Red Sea Reef Mature Cycling Program
Well, it's been a while...and a lot has happened.
When it comes to cycling a tank there are a lot of options out there. The cheap damsel method (cruel), the dead shrimp method (gross), Dr. Tim's, Micro-Bacter 7, Red Sea Reef Mature, and probably a dozen others. While most are fairly well documented by internet sources, the Red Sea Reef Mature program has a relative dearth of good information. Especially if you are cycling with dry rock instead of live rock. And that's where we begin.
As I'm sure hundreds, if not thousands, of others were before me, I was lured back into the reefkeeping hobby by the BRS160 weekly YouTube series of videos on starting a new reef tank. I found Ryan's videos to be entertaining, engaging, and incredibly informative. I couldn't help myself but to follow along and set up a tank of my own.
In order to keep from getting lost in the sea of internet misinformation, I've tried to stick to the techniques and principles that are advocated by the BRS160 series. So, after much deliberation, I decided to follow their lead and begin with dry rock--for reasons mostly related to sustainability and minimizing hitch-hikers. And like the BRS160 series, I opted to cycle my tank using the Red Sea Reef Mature program. I chose to follow BRS here partly because Red Sea has a solid reputation for science-based products, but mostly because I did not do enough research ahead of time. Looking back I probably would have chosen Dr. Tim's, but this is a topic for another post.
Now, in the last 30 seconds of the "cycling" episode of the BRS160, Ryan says that he's going with the Reef Mature program, he won't use the Coralline Grow, and that's it. No advice, no step-by-step, no "here's how it went" in a later video. Nudge nudge Ryan...if this makes it way to you, I'd love to see a video on BRS' thoughts of how the Reef Mature cycle worked out.
So, I bought the kit and got started. I read a bit on the forums and discovered RedSeaKev, who must work for Red Sea, and doles out wonderful advice to people struggling with the Reef Mature program. Because of him, I think I actually understand how NoPoX works and why I need to run a wet skimmer. Despite Kev's helpful insights, the best I could gather about my specific question is that Reef Mature is made to be used with live rock and will 'take longer' with dry rock.
That seemed vague, so I contacted Red Sea. And they said,
But...how much longer? Will I need to feed the bacteria more Bacto Start during the later weeks, when the ammonia is exhausted, so they don't starve? Do I need to run my lights since I have no beneficial algae to support? These sorts of questions remain unanswered. So, I'm recording my own experience below to let you know how I fared cycling an Innovative Marine Nuvo Fusion 20 gallon tank with dry rock and live sand with Red Sea Reef Mature.
If you're impatient, I'll give you the end results now. My tank took 46 days to fully cycle. During that period I battled a slimy bacterial outbreak that resulted from overdosing the NoPoX carbon-dosing supplement, but eventually cleared up. Below is the graph of my ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate levels over that period:
If you're interested to read more, the following is a brief introduction to the Red Sea Reef Mature program and a day-by-day journal of my experience cycling my new aquarium...
Red Sea Reef Mature Cycling Program
If you're not familiar with the Reef Mature program, honestly you can probably find a better explanation elsewhere, like Red Sea's website. But in the interest of completeness, I'll do my best to explain what I think it is, here.
The program consists of four components (liquid supplements) to be added to the aquarium on a very specific schedule over a period of three weeks, with intermittent water testing and thresholds to be achieved before introducing each type of livestock (invertebrates, herbivorous fish, other fish, corals). I'll be testing ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate every day so that I can hopefully provide some useful information to anyone reading this, and make that pretty graph of each parameter through the cycle.
The four supplements are Nitro Bac, Bacto-Start, KH Coralline Grow, and NO3:PO4-X or NoPoX.
I am using Instant Ocean Reef Crystals salt, which mixes up to an alkalinity of about 12 dKh. Since I have no coralline algae, I've noticed that once my alkalinity settled in between 10 and 11, it never dropped from that point. So, like BRS, I'm not dosing the KH Coralline Grow.
I am following Red Sea's advice by dosing NoPoX at 3 ml per 100 liters of water, every day. I will continue to do this even after the cycle has completed. The goal here is to foster and feed (essentially carbon dose) anaerobic de-nitrifying bacteria that will help reduce and maintain low nitrates and phosphates over time. The "wet skim" removes the de-nitrified (?) and de-phosphized (?) compounds. Red Sea makes a big deal about how much better NoPoX is than vodka or vinegar dosing, but if I'm honest the powerful smell of the mystery liquid in the NoPoX bottle is distinctly vinegar-like with a hint of ethanol. So I think Red Sea has taken the mystery out of carbon dosing by producing their own vinegar-vodka and providing a calculated dosing regimen. Either way, I've heard good things and I can always stop if it's not working. This stuff would probably taste great on french fries, too. (Not really, don't eat it.)
