I have been seeing a lot of people throwing around the term soft cycle when referring to how they plan to start their tanks or as to how they are cycling their tank. Unfortunately most don't grasp the true meaning of a soft cycle and just jump on the bandwagon, as with so many other things in reefing. Hopefully I can clear a few things up.

The concept of soft cycling is simple, to keep as many sessile inverts and plants already on the rock alive during the cycling process by keeping the ammonia at a minimum. The key to a good soft cycle is high quality, fresh live rock, good lighting on a regular cycle, strong filtration (skimmer and running carbon are sometime necessary), regular water testing and very frequent water changes. Before you even think of soft cycling a tank you need to make sure you have the resources at your disposal to correctly soft cycle a tank. Do you have the money for high quality rock? Do you have a place to get the rock from? Do you have accurate test kits for NH3/NH4, NO3, NO2? Do you have plenty of salt and water on hand for water changes? Do you have enough storage space to store premixed salt water for water changes (sometimes as large as a 100%)? Do you have enough time to do daily water changes, test the water, monitor the tank, empty skimmer cups for up to 3 weeks? If you answered "No" to any of these a soft cycle is probably not right for you.

For those of you who did answer "Yes" to all the questions lets go over what preparation should be done for a soft cycle. The most important part of a soft cycle is the quality of the rock you start with since you can only maintain the animals that initially come in on the rock. A lot of people on this site I have seen claiming to soft cycle their tanks using very white or drab rock with almost no life, this entirely defeats the purpose of a soft cycle. The best way to get high quality live rock is to find a local store that can get direct shipments from importers or, even better, directly from the source in the eastern pacific or the Caribbean. Learn when they are expecting a shipment and have your tank ready before it arrives to minimize the amount of time that the rock remains out of water. If a local source can not be located then you can always get live rock from one of the many online sources, I would highly recommend Premium Aquatics. Call them and learn when they are expecting a shipment from a source that is known to typically have high quality live rock covered in life. Next set-up a shipment so that as soon as they get it they turn around and ship it to you. The most important thing about getting live rock shipped to you that it is shipped Overnight; Express or Ground WILL NOT WORK. It is vital that transfer time is kept to a minimal.

Once you get the live rock it is important to go over it thoroughly before you add it to your tank. Remove any dead crabs, worms, sponges, etc. from the rock. Determine which face of the live rock is up and identify where potential corals are and make sure they are facing towards the light. I would also leave as much macro algae, even potential pests, on the rock as possible as they can metabolize a significant amount of free nitrogen and carbon into their tissue. Its best to point strong flow going parallel across the face of the live rock so as to remove as much debris as possible and get it into the water column where it can be removed mechanically or neutralized chemically. Skimming is also going to be to be crucial to success (at least IMO) as it is perhaps the easiest method to remove dissolved organics from the water column. Remember to tune your skimmer to maximize the amount of skimmate that is pulling, keeping a constant watch to ensure the skimmer is running as efficiently as possible.

Now comes the hard part, keeping as little nitrogen in the water as possible. Nitrogen in the form of ammonia and nitrite will readily burn many of the animals that are intended to be saved by a soft cycle. The water in the tank must be monitored constantly and appropriate action must be taken based on these results. Water should be tested once if not two or three times daily. During the first couple days you should expect to see a spike in ammonia and large water changes (between 50-100%) should be preformed according to test results. It is important to set-up a water standard as far as temp, salinity, PH and alk are concerned and adhering to these standards for any new water entering the tank, so as not to shock the animals any further. Testing should continue and water changes done accordingly until nitrATES are registering near zero for a few day. There is absolutely no time table that can be set for a soft cycle as it is largely dependent on you filtration system, quality of live rock, and time spent in transit.

I hope this is helpful and I will readily edit it as need be.

To be continued.......

Crap. I hate to say it....but what Greenstar said is about right. Thats how I did my last tank (more or less) and worked for me.

Mark

Nice write up.

