the same as you have in your tank - plan to spens a day or more for the process.)

The general info you see for cycling is for freshwater, in which case after one week, your ammonia should be evident and at or near it's peak, and the nitrite beginning to show (see the graph in this link: http://www.firsttankguide.net/cycle.php ) Saltwater, because of the more common use of the "live" media for cycling may not have the "peak", or may have it within the first few days since the bacteria are present in so much higher numbers at the start. If you have enough media, you might not see a spike at all (ammonia or nitrite), but you should be able to detect some amount of nitrate (the end product).

If you haven't seen any nitrate yet (in addition to no ammonia or nitrite), you might try having a sample of your tank water tested by another source, just to be sure the problem isn't with your testing chemicals.

If the fish aren't in the tank yet, adding them won't hurt the cycle, other than maybe make it take a little longer (from needing to remove some of the ammonia in the water in the water changes). If anything, having a certain soirce of ammonia will let you be sure the tank IS cycling. If you've just set up the tank, made up the saltwater, and added the media without an ammonia source, this is why you haven't seen any results yet.

Answer 2

im not sure what your asking aBOUT the mollies but the ammonia spiked at about the 10 day mark for both my salt tanks so no the nitrite , ammonia and nitrate should not have spiked yet. Also first the ammonia goes up which is turned into nitrite and then nitrate. Nitarte is the least toxic of the 3.

Good luck with your tank, it is very rewarding to have a salt tank hope you enjoy it

Answer 3

Nitrates of 20 is not bad,nitrates are something you will fight the entire time you have saltwater.Adding some macro algae will help bring the numbers down also doing water changes will bring them down anything over 40 is high anything under then you are doing good.It is almost impossible to keep them at 0. As far a your tank cycling,,your cycle is done.The ammonia and nitrites are what will spike and go back to 0 not the nitrates..My 135 gallon tank cycled in a week.My nitrates stay at 5 to10.I do have macro algae in my over flow.

Answer 4

I wouldn't add fish because they will most likely die if the tank is not cycled, thats why you cycle the tank so they can live in the tank. when your nitrates are 0, nitrites 0, ammonia 0, and ph is around 8.0 to 8.5 fish will be able to live in your tank! and I wouldn't add the mollies you need to get them use to saltwater before you throw them into the tank as i've never heard of mollies in a saltwater tank maybe a brackish tank but not SW. And if your adding live sand or rock add that in the cycle before adding fish because they will spike the readings and possible kill the fish! hope this helps!