Since I've covered the KH Coralline Grow and NoPoX supplements here, I won't discuss them later on. Assume I'm never dosing the former and dosing 2 ml (for my 68 liter system) of the latter every day of the cycle, unless otherwise noted (see Days 21+).
Day 1 - 9/4/17 - Setting Up
For me, Day 1 was actually almost two weeks, but that's because I was assembling my setup piece by piece. In retrospect I probably should have bought the Red Sea Max NANO all-in-one tank. Because for more money, I ended up essentially building a rectangular version of this handsome cube tank, which doesn't look nearly as slick because it lacks the one-brand integration that Red Sea has designed into their system. Sigh...the path not taken...but I digress.
Day 1 has you up and running with sand, rock, and water in the tank with stable temperature (79-82 F) and salinity (35 ppt), and a skimmer running "wet." Once you've got that you're ready to start. But, I diverged from the recommendations in two key ways.
First, I installed my brand new Ghost Skimmer, but since it needed to be broken in I had to start by running it only 2-3 hours a day when I was home, since it would foam like crazy and fill the skimmate cup in an hour or less. Since Day 2, I've been ramping the skimmer up a couple hours a day. By Day 10 the skimmer was running 24/7, producing nice wet skimmate that is not quite tea colored but not clear either. After 10 days the dreaded Ghost Skimmer microbubbles had subsided and all was right with the world.
Second, I am not running lights during the cycle. If I understand correctly, neither nitrifying nor de-nitrifying bacteria are photosynthetic. Since I don't have any desirable (coralline) algae on my dry rocks, I am skipping the lights in order to minimize the growth of nuisance algae. Basically, I'm trying to avoid the ugly-tank-syndrome that I've seen other Reef Mature users, like Roy Page, suffer from.
Day 2 - 9/5/17 - First Doses
(Ammonia = 0.0ppm, Nitrite = 0.1ppm, Nitrate = 1ppm)
Day 2 has the first dosing of Nitro Bac (the bacteria) and Bacto-Start (the bacteria food). The Day 2 dose is two parts bacteria (Nitro Bac) to one part food (Bacto-Start). In my case 13.4 ml of Nitro Bac and 6.8 ml of Bacto-Start.
On the morning of Day 3 I noticed the water was pretty cloudy. I think this was a little bacterial bloom.
Day 3 - 9/6/17 - More Bacteria
(Ammonia = 0.4ppm, Nitrite = 0.2ppm, Nitrate = 10ppm)
Day 3 adds an additional 1 part of Nitro Bac (the bacteria), in my case 6.8 ml.
This addition probably further added to the bacterial bloom, which lasted another day or two.
Day 3 is the first testing day and with live rock we'd expect the ammonia to be 1ppm, nitrite to be 0.1ppm, and nitrate to be 36 ppm. It appears that my system is slower on the uptake, since all of my parameters are lower than expected with live rock.
Days 4-6 - 9/7-9/17
(Ammonia = 0.1 to 0.0ppm, Nitrite = 0.2 to 0.0ppm, Nitrate = 15 to 20 to 15ppm)
No doses of bacteria or food these days.
Day 7 - 9/10/17 - More Dosing, First Water Change
(Ammonia = 0.0ppm, Nitrite = 0.0ppm, Nitrate = 10ppm)
Day 7 adds an additional 0.5 part of Nitro Bac (the bacteria), in my case 3.4 ml. It also adds an additional 1 part of Bacto Start (the bacteria food), for me 6.8 ml. Unlike the other times, this addition has more food (ammonia?) than bacteria being added. I had to re-read the instructions several times to be sure I was reading it correctly. I am. Whether this is correct or a mistake in the directions, I don't know.
The program includes a 5% water change, here. I did 1 gallon which is about 6%.
Day 7 is a partial testing day and with live rock we'd expect the ammonia to be <0.25ppm and nitrite to be <0.05ppm. So far, so good. But after the new addition of Bacto Start, things really started to take off.
Days 8-9 - 9/11-12/17
(Ammonia = 0.8 to 0.2ppm, Nitrite = 0.35ppm, Nitrate = 35 to 50ppm)
No doses of bacteria or food these days.