I would also suggest, if one has the time and inclination, to prepare a chemically seeded wet/dry or fluidized bed filter in advance. It needn't be fancy or expensive. You can cycle this abiotically by adding ammonium nitrate or ammonium chloride and monitoring daily for N compounds. Once nitrate begins rising you can add larger and larger amounts (keeping total ammonia under 1.0ppm) to produce a "bioload". When the rock arrives, do a 100% water change and keep everything running.

Inside the container you are using to do this I would also suggest elevating the rock on a frame so that shedded detritus settles where it is easy to siphon out or suspend for filter removal. Pulling the rocks out and swishing them around vigorously in seawater in a separate container will help as well.

Thanks for all the info greenstar.

You know, if you added some pics, that would make a nice article for the Information/Nano Reef Articles Section.

IMO, we need to build that section up; it would certainly save time for the more experienced members because we can just direct people to articles instead of typing the same thing over and over again. Better than stickying threads.

I'm letting my tank cycle without loads of live rock right now (there's a foam rock wall in the main display and only two small pieces of rock in the fuge- lots of sand). I'm planning to buy some sealifeinc rock or premium aquatics rock (whatever the best deal is) and add that to the fuge after my tank finishes the cycle that's going on right now. I'm hoping that this should help out with soft-cycling the new rock and keep all the hitchers alive. I'll still go for water changes, etc. Think having an established bio filter in the tank is going to help?

It couldn't hurt but I think the question is more about capacity rather than simple presence. If your bacteria are set and ready to go, they can chew through a lot of NH3 and NO2 in a swift amount of time.

True - I guess I'm wondering if I'll have enough of a capacity to handle the new rocks without running into a huge second cycle. The whole rock wall will be populated along with sand beds in both the display and the fuge. I'll just have to keep a close eye on it.

Thank you Greenstar. You very effectively summarized what I have had to go through twice in the last 6 weeks and will again in about 2 weeks.

I would add the following:

1. You can fully cure live rock before you put it in so you do not have to buy all new high quality live rock. Just a portion that you use to seed the other rocks.

2. Running carbon and a skimmer are not options they are mandatory

3. Testing at least twice a day and better 3-4 times is also mandatory

4. Macro algae is also a good addition to take up Nitrates et al.

5. Over 50% water changes are not wise and should only be done in a true emergency situation. Better to do a 25% then wait several hours, test again, and if needed do a second 25% water change than a 50%+ one all at once.

So I guess the dead rock/boiled rock/cooked rock fad is over huh?

Personally I wish an unhappy death to most everything on my live rock. I want my rock as rock-like as possible, with NO hitchhikers. In my experience ALL hitchhikers end up as pests, save for stomatella.

I like the stuff that came in on mine... Nice macros, coral, etc.

I could do without the bubble algae than came with some of my early frags though.

Really no one hard cycles anymore? I use base everything, add a dead shrimp wait until amonia spikes and then is taken care of by the hob biowheel. (The best thing I ever did was keep my old hob biowheels running all the time. Whenever I set up a new tank these mature filters that now sit in a 500 gallon system are ready to cycle a 70 gallon tank overnight). Only after the tank is fully cycled I would add liverock slowly, keep an Ammonia Alert on the tank just in case of sudden change, and I never really see ammonia again. Any liverock losses are unnoticeable. I then add the more rock, algae, etc... Eventually the hob is removed and the biowheels go back in a tank to stay alive. IIf you have a tank and are thinking about another this works for me at least. I think prolonging the process with mini cycles put undue stress on inverts. Get it done and forget about it.

Get 'er done!

Best rock I have I grew myself. When I came later and added rock covered in hitchhikers to my base, no noticeable die off or spikes.

For carbon, are we talking normal carbon or something HQ like chemi-pure elite?

Just activated carbon would do some good.

Alright, good. that's what I"m running. How often should I change it out? I'm running a small media bag full.

You could easily change it out every day but I am sure that two days would be fine too.

Are you pushing water through it? You'll want to have water move through it to maximize it's affect.

