I just got a new tank, and its salt water. It has nothing alive in it but 2 pieces of live rock. Its set up on a sump filter and has not been cycled. I got a new test kit and everything looked fine so it was recomended to me that i get a fish to begin the cycling process. I got a blue damsel. He later died and i realized that i had read my tank results wrong. Th pH was around 8.2, the salt water ammonia was a 0, nitrates where around 10 and the nitrtates wher at 1.0 ppm. I know that is high, how can i get them down and why is it that hight?
Answers:
The reason the nitrates are high is because your tank is cycling. Dont add fish, especially damsels, until cycling is over. Damsels are horribly mean little fish, they will seem nice and docile until a fish gets a bit sick, then torture said fish to death, when you try to remove them from the tank, good luck, you'll have to remove all rocks corals and everything to get them out.
Try putting a bit of fish food in to kick start the cycle. or if you've got any frozen shrimp (just normal shrimp, salad shrimp or whatever from the grocery store) throw one in there and just leave it, it should break down providing food for the bacteria that break down the ammonia into nitrite the nitrite feeds the bacteria that make it nitrate, and if you've got enough live rock (should be 1-2 lbs per gallon of water) then the anerobic areas of the rock should harbor bacteria to remove the nitrate. Until the cycle completely stops movin around (can take a few weeks) dont put any poor fishies in!
After you start adding fish add only one per month or so, that gives the bacteria enough time to adjust itself to the growing bioload.
oh yes, and you didnt necessarily read the numbers wrong, it was likely the damsel did indeed kick off a cycle, and the bacteria couldnt keep up with the load, and the fish died in what was basically toxic water, which is part of why you shouldnt cycle with live fish, I know its boring without them, but ya just gotta wait it out!
Maybe you are like me and you just don't have much patience. You see a empty tank with no fish and it drives you crazy. I can tell you that there is a few solutions for this. But it's a little on the costly side. It's a long post but you can just skip to the bottom and just read the last paragraph if you like and still get the main idea.
Option A.There is something called Bio Spira. I don't know what size tank your salt water aquarium is. But it only takes 3oz to treat 90 gallons. This stuff isn't cheap however nor is it easy to find. Make sure it's kept cold and hasn't sat on the self for too long.
Option B is using media from an established tank. Make sure you know the tank you are getting that media from is a good source. By a good source I mean very healthy fish in a tank that is kept clean. Taking media from that tank and placing it in yours should add beneficially bacteria to your tank. However, this will have a negative affect if the person your getting media from doesn't take good care of their tank.
Option C adds on to the answer above mines. Throwing in food would work I suppose. But I normally use pure ammonia. Not the easiest thing to find. I'm sure you have some in the hardware stores around you. The trick is finding out where in the store they have it. This product has a very low demand so even the workers have no clue where it is. I promise you that this option will work. It just takes a lot of patience. It's going to be about 4 to 6 weeks before your able to add fish.
Option D. Add in your fish now without cycling and be on top of the water changes. Your going to be doing a whole lot of water changes. I went through this and sometimes I was changing my water out twice a day. I hated that and I don't recommend anyone to go that route. Just letting you know that it is an option. Even if you do change your water twice a day I can't promise your fish will live.
Option E. You can pick up a few things that will control the high ammonia or nitrite levels your seeing depending on your filter type. I wouldn't go this route either because if it works it will probably stop your bacteria from building. So this would mean you have one more thing your going to be replacing.
Long story made short. If you don't have patience spend a bit of cash and get some Bio Spira. Add all or at least most of the fish that you plan to add at one time and place them all in the tank together. If you were to do it one at a time you'll waste your money on the Bio Spira. It only supports the amount of fish you have in your tank. In other words. If you put in one and add Bio Spira everything will be fine. Then a month later you try to add 3 more and you will go through another deadly cycle. Vs adding all 4 or even 10 fish at once with the Bio Spira and avoiding the cycle completely.
I know that was a lot of info. But I hope you find it useful.
As the others have mentioned, your tank is currently cycling. The types of bacteria you need came in with the live rock, along with other organisms, but it's normal for some of the organisms to die when the rock is transported. These dying organisms are your original source of ammonia, so since all the ammonia has presently been converted to nitrite, the bacteria for the first stage (converting ammonia to nitrite) are already present in good numbers. You only need the bacteria for the second stage (converting nitrite to nitrate) to finish reproducing to the point where all the nitrite present is converted for your tank to be fully cycled at this point.
You can do this completely without fish (using fish food or a piece of shrimp), in which case, you only need to wait (there is another method which uses ammonia, but If you have live rock, I wouldn't suggest using this, as too much ammonia will be toxic to any other organisms that are living on the rock).
If you want to add another fish now as your ammonia source, you'll need to do water changes to bring the nitrite level down to a level the fish will be able to tolerate. Rather than using most damsels which will be aggressive to later fish, use a green chromis which is peaceful. You'll need to change over 50% of the water though, and depending on how high the live rock is in the tank, this may require more than one change - you don't want any of the rock to be out of the water.
Also, even after you initially cycle the tank, be aware that every time you add a new fish your ammonia level will go up a little followed by the nitrite until the tank is fully stocked. When the tank is cycled with or without fish, it only supports the amount of bacteria needed to convert the ammonia and nitrite levels present at that time. Each new organism adds just a bit more ammonia, so the number of bacteria needed is increased. You just need to add new organisms slowly (no more than 1 fish every 2 weeks or so) so the bacteria needed can develop. Once you have the tank stocked and can only detect nitrate in the water tests, then you're completely done with the cycling, but y ou'll still need to monitor the nitrate - the best way to remove these is through regular water changes.
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