Day 10 - 9/13/17 - Final Doses
(Ammonia = 0.2ppm, Nitrite = 0.2ppm, Nitrate = 50ppm)
Day 10 adds the final 0.5 part of Nitro Bac (the bacteria) and 0.5 part of Bacto-Start (the bacteria food), in my case 3.4 ml of each. Now we wait...
Day 10 is a testing day and with live rock we'd expect the ammonia to be 0.0ppm, nitrite to be 0.0ppm, and nitrate to be 10 ppm. To confirm Red Sea's recommendation, dry rock does take longer than live rock. This is where the instructions and my experience began to diverge. Frankly my nitrate level was maxing out my test kit at this point, so it could have been higher than 50ppm and I can't tell if it's on the way up or down.
According to the program, if parameters were in line, we'd begin adding the cleaning crew today. I have no algae for them to eat and ammonia and nitrate levels that would not be healthy for any organism, so I'll be holding off on these little fellas for at least another week or two.
Day 11-13 - 9/14-16/17
(Ammonia = 0.2ppm, Nitrite = 0.35 to 0.2ppm, Nitrate = 50ppm)
Days 11 through 13 are for waiting for the levels to further reduce. In my case, I'll likely be waiting longer.
Day 14 - 9/17/17 - Second Water Change
(Ammonia = 0.1ppm, Nitrite = 0.2ppm, Nitrate = 35ppm)
The program recommends another 5% water change. Since the volume is so small and it's basically the same effort to do more or less, I opted to change out about 1.5 gallons of water or ~10% this time.
Day 14 is a partial testing day and with live rock we'd expect the ammonia to remain at 0.00ppm, nitrite to remain at 0.00ppm, and nitrate to have reduced to 5ppm. As you can see, with dry rock I'm still lagging well behind. But Day 14 did mark the first subtle reduction in nitrate, so it feels like we're headed in the right direction.
Day 15-20 - 9/18-23/17
(Ammonia = 0.1 to 0.0ppm, Nitrite = 0.1 to 0.025 to 0.1ppm, Nitrate = 20ppm)
Days 15 through 20, more waiting. Ideally, we're looking for ammonia and nitrite to drop to zero and nitrate to reach 10ppm. At that point (if there's any algae) the tank is ready for a cleanup crew. When nitrate hits 5ppm the system is ready for its first herbivorous fish. Finally, when nitrate stabilizes around 2ppm, the tank is fully cycled and ready for incremental additions of fish and corals.
At Day 19 I started noticing a clear, hairy slime beginning to form on my dry rocks. Everything I've read said to "be patient" while cycling, so for two days I left this as is and kept dosing as usual.
At Day 20, ammonia and nitrite were 0.00 and 0.1, respectively. Nitrates, however are coming down more slowly, testing at ~20ppm at day 20. This is not unexpected, as the de-nitrifying bacteria do take longer to establish and do work more slowly and gradually than the nitrifying bacteria, if I understand correctly. I think is where Red Sea's comment that dry rock "takes longer" comes into play.
Day 21 - 9/24/17 - Third Water Change
(Ammonia = 0.0ppm, Nitrite = 0.05ppm, Nitrate = 20ppm)
By Day 21, the clear slime had gotten pretty bad with strands 1/2" long growing off several of the rocks. At this point I thought that it might be a die-off of my nitrifying bacteria because I had not introduced an ammonia source to the tank since Day 10. A call to Red Sea and a trip to my LFS both confirmed that nitrifying bacteria will continue to live without an outside source of ammonia for some time (months to years) and so I should not need to continue dosing ammonia while the cycle finishes. LFS said the clear slime was likely a bacterial bloom and that it should go away on its own.
The program recommends a 5% water change at Day 21. In order to try and get ahead of the slime, I spent 15 minutes blasting it off of my rocks with a turkey baster, which worked surprisingly well, and cleaned the glass and back of the tank. I also removed the protein skimmer and rinsed off a coating of slime on it and cleaned the impeller and made sure the airline was clear, then reinstalled it. Finally, I did a ~25% water change, 4 gallons, and changed the filter sock/pad. The water cleared up within an hour and the slime seemed greatly reduced. Things were looking up.
At Day 21, Red Sea's instruction manual ends, so I'm now moving forward into uncharted territory. As outlined in Day 15-20 description, I'll be basing my judgment of when the cycle has completed on my maintenance of ammonia and nitrites at 0.0ppm and my nitrates stabilizing around 2ppm.
Day 22-23 - 9/25-26/17 - Watching and Waiting
(Ammonia = 0.0ppm, Nitrite = 0.05ppm, Nitrate = 20ppm)
I kept an eye on the slime and continue to test and dose NoPoX, as the slime returned and started getting worse.