It's in an old AC30 I had - I don't have a media reactor so that's the best I can do. At least it has a good amount of flow going around the bag.

Would it be ok to soft cycle in a smaller tank so I could use less water? I'm setting up a 35 gallon tank with a 10gal sump and a 10 gal refugium. I plan to have around 25 to 35 lbs of bulk reef supply "reef saver" rocks and around 15 to 25 lbs of Sea Life Inc rock (overnighted). So could I soft cycle the 15 to 25 lbs of live rock in say a 10 gal tank (with carbon and skimmer)? I'm thinking that the added gallonage of doing the soft cycle in the 55 gal system would help buffer the ammonia, nitrite, and nitrates much better than a 10 gal. But would it be worth the added trouble of the added gallons need for a 25%-50% water change on the 55 gal system? Of course as I write this I'm thinking that a 10 gal soft cycle system would probably require more water changes than the 55 gal system would, so the amount of water used would could be the same in the end. I have an ro/di unit so as long as I premake the salt water I guess the water changes will not be too big of a deal.

Any thoughts?

I followed these suggestions for cycling my tank because I spent a lot of money on my rock and wanted my hitchhikers to survive. Just wanted to say it worked marvelously I did smaller water changes though. Lot's of stuff survived Thx

Yeah. Me too. I would much rather not have to deal with the nasties like Apstasia and GHA that seem to come along with the nice stomatella and micro brittle stars. Ergo why my 'new' live rock has been cooking in a trash can for three months. By now *EVERYTHING* over 100 micron's should be dead on it but it should be nice and populated with bacterium...

Another thing you might want to add to this list would be vodka dosing. Especially if its about getting bacterium up to speed quickly. I believe Mew mentioned something about using 2-4 ml of the stuff daily to really jump start the bacteria growth in a new tank and shorten the cycle time...

Hey Urchinhead,

What's your reasoning here?




I so wish Aiptasia would go away by doing that but it seems that it rarely does IME. Seems like it can do just fine without any light at all.

When I posted it I am sure there was a stunningly brilliant and well reasoned cause for it... Now I can't seem to remember... I am guessing I was transposing QT tank and soft cycle upon looking back and in the timeframe.

To retract what I said... I would agree if its a new tank then 50%+ to cut down NO3/4 and NH3 levels is a good thing.



Argh! And here I was hoping that the salinity shifts and keeping it in the dark with high amounts of Ammonia/Nitrite/etc and a hypoxic environment (as the big stuff on the rock dies and bacteria blooms) would kill everything off! LALALALALALA I AM NOT LISTENING TO WOMBAT! NO AIPTASIA! ALL DEAD! LALALALALALA!

Salinity shifts do NUZZING!

if you are setting up a refugium in the system then just cycle that part then add the LR in stages and you will be fine.

<fingers in ears> LALALALALALA I AM STILL NOT LISTENING TO WOMBAT! NO AIPTASIA! ALL DEAD! LALALALALALA!

Intellectually I understand that. Emotionally though... Actually for Aiptasia (and other things) I use a combo of concentrated kalk paste and/or Joe's. And I jump on it the moment I see it. So far it works like a charm.

Seriously though it was more about killing off as much as what was left on the rock and recycling it bacteria-wise than anything else. Thats why it sat there for so long (actually it was because I was WAY late getting the 60 on line but that's my story and I am sticking to it! )

Oddly enough a fair amount of creatures did survive. Including a small star fish that I caught on the glass last night and a passel of 'pods that went scurrying when I turned the lights on. I wasn't planning on doing any testing until this Friday (It would be one week with water at that point) but since there is "Proof of Life" in the tank it looks like I am going to have to. And jump on the soft cycle bandwagon hard core.

Do those ammonia meters I see at PetCo actually work for salt water? I always was under the impression they don't.

