Cycling my first tank. Questions.

Hey guys,

After lots of money spent, I am finally cycling my first tank. Relevant specs:

100 gallon
120 lbs of BRS reef saver live rock (so no dead matter on it) that soaked in a bin for a week before adding it to main tank (to reduce dust and stuff).
A two inch live sand bed.

I have a protein skimmer, sump/refugium underneath. By the way, when should I add algae to the refugium?

I ordered a starting kit online, which basically came with a bottle of TLC quickstart (which I added), a live rock covered in coralline algae and later found out the mussles on it were alive! (it's in the tank), and a bag of gravel and water from an old established tank (came with the rock and TLC).

Anyways, my ammonia and nitrites are zero, nitrates are about 20. I am using red sea salt mix (and my calcium/Mg/KH are all correct parameters) and my PH is about 7.8.

Question/problem 1:
I was hoping that the coralline algae would grow on the other very boring looking rocks. In order to do this, I have been blasting nothing but deep blue LED's (I have a radion led fixture... yes I am poor now) on it, because I know they like blue light. It's not spreading (it's been about four days now) but there IS some white hair algae starting to spread. Should I be worried about this? Should I just do normal light cycles, or is the blue light okay to get through all the algae stages?

Question/problem 2:
When can I add a hardy fish/cleanup crew? This tank is soooo boring, and it's hard to get my wife to be as patient as I am. There is currently a few mussels/filter feeders on the one live rock we have (which is starting to grow white hair algae).

Overall the rock has been in the tank for nearly a month now. Thanks in advance for your help. Being patient at this stage is hard.

 

Coraline algae can really take a long time to grow. It will probably be months before it really starts to spread out a lot.

 

You can add your refugium algae now if you'd like.

As far as the coralline, it's still very early, I wouldn't worry. It takes some time before it starts growing everywhere, and even longer before it starts covering everything.

Your cycle might be over, could not be. I would add some kind of ammonia source such as fish food to see if the bacteria in your tank has established itself. If you don't get any spikes and the ammonia is gone within a day, you're good to add your CUC.

 

As for the coraline algae, Place your rock in front of a power head. It may help you in distributing the algae.

I would wait AT LEAST a week to 10 days(Best to give it a month if you have the patience) before adding fish/cleanup crew.(Assuming you are starting with live rock) From what you say it has already been a month. Live rock and live sand starts the cycle pretty fast. You need to add fish very slowly. I wouldn't add more than one per month. Your tank needs time to adjust to the increased bio load. IME, The cleanup crew can be added after about a month. So you are probably ready to get started.

 

I would go ahead and add a small fish like a damsel or clown. You will want to get your nitrates down, as they feed algae, but 20 isn't terrible and won't hurt a fish or CUC. Are you using RO/DI water. That is a MUST. Have you tested for phosphate?

Are you sure its white hair algae and not a sponge? Sponges hate flow. I would point a powerhead right at it and scrub it off with a toothbrush. It will fall off and die. Most sponges aren't bad, but ugly and annoying. I have had sponges that actually smothered and killed corals. If it is just on one rock I would just take that rock out. Sponges are usually white, and have many shapes. Get rid of it before it becomes a problem. Take a picture...

 

Totally disagree with adding a Damsel. You'll just wind up *trying to remove it* later as they are pretty aggressive.
Please be patient! Give your tank at least 4 full weeks to establish a good bacteria growth.
As for the white fuzzy algae looking stuff, without a pic it's hard to say what it may be. A few ideas, fungus, sponge or some type of algae. Try directing a little more flow to that area.
Ditto on the coralline growth being somewhat slow in the beginning. Again give it time, again maintain patients.

 

Thanks so much for all the quick replies.

I have been shining nothing but "Deep blue" light for the past couple days. Does anyone know if it's okay/smart to do this?

My reasoning: Unwanted algae needs red/white light. Coralline algae (the best kind right?) wants deep blue lights.

Foreseen problem: I may not get the algae blooms that other people get in a tank. Will this ultimately hurt my ecosystem? Should I just let the algae come?

I am using RODI water.

I don't want a Damsel in my tank. I'll post a fish list for everyone to look at when I get home

 

I uploaded a picture of the white stringy stuff. Zoom in and its clearer. It's kind of hard to see through the camera. I added some frozen fish food this morning, as someone advised. Here are my water parameters 10 hours later:

Ammonia: .50 ppm
Nitrite: 0 ppm
Nitrate: 5 ppm
Phosphate: .25 ppm (boo hoo)

What do people think? Wait longer?

I am using an API test for everything.