Day 24 - 9/27/17 - Cracked It...Hopefully
(Ammonia = 0.0ppm, Nitrite = 0.05ppm, Nitrate = 20ppm)
On Day 24 things were looking pretty grim. The strands of slime were now 1-2" long in some places and tank was starting to look pretty nasty, although the water was still crystal clear. I spent a good portion of the day googling about clear slime and starting finding a common thread...clear slime is regularly associated with carbon dosing, particularly over-dosing.
I'd been dosing 3ml/100l of NoPoX since day 2 of the cycle, which I calculated based on my 18 gallon total water volume (20 gallon tank minus 2 gallons for rocks and sand, which I noted when I removed water to add the sand and rocks). This would make my system 68 liters, so my NoPoX dose was calculated at 2.04ml, which I rounded to 2ml.
Except with this new overdosing information, I decided to recalculate my system volume. I used a volume calculator by dimensions and using the ACTUAL interior dimensions of the tank calculated 17.06 gallons. Subtracting my 2 gallons of rock and sand displacement, I'm now calculating a system volume of ~15 gallons or ~57 liters. This means my 3ml/100l dose should have been 1.70ml. So for 20 days, I'd been overdosing my carbon source (NoPoX) by almost 20% per day. This explains a lot.
Now that I had a culprit, I was able to find dozens of forum threads and even an FAQ on Red Sea's website about clear slime resulting from overdosing NoPoX. Red Sea's recommendation is to reduce the dose by half, so I'll be taking a few days off of dosing NoPoX at all and then resuming at 1ml per day. Hopefully this will help...
On Day 24 I turkey basted the rocks again, turned on my wavemaker full blast for 15 minutes (which also helped a lot) and then replaced the filter socks to catch as much slime as possible. Also, for the first time, I did not dose any NoPoX.
Day 24-43 - 9/28/17-10/17/17 - Patience Iago...
(Ammonia = 0.0ppm, Nitrite = 0.1 to 0.025ppm, Nitrate = 15 to 6ppm)
Over the next three weeks I tried to be as patient as possible while the bacterial situation and levels worked themselves out. Other than testing and dosing 1mL of NoPoX each day (or 0.5mL on days when the slime appeared to be growing again) I did a 13% water change (2 gallons) each Sunday but didn't vacuum the gravel. I also changed the filter pads every three days or so and gradually I was getting less and less slime. What remains now is just a fine coating over of the bacterial film on the lower rocks, which I'm hopeful will also fade in time.
At this point, the cycle was nearly complete, so I started making preparations for tank inhabitants...
When it comes to cycling a tank there are a lot of options out there. The cheap damsel method (cruel), the dead shrimp method (gross), Dr. Tim's, Micro-Bacter 7, Red Sea Reef Mature, and probably a dozen others. While most are fairly well documented by internet sources, the Red Sea Reef Mature program has a relative dearth of good information. Especially if you are cycling with dry rock instead of live rock. And that's where we begin.
As I'm sure hundreds, if not thousands, of others were before me, I was lured back into the reefkeeping hobby by the BRS160 weekly YouTube series of videos on starting a new reef tank. I found Ryan's videos to be entertaining, engaging, and incredibly informative. I couldn't help myself but to follow along and set up a tank of my own.
In order to keep from getting lost in the sea of internet misinformation, I've tried to stick to the techniques and principles that are advocated by the BRS160 series. So, after much deliberation, I decided to follow their lead and begin with dry rock--for reasons mostly related to sustainability and minimizing hitch-hikers. And like the BRS160 series, I opted to cycle my tank using the Red Sea Reef Mature program. I chose to follow BRS here partly because Red Sea has a solid reputation for science-based products, but mostly because I did not do enough research ahead of time. Looking back I probably would have chosen Dr. Tim's, but this is a topic for another post.
Now, in the last 30 seconds of the "cycling" episode of the BRS160, Ryan says that he's going with the Reef Mature program, he won't use the Coralline Grow, and that's it. No advice, no step-by-step, no "here's how it went" in a later video. Nudge nudge Ryan...if this makes it way to you, I'd love to see a video on BRS' thoughts of how the Reef Mature cycle worked out.
So, I bought the kit and got started. I read a bit on the forums and discovered RedSeaKev, who must work for Red Sea, and doles out wonderful advice to people struggling with the Reef Mature program. Because of him, I think I actually understand how NoPoX works and why I need to run a wet skimmer. Despite Kev's helpful insights, the best I could gather about my specific question is that Reef Mature is made to be used with live rock and will 'take longer' with dry rock.