We do some cycling with ammonium nitrate (rather than fish or live rock) and use these bad boys to tell us when to add more:

http://www.aquariumguys.com/ammoniaalert.html

I generally take pretty drastic action (like 50% water changes) if a tank ever shows anything above the zero level while animals are in it.

Ah. I see. Ok I can swing that. Petco near me carries them... Thank you.

Probably a little late, since I just read through this thread again (for the tenth time), I would use the larger tank and do larger water changes, or more frequent water changes.

This makes no sense if the goal is setting up a microbiologically balanced system; you can't stoichiometrically pre-determine what the load will be and set-up a filter before hand which will be balanced with the final load. One will always either over- or under-shoot the final load, and the final setup will still need to balance out microbiologically, i.e. cycle.

The point of a soft-cycle is for the life in the tank to NOT experience any discernable cycle. Abiotically cycling a tank with ammonium chloride is the farthest thing from soft-cycling that I can imagine. It also adds a completely unnecessary complication and source of imbalance. This thread has gone horribly wrong if that's what the discussion has turned into.

Thanks for this thread... Ideally it sounds great but I read through and answered no to some of those questions and stopped reading. Not going to try it out.

I was kind of forced to do a softer cycle, myself.

I bought 25 pounds of Bali Live rock from AquaCON, before I knew better.
He shipped it ground from Florida to California. Took 8 days to arrive.

Needless to say, my live rock was essentially base rock by the time. In terms of coralline and hitchhikers.

A month after cycling that mess I bought another 25 pounds of uncured Bali from Premium Aquatics. Shipped overnight.
It was teeming with life(and death) on arrival. I cure cycled that, with foam fractionator running. And a month later it was still teeming with life. Polyp corals, crabs, sponges, coralline is off the hook alive, bristleworms, little rock feather dusters.

House had a weird and funky smell kinda for a week, but am very satisfied with the tank now. And with the bio diversity. Fighting nuisance algae still right now, but that will abate soon enough.

If you are interested in keeping hitchhikers and the like alive on your live rock. And want to have a biologically diverse tank, I (now) think that a soft or softer cycle is a viable and desirable way to go.

And can be done as simply intentionally, as I found on accident. Buy half the live rock you want. Cycle that for a month. Turn on your skimmer, and then add the rest of your live rock. Pretty simple process.

I've actually soft cycled both my 95 and 24 gallon reef systems. I had very good experience with it and never had to battle the algae issues. All I did was 10% daily water changes for the first 2 months and a 20% water change every week. My 95 gallon has a protein skimmer and phosphate reactor with about 175 lbs of cured live rock. I bought it from an established system that was running for about 3 years. There was minimal die off because it was only in transit for about 30 min in buckets of SW. Along with the rock came several fish and a few corals. All have survived for the last two years even during the cycling process. Obviously, there was some die off because I had a different aquascape than the original owner, but it was very minimal and my nitrates only went up to 10. Because of the frequent water changes the phosphates, nitrites, ammonia, remained at 0. However, I did have a low PH at about 7.9 for the first two weeks and I gradually raised it with some reef buffers.


I did the same last year when I bought a 24 gallon Aquapod from CC. It came with acans, trumpets, palys, carpet nem, GSP, Blue cloves, pair of clowns, and a dottyback. The tank also had about 35 lbs of LR and a 1/2 inch of LS. I got rid of the LS and put some fresh sand in there when I set it up. The system was up for 2 yrs and there was awesome growth on the corals. There's no skimmer and the only filtration is the filter pads, carbon bag, and phosban media bag. I did 1-3 gallon daily water changes and a 5-10 gallon water change weekly. I bought the tank last April. I still do daily and weekly water changes and the tank is doing awesome. Here are some pics. I obviously added some corals in the last few months.

http://i684.photobucket.com/albums/vv202/n.../IMG_0230-1.jpg
http://i684.photobucket.com/albums/vv202/n...16/IMG_0237.jpg
http://i684.photobucket.com/albums/vv202/n...16/IMG_0233.jpg
http://i684.photobucket.com/albums/vv202/n...16/IMG_1755.jpg
http://i684.photobucket.com/albums/vv202/n...16/P1000354.jpg


Hope this helps

I didn't know what a soft cycle was....but that is what I did, basically, except with fuge and no skimmer... I guess that is why I have purple going crazy at 3 1/2 weeks. This does work people.

