Cured rock in a new tank

[Reeftanker3295]

I set up a 30 gallon tank 3 days ago, I added 15 pounds of fine dry sand, and then added about 15 pounds of live rock that I have had cooking in a bucket with a powerhead and heater for about a year now. Before that the rock was in my tank, it is completely clean and produces no phosphate in the bucket. I also dumped in 3 cups of live sand and added a handful of chaeto from my main tank to kickoff the microfauna in the sand bed. I added a crab yesterday (this is a native tank) and he is doing just fine. My question is do you think the tank will go through a cycle that will damage a fish with only cured live rock? I am holding some juvenile fish in a bucket until the tank is finished and want to add them ASAP.

 

[thirty5]

May be a silly question, but were you feeding the bucket with the rock.. I think that you may have a mini-cycle...

 

[KathyC]

Better to take the crab out of there and add a supermarket shrimp (or you could use a TINY amount of real PURE ammonia -(you can get it at the supermarket) as that will raise the ammonia level faster - and raise the ammonia level to say .25 ..and then see if it drops right back down within a day or 2.
If it does that, then the tank is cycled. If not, you will need to cycle the tank.

Also be careful of how many fish you add at once to the tank as that cause also cause a larger ammonia spike and cause the tank yet another cycle!