That seemed vague, so I contacted Red Sea. And they said,
"When using dry rock rather than live rock there is a good chance that the cycle may take a little bit longer because the natural bacteria that the live rock would bring into the system is not there. The dosing would still be according to the instructions but I would[n't] add in livestock until you are getting safe readings from testing."Yup, got that.
But...how much longer? Will I need to feed the bacteria more Bacto Start during the later weeks, when the ammonia is exhausted, so they don't starve? Do I need to run my lights since I have no beneficial algae to support? These sorts of questions remain unanswered. So, I'm recording my own experience below to let you know how I fared cycling an Innovative Marine Nuvo Fusion 20 gallon tank with dry rock and live sand with Red Sea Reef Mature.
If you're impatient, I'll give you the end results now. My tank took 46 days to fully cycle. During that period I battled a slimy bacterial outbreak that resulted from overdosing the NoPoX carbon-dosing supplement, but eventually cleared up. Below is the graph of my ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate levels over that period:
If you're interested to read more, the following is a brief introduction to the Red Sea Reef Mature program and a day-by-day journal of my experience cycling my new aquarium...
Red Sea Reef Mature Cycling Program
If you're not familiar with the Reef Mature program, honestly you can probably find a better explanation elsewhere, like Red Sea's website. But in the interest of completeness, I'll do my best to explain what I think it is, here.
The program consists of four components (liquid supplements) to be added to the aquarium on a very specific schedule over a period of three weeks, with intermittent water testing and thresholds to be achieved before introducing each type of livestock (invertebrates, herbivorous fish, other fish, corals). I'll be testing ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate every day so that I can hopefully provide some useful information to anyone reading this, and make that pretty graph of each parameter through the cycle.
The four supplements are Nitro Bac, Bacto-Start, KH Coralline Grow, and NO3:PO4-X or NoPoX.
- Nitro Bac is the actual nitrifying and de-nitrifying bacteria.
- Bacto-Start is the food for said bacteria. I'm assuming that Bacto-Start is basically ammonia, which would be the ideal food for these bacterial populations, but I can't seem to confirm this anywhere.
- KH Coralline Grow is an alkalinity supplement to replace alkalinity depleted from the water by the growth of coralline algae.
- NO3:PO4-X is a form of carbon dosing to feed de-nitrifying and de-phosphizing (?) bacteria that will help reduce and maintain low levels of nitrate and phosphate for overall tank health and improved coral color.
I am using Instant Ocean Reef Crystals salt, which mixes up to an alkalinity of about 12 dKh. Since I have no coralline algae, I've noticed that once my alkalinity settled in between 10 and 11, it never dropped from that point. So, like BRS, I'm not dosing the KH Coralline Grow.
I am following Red Sea's advice by dosing NoPoX at 3 ml per 100 liters of water, every day. I will continue to do this even after the cycle has completed. The goal here is to foster and feed (essentially carbon dose) anaerobic de-nitrifying bacteria that will help reduce and maintain low nitrates and phosphates over time. The "wet skim" removes the de-nitrified (?) and de-phosphized (?) compounds. Red Sea makes a big deal about how much better NoPoX is than vodka or vinegar dosing, but if I'm honest the powerful smell of the mystery liquid in the NoPoX bottle is distinctly vinegar-like with a hint of ethanol. So I think Red Sea has taken the mystery out of carbon dosing by producing their own vinegar-vodka and providing a calculated dosing regimen. Either way, I've heard good things and I can always stop if it's not working. This stuff would probably taste great on french fries, too. (Not really, don't eat it.)
Since I've covered the KH Coralline Grow and NoPoX supplements here, I won't discuss them later on. Assume I'm never dosing the former and dosing 2 ml (for my 68 liter system) of the latter every day of the cycle, unless otherwise noted (see Days 21+).
Day 1 - 9/4/17 - Setting Up
For me, Day 1 was actually almost two weeks, but that's because I was assembling my setup piece by piece. In retrospect I probably should have bought the Red Sea Max NANO all-in-one tank. Because for more money, I ended up essentially building a rectangular version of this handsome cube tank, which doesn't look nearly as slick because it lacks the one-brand integration that Red Sea has designed into their system. Sigh...the path not taken...but I digress.
Day 1 has you up and running with sand, rock, and water in the tank with stable temperature (79-82 F) and salinity (35 ppt), and a skimmer running "wet." Once you've got that you're ready to start. But, I diverged from the recommendations in two key ways.