I believe the quality of the rock is the biggest factor; if you're like me and can't stand waiting 3 months +, buy the best (and that usually means most expensive) rock you can find.

My rock was $10per Lb from LFS, so it wasn't out of the water more than 15min. Also I believe a key factor is gathering bacteria (from good healthy looking tanks) from multiple different locations. You can't expect one "rock" to have all the bacteria the ocean contains, nor will 100 rocks, but the more of a variety you get the more varied you're biological filter will be.

Hi guys i know this is an old thread. But just checking on a few details as I am trying to do a soft type cycle.

I have a 20gal AIO (Cheap Copy is all thats avaliable here is OZ) it was cycled for two weeks with seeded Aragonite and very cured base rock and 4kg on new cured rock.
I have just added 10kg of the freshest rock I've every seen straight off the Barrier Reef shipped directly form the collector the day he came ashore.
the life in this is amazing it's been in the tank for two days, I've started skimming and daily water changes, also have carbon and fresh macro running on a 24hr light cycle.
Am I on the right path so far?
any things to look out for? tank is begining to smell as the die off occurs
all suggestions greatly appreciated
thanks

How big are your water changes? You might want to inspect for clearly dead things.

Skimming and water changes are great. Carbon and macroalgae may help (the light cycle doesn't have to be 24 hours).

Water change size planned was dependant upon test results really, higher the ammonia greater the water change.
as for dead stuff was considering removing some of the rock for a light scrub as there is defintly some macro dying on there.. just love to keep the acro and monti alive if I can...

If you want an acropora/montipora to survive, you will need to keep ammonia at effectively 0 ppm. Try to do large water changes (50% or more), and make sure your water source is filtered (like distilled or RO/DI).

Will this work as a sort of pre-cycle?
I was thinking of using bio balls in the filter section of my CL 22gal, and fill the fuge with cheap live rock pieces to get the bacteria in the tank. Then i will try to cycle that with dead shrimp or ammonia. Once this is cycled I was thinking of ordering high quality LR and LS same day delivery to my local airport. After I do a full water change, I would add the LR and LS and then I can slowly remove the bio balls over several weeks.

Even same day delivery would cause some die-off and it would not be a soft cycle...

Just get the rock and put it in your tank. It will do its thing even if you try to build up the bacteria before hand.

IMO, live sand is not really that huge of a thing to order. Just get regular sand and put the LR on top of it. It will become LS soon enough.

dsoz

don't remember the last time I was so enthralled by a thread. don't keep up with any new trends so I hadn't clicked on this thread even once to know what a soft cycle was, and its amazing to think of the countless type arguments I have been in advocating this idea not even knowing it had a coined moniker already, wow. thought I was alone.

in no way do I dislike hard cycles either John, as some of my friends didn't have access to wet stuff and had to do it the old fashioned way, which they deserve more credit in the end for success anyway for 'hand assembing' their automobiles...but if given the choice I like to choose soft simply for the quick startup.

there's only one thing I want to add/question, and that's why does one even have to have the initial ammonia reading to begin with? To me, that makes it -not- a soft cycle, SC in the purest sense Im claiming should be all ammonia free, at every step in the tank, such that you do -not- have to test the water more than a couple times total because the biology will be trustworthy, always. I have ran several year+ pico reefs with online threads and not one time has ammonia ever, ever been detected even when filling up the tank with corals on day 2 or 3. here's why:

so the ammonia in the first thread is coming from dieoff, where benthic life was previously supported by aged systems (or the ocean) with great internal floc/marine snow/natural suspended life and larvae. Thats what the benthic array of sponges, feather dusters and micropods feed upon, and its usually the #1 lacking foodstuff in a new (and aged) nano, so the populations starve and dieoff, I can see that. Also, emersing the rock or handling it rough during shipment in bags of rotting water can also cause dieoff I see that too.