First, I installed my brand new Ghost Skimmer, but since it needed to be broken in I had to start by running it only 2-3 hours a day when I was home, since it would foam like crazy and fill the skimmate cup in an hour or less. Since Day 2, I've been ramping the skimmer up a couple hours a day. By Day 10 the skimmer was running 24/7, producing nice wet skimmate that is not quite tea colored but not clear either. After 10 days the dreaded Ghost Skimmer microbubbles had subsided and all was right with the world.
Second, I am not running lights during the cycle. If I understand correctly, neither nitrifying nor de-nitrifying bacteria are photosynthetic. Since I don't have any desirable (coralline) algae on my dry rocks, I am skipping the lights in order to minimize the growth of nuisance algae. Basically, I'm trying to avoid the ugly-tank-syndrome that I've seen other Reef Mature users, like Roy Page, suffer from.
Day 2 - 9/5/17 - First Doses
(Ammonia = 0.0ppm, Nitrite = 0.1ppm, Nitrate = 1ppm)
Day 2 has the first dosing of Nitro Bac (the bacteria) and Bacto-Start (the bacteria food). The Day 2 dose is two parts bacteria (Nitro Bac) to one part food (Bacto-Start). In my case 13.4 ml of Nitro Bac and 6.8 ml of Bacto-Start.
On the morning of Day 3 I noticed the water was pretty cloudy. I think this was a little bacterial bloom.
Day 3 - 9/6/17 - More Bacteria
(Ammonia = 0.4ppm, Nitrite = 0.2ppm, Nitrate = 10ppm)
Day 3 adds an additional 1 part of Nitro Bac (the bacteria), in my case 6.8 ml.
This addition probably further added to the bacterial bloom, which lasted another day or two.
Day 3 is the first testing day and with live rock we'd expect the ammonia to be 1ppm, nitrite to be 0.1ppm, and nitrate to be 36 ppm. It appears that my system is slower on the uptake, since all of my parameters are lower than expected with live rock.
Days 4-6 - 9/7-9/17
(Ammonia = 0.1 to 0.0ppm, Nitrite = 0.2 to 0.0ppm, Nitrate = 15 to 20 to 15ppm)
No doses of bacteria or food these days.
Day 7 - 9/10/17 - More Dosing, First Water Change
(Ammonia = 0.0ppm, Nitrite = 0.0ppm, Nitrate = 10ppm)
Day 7 adds an additional 0.5 part of Nitro Bac (the bacteria), in my case 3.4 ml. It also adds an additional 1 part of Bacto Start (the bacteria food), for me 6.8 ml. Unlike the other times, this addition has more food (ammonia?) than bacteria being added. I had to re-read the instructions several times to be sure I was reading it correctly. I am. Whether this is correct or a mistake in the directions, I don't know.
The program includes a 5% water change, here. I did 1 gallon which is about 6%.
Day 7 is a partial testing day and with live rock we'd expect the ammonia to be <0.25ppm and nitrite to be <0.05ppm. So far, so good. But after the new addition of Bacto Start, things really started to take off.
Days 8-9 - 9/11-12/17
(Ammonia = 0.8 to 0.2ppm, Nitrite = 0.35ppm, Nitrate = 35 to 50ppm)
No doses of bacteria or food these days.
Day 10 - 9/13/17 - Final Doses
(Ammonia = 0.2ppm, Nitrite = 0.2ppm, Nitrate = 50ppm)
Day 10 adds the final 0.5 part of Nitro Bac (the bacteria) and 0.5 part of Bacto-Start (the bacteria food), in my case 3.4 ml of each. Now we wait...
Day 10 is a testing day and with live rock we'd expect the ammonia to be 0.0ppm, nitrite to be 0.0ppm, and nitrate to be 10 ppm. To confirm Red Sea's recommendation, dry rock does take longer than live rock. This is where the instructions and my experience began to diverge. Frankly my nitrate level was maxing out my test kit at this point, so it could have been higher than 50ppm and I can't tell if it's on the way up or down.
According to the program, if parameters were in line, we'd begin adding the cleaning crew today. I have no algae for them to eat and ammonia and nitrate levels that would not be healthy for any organism, so I'll be holding off on these little fellas for at least another week or two.
Day 11-13 - 9/14-16/17
(Ammonia = 0.2ppm, Nitrite = 0.35 to 0.2ppm, Nitrate = 50ppm)
Days 11 through 13 are for waiting for the levels to further reduce. In my case, I'll likely be waiting longer.
Day 14 - 9/17/17 - Second Water Change
(Ammonia = 0.1ppm, Nitrite = 0.2ppm, Nitrate = 35ppm)
The program recommends another 5% water change. Since the volume is so small and it's basically the same effort to do more or less, I opted to change out about 1.5 gallons of water or ~10% this time.
Day 14 is a partial testing day and with live rock we'd expect the ammonia to remain at 0.00ppm, nitrite to remain at 0.00ppm, and nitrate to have reduced to 5ppm. As you can see, with dry rock I'm still lagging well behind. But Day 14 did mark the first subtle reduction in nitrate, so it feels like we're headed in the right direction.
Day 15-20 - 9/18-23/17
(Ammonia = 0.1 to 0.0ppm, Nitrite = 0.1 to 0.025 to 0.1ppm, Nitrate = 20ppm)
Days 15 through 20, more waiting. Ideally, we're looking for ammonia and nitrite to drop to zero and nitrate to reach 10ppm. At that point (if there's any algae) the tank is ready for a cleanup crew. When nitrate hits 5ppm the system is ready for its first herbivorous fish. Finally, when nitrate stabilizes around 2ppm, the tank is fully cycled and ready for incremental additions of fish and corals.
At Day 19 I started noticing a clear, hairy slime beginning to form on my dry rocks. Everything I've read said to "be patient" while cycling, so for two days I left this as is and kept dosing as usual.
At Day 20, ammonia and nitrite were 0.00 and 0.1, respectively. Nitrates, however are coming down more slowly, testing at ~20ppm at day 20. This is not unexpected, as the de-nitrifying bacteria do take longer to establish and do work more slowly and gradually than the nitrifying bacteria, if I understand correctly. I think is where Red Sea's comment that dry rock "takes longer" comes into play.
Day 21 - 9/24/17 - Third Water Change
(Ammonia = 0.0ppm, Nitrite = 0.05ppm, Nitrate = 20ppm)
By Day 21, the clear slime had gotten pretty bad with strands 1/2" long growing off several of the rocks. At this point I thought that it might be a die-off of my nitrifying bacteria because I had not introduced an ammonia source to the tank since Day 10. A call to Red Sea and a trip to my LFS both confirmed that nitrifying bacteria will continue to live without an outside source of ammonia for some time (months to years) and so I should not need to continue dosing ammonia while the cycle finishes. LFS said the clear slime was likely a bacterial bloom and that it should go away on its own.
The program recommends a 5% water change at Day 21. In order to try and get ahead of the slime, I spent 15 minutes blasting it off of my rocks with a turkey baster, which worked surprisingly well, and cleaned the glass and back of the tank. I also removed the protein skimmer and rinsed off a coating of slime on it and cleaned the impeller and made sure the airline was clear, then reinstalled it. Finally, I did a ~25% water change, 4 gallons, and changed the filter sock/pad. The water cleared up within an hour and the slime seemed greatly reduced. Things were looking up.
At Day 21, Red Sea's instruction manual ends, so I'm now moving forward into uncharted territory. As outlined in Day 15-20 description, I'll be basing my judgment of when the cycle has completed on my maintenance of ammonia and nitrites at 0.0ppm and my nitrates stabilizing around 2ppm.
Day 22-23 - 9/25-26/17 - Watching and Waiting
(Ammonia = 0.0ppm, Nitrite = 0.05ppm, Nitrate = 20ppm)
I kept an eye on the slime and continue to test and dose NoPoX, as the slime returned and started getting worse.
Day 24 - 9/27/17 - Cracked It...Hopefully
(Ammonia = 0.0ppm, Nitrite = 0.05ppm, Nitrate = 20ppm)
On Day 24 things were looking pretty grim. The strands of slime were now 1-2" long in some places and tank was starting to look pretty nasty, although the water was still crystal clear. I spent a good portion of the day googling about clear slime and starting finding a common thread...clear slime is regularly associated with carbon dosing, particularly over-dosing.
I'd been dosing 3ml/100l of NoPoX since day 2 of the cycle, which I calculated based on my 18 gallon total water volume (20 gallon tank minus 2 gallons for rocks and sand, which I noted when I removed water to add the sand and rocks). This would make my system 68 liters, so my NoPoX dose was calculated at 2.04ml, which I rounded to 2ml.