But what about only selecting pristine small pieces from an aged aquarium, where the rock has been in there for months and is all purple and has the *normal* benthic densities based on its recent lifespan in an *aquarium*? why does there have to be dieoff when transferring to the new nano reef, from an existing one or from a slightly larger 75 gallon LFS live rock tank which isn't itself registering detectable ammonia? I say instead of taking live rock we could never support, and killing some of it, we leave that stuff in place and only work with aquarium goods, where all is selected for this low suspended nutrient, high dissolved nutrient lifestyle?

So in retrospect, soft cycling is all I've ever known, its all Ive ever done, and I've never seen ammonia I've never even owned the test kit for it, was a borrowed one the first few times I tested just because the books said you had to. after never finding it on my first pico, the test has never been ran again on several successive sytems and corals will indicate systemic ammonia faster than a test kit so with them all bright and shiny id still claim there never was any. I simply buy rounded fist-sized chunks of purple rock, without a lot of extra growth and use the reefbowl to tack on the extra growth as selected for...its instant cycling, with instant coral loading and it works at the gallon level I find it vexing people with 20x tanks have a harder time... perhaps the fact I do only 100% water changes matters too lol

100% water changes are not harmful at least in non fish setups I can say that without challenge or my pico pics wouldn't show the density of life they do year in and out on the same tank with no changes. sponges, tube worms and unidentified hangers-on are there that did not begin there, to me a true soft cycle never had a chemical downside and was on the up and up from day one.

I'd have to agree and have used this method for the last two years to setup new tanks and transfer old ones. As long as you start off with cycled rock from an established system I've had 0 ammonia readings and stopped testing ammonia years ago. To be honest, the only test I use are Ca, Mg, Alk, and occassionally Nitrates, but even then I don't test for nitrates because I could tell by looking at my tanks if there's any issues. I've been using this method in my two nano's not only during the cycling period, but I do small daily water changes and a larger weekly water change in my 24 gallon. I've had corals in all of my tanks because they were bought as established systems for the most part, except my 12 gallon AP. I transfered over the rock and sand from my 95 gallon into the 12 gallon and added some coral frags since day one. All are alive and healthy. What also helped was a ball of chaeto in the main display the size of a baseball. After 6 weeks it was the size of a softball, but every coral in there was alive and thriving. Anyways, this is how I will always cycle my tanks and there's no use of throwing in dead stuff to jump start anything. However, I would have to say that it takes more dedication, but the results are a lot less issues and headaches in the long run..

I think greenstar had in mind uncured live rock to have a soft cycle ("The key to a good soft cycle is high quality, fresh live rock..."), not using cured (pre-cycled) rock, where a cycle is unlikely to happen in the first place. He goes on to say "A lot of people on this site I have seen claiming to soft cycle their tanks using very white or drab rock with almost no life, this entirely defeats the purpose of a soft cycle."

The way I interpreted the soft cycle is that it's meant to save hitchhikers that would be missing in LFS cured rock, unless it was soft cycled there.

and to add the life on the live rock I think should actually be lesser than the ideal, ie whatever one is allowed to grow in their system is what should be on the rock. starting with the growth attained in months under refugiums, exceptional planktonic feeding or even worse the ocean and then moving it to a 14 gallon biocube spells dieoff nearly everytime.

just my opinion but the large water change should be the soft cyclers best friend just as a safety net for whatever~this is a rather impatient technique lol

So you disagree with 50% of the "soft cycle" idea. The waterchanges are ok, but you don't want rock that is covered in oceanic life. I also marvel at your accusation that this is a "rather impatient technique".

For the people who advocate this method (such as myself), this isn't a patience/impatience issue, it is the development of a new paradigm.