Except with this new overdosing information, I decided to recalculate my system volume. I used a volume calculator by dimensions and using the ACTUAL interior dimensions of the tank calculated 17.06 gallons. Subtracting my 2 gallons of rock and sand displacement, I'm now calculating a system volume of ~15 gallons or ~57 liters. This means my 3ml/100l dose should have been 1.70ml. So for 20 days, I'd been overdosing my carbon source (NoPoX) by almost 20% per day. This explains a lot.
Now that I had a culprit, I was able to find dozens of forum threads and even an FAQ on Red Sea's website about clear slime resulting from overdosing NoPoX. Red Sea's recommendation is to reduce the dose by half, so I'll be taking a few days off of dosing NoPoX at all and then resuming at 1ml per day. Hopefully this will help...
On Day 24 I turkey basted the rocks again, turned on my wavemaker full blast for 15 minutes (which also helped a lot) and then replaced the filter socks to catch as much slime as possible. Also, for the first time, I did not dose any NoPoX.
Day 24-43 - 9/28/17-10/17/17 - Patience Iago...
(Ammonia = 0.0ppm, Nitrite = 0.1 to 0.025ppm, Nitrate = 15 to 6ppm)
Over the next three weeks I tried to be as patient as possible while the bacterial situation and levels worked themselves out. Other than testing and dosing 1mL of NoPoX each day (or 0.5mL on days when the slime appeared to be growing again) I did a 13% water change (2 gallons) each Sunday but didn't vacuum the gravel. I also changed the filter pads every three days or so and gradually I was getting less and less slime. What remains now is just a fine coating over of the bacterial film on the lower rocks, which I'm hopeful will also fade in time.
At this point, the cycle was nearly complete, so I started making preparations for tank inhabitants...
Day 44-45 - 10/18-19/17 - Prep
(Did not test)
Over these two days I gradually turned the tank temperature down from 79-80 degrees, where Red Sea recommended for the cycle to 77-78 degrees, where most sources seem to say is ideal for fish. I lowered the temperature by one degree per day so as not to shock anything.
(Did not test)
Over these two days I gradually turned the tank temperature down from 79-80 degrees, where Red Sea recommended for the cycle to 77-78 degrees, where most sources seem to say is ideal for fish. I lowered the temperature by one degree per day so as not to shock anything.
Day 46 - 10/20/17 - Cycle Complete
(Ammonia = 0.0ppm, Nitrite = 0.05ppm, Nitrate = 4ppm)
On Day 46 I declared the cycle complete! With Nitrates at 4ppm, I'm within Red Sea's recommended range for adding the first fish. Although I still occasionally see bumps of nitrite up to 0.05ppm, I think this is related to small die-offs of the de-nitrifying bacteria as I continue to reduce the dosage of NoPoX. At this point I've decided that 0.5mL is a day is probably a sustainable amount. We'll have to see whether that is enough to control nitrates in the long run...
As a reward for being patient through this long and sometimes confusing cycle, I headed to my LFS and picked out two adorable captive bred (Sea and Reef) juvenile ocellaris clownfish. I also picked up 500mL of Seachem Matrix which is a porous rock to go in the sump to host nitrifying and de-nitrifying bacteria. I'm doing this because I may remove some of my live rock in the future to make my aquascape more minimal and I want to be sure I have enough substrate for bacteria if I do that.
When I got home, I realized the smaller of the two clowns is a double mis-bar on the posterior two stripes, which I think is adorable. This is Pwa, above, and Elah, below (both named by my 5 month old son).
While I realize it is very long, I hope this article is helpful to anyone else considering using the Red Sea Reef Mature program to cycle a new tank with dry rock.
(Ammonia = 0.0ppm, Nitrite = 0.05ppm, Nitrate = 4ppm)
As a reward for being patient through this long and sometimes confusing cycle, I headed to my LFS and picked out two adorable captive bred (Sea and Reef) juvenile ocellaris clownfish. I also picked up 500mL of Seachem Matrix which is a porous rock to go in the sump to host nitrifying and de-nitrifying bacteria. I'm doing this because I may remove some of my live rock in the future to make my aquascape more minimal and I want to be sure I have enough substrate for bacteria if I do that.
When I got home, I realized the smaller of the two clowns is a double mis-bar on the posterior two stripes, which I think is adorable. This is Pwa, above, and Elah, below (both named by my 5 month old son).
While I realize it is very long, I hope this article is helpful to anyone else considering using the Red Sea Reef Mature program to cycle a new tank with dry rock.
Very helpful, thank you! Came here trying to decide whether to use the Red Sea approach or not, given that I have dry rock. Clearly beneficial but if anything your experience has helped me eliminate the option.
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