The impetus behind the soft cycle technique is a different paradigm than you typically find. Generally, aquarists stay away from ocean hitchers and go for "cured" rock that's been in an LFS tub for 6 months, hoping to avoid mantis shrimp or difficult microalgae. In contrast, the soft-cycler attempts to retain as many oceanic hitchhikers as possible.

lol you wanted to argue because of my syntax but great science kept you from filleting what I wrote thats neat Fos feel free to come back firmer next post Im just saying we don't disagree on specifics all that much in past posts.



Maybe I don't take what the OP wrote about soft cycling lock, stock and barrel yes~

In my mind soft cycling just means never detecting ammonia, and starting off with bioloading quicker than past paradigms. ie impatient, thanks for your correction

If I could be pinned down to one statement, and held accountable, it would be that you can know, predict and utilize the presence of ammonia and nitrite without ever testing for them because of the order of operations one used in building a tank. use a messy, eclectic order of operations and you get no repeatability. these are not unpredictable compounds, they are solidly repeatable among systems if close stocking techniques are applied, that's the new science to me

Proper syntax is important when trying to convey meaning. Try using proper sentences and perhaps you may actually get your point across here.



So then you do disagree with about half the reason that this method was first advocated.

Forgive me for saying so but it really doesn't matter what soft cycling is in your mind. You've already made it clear that you don't like the paradigm so I don't see how a strawman helps you here. If you want to talk about your own view of soft-cyling, that's fine but let's not pretend that you're talking about the same thing as everyone else here.



I think I'll go ahead and hold you accountable to each statement you make and I expect you do to the same for me. This is a great favor to those who want to increase in wisdom and knowledge.

In this case, you appear to be arguing from one or a combination of these implicit assumptions:

1) We (the general population of aquarists) misunderstand the order of the nitrogen cycle.
2) The nitrogen cycle does not occur in the same sequence in all aquaria.
3) We cannot use past evidence to predict the course of future events in aquaria.

I'm going go ahead and categorically reject all three of them and say that your argument is both fallacious and needlessly argumentative.



Once again, your meaning is lost because you fail to actually explain yourself. At best, this is a truism as stated. Please hang up and try again.



What are you talking about here?

You did escalate he he thats a suprise

As far as your 123 listing, I am saying that more people (who aren't challenged enough) in these/this forum misstate the nitrogen cycle and how that is unique to nano reefs vs large tanks, just like denitrification, etc and they also like to write their statements in a factual way. challenging that if its wrong is my schtik, its what I live for due to ocd in pico reefs, lets you and I play.
we just need to separate the personal insult from the science and that will reveal.

Only people with test readings can participate, without test readings from a newly established tank all argument is null. I have my old ones from newly established tanks to go on, you get yours.

Wherever ammonia registered, lets talk about that and I'll tell you how it could have been prevented in the soft cycle. Fos rather than just witty types we can be really specific here, you and I could make a thread for the ages keep on track. quote me like you have been doing, only start here<

When nitrite magically appears, after nitrate registered and ammonia was zero, we'll talk about that too.

thanks for joining fos, takers are few this place needs checks and balances lol thank you for providing mine


I do set up systems all the time under my method, do you have proof that my ways do not work? Been doing it ten years with the pics and vid to show that rather than saying "Ive done nano reefs for ten years this way" without having nano reef pics and vids that old (coming up). Id like to see yours, but more importantly Id like to see your test results rather than your exceptional banter, my old test results were exactly as written. the test results I get in pm (later to be submitted as evidence against your claim) are exactly what I wrote, why would a nano reef og lie man? its wiser to just post ammonia and nitrite readings and argue for that, but you won't, you'll just argue up more philosophy.



Your login date shows four years although Im sure your nano reefing goes back far longer, it always does with you guys. The funny thing is, the older your pics get the larger the tanks right~ actual nano reef experience is probably right about what your login date shows how have you had time to see it all? Your abililty to cut and paste information written for large reefs, and not specifically to nanos, should be sheerly profound Im ready to learn. If you have pics and readings ready on more than 5 individual tanks showing out of order nitrification readings that's also amazing and would really look great for you.


You want to argue the semantics of soft cycling as a detraction from facts I want to hold you to, who cares if you don't like my definitions I was trying to be helpful from experience. If you want to say my designs from 2001 using this method are wrong and not repeatable to the several ongoing discussions in my inbox that's just silly and not worth the battle but it will be fun proving you wrong with pms from about 15 people on this board-- if I can get their permission to inject them perpendicular to your diatribe. The only thing I will be posting are the test measurements, no personal opinions.

It is possible to never register ammonia in the life history of your reef tank. Ammonia is so 1990 and equals death, it won't show up without DEATH or direct addition in a nano reef and that's something the caretaker missed IF they are dealing in soft cycles. THATS why ammonia is always predictable without a test kit, its the least important, most unused test kit I could ever be pressed to buy because I modulate death to avoid needing it buddy.

purists won't have it, detectable ammonia, so my ways are for purists man. maybe its the tree hugging of nano reefs I don't know lol but they work unendingly.

In every tank I have ever setup or coached we have never, ever detected nitrite, how about those apples. Hell the youtube comments alone describe the journey for a few, you just spend too much time on nr not gettin that ego checked and not innovatin a whole lot but Im sure you'd edge me in a diction assay kind Sir lol.

Curing level of live rock for soft cycling in the nano reef:

It is possible to sustain all the benthic growth I mentioned to avoid, however most will not take the appropriate steps and will overnutrify their tanks so YES my experience tells me to start with a lower threshold for the new reefer. When you introduce highly diverse live rock into a new system, be it wild (which is lame and unsustainable if not maricultured, stop it) or heavily aged in a tank with exceptional feeding or a refugium, it has a feed demand just like adding a fish. There are trophic levels so diverse even reefers with 4 years experience don't talk about them so it should be known that live rock quality impacts a lot for the nano reef, and its impact is always predictable before the fact unless you have the 1/1,000,000 rotten live rock.

The growths on quality must have pure, non degraded proteinic foods in suspension, and this is the number one thing lacking in a new reef (90% of nano reefs) along with the ability to predict and assuage high dissolved nutrient levels in the water which is what a lot of newcomers get when trying to feed a tank really well and export it not so well. Export hasn't been covered enough for my tastes in the thread.

the benthic communities in live rock are better earned, and not placed with purchase, in the nano reef, for reasons unbecoming to a larger reef. I'll show you a pic of what I earned with my methods of treatment below as one way that works with verifiable proof (a pic)

Unless you take specific steps to manage thick live rock growth, and some have been mentioned really well in here, you will read ammonia and this means you didn't manage your lifebox very well. Ammonia and nitrite never appear without an instantly detectable source, the hardest being poor quality live rock decaying from within. I have never come across any, but I know its there because its the only substrate in the nano reef we can't take apart to see, and subtrate+protein is what the whole point of our argument is about. In highly exceptional cases of rotten live rock the measures I support will be off, but not ever outside that causation. How cool is that, 99% repeatability and 8 years of pm's to back it up. You must have alot of second hand information in your arsenal too Fos, not just first hand testing of your own multiple reefs you are about to post showing nitrite after zero ammonia, so lets see that. I need more links handy when tangling with cool guys.

If the original poster wants to insert the most aged live rock and the most diverse, and handle the suspension feedings and water changes that come along with supporting that more power to you, its the upper echelon of soft cyclers but most of that life will transition anyway within the confines of the nano reef and new reefers have a hard time maintaining high suspended nutrients and low dissolved ones (the only condition that supports prime reef rock). I balance my recommendations with what keeps algae at bay the best in nano reefs as well, and the smartest thing you will ever do with live rock in a nano reef is earn the growth that comes on it, don't start out with it, because its the lowest nutrient demand which is always best for new reefers. At least people should know of these nutrient demand issues when dealing with live rock continuums, quit assuming dieoff is not negotiable and unpredictable that's so yesterday and repetitive