Starting a 20 gallon long saltwater aquarium tank

[ReefWreak]

At the bottom of the second page Jlavine offered that if you private messaged (PM) him he would give you his phone number to talk it through

Prepare for lots of cords in the water. Powerheads, heaters, skimmers, pumps, etc. Just follow directions and use drip loops whenever possible. And a GFCI ground fault thing in case there are any issues of electricity leakage

 

[oro50]

I did a ammonia test

about 36 hours after the last one.

Test results last monday or tuesday. 3 weeks and a bit more already have passed since the cycling process started Very dark even bluish green 8ppm

Test results today Friday as of 3:00pm About the same figure?

And the tank now has a new powerhead, which I believe is helping more oxygen reach any anerobic bacteria still alive?

So conclusion I can draw right now, (almost a month now) during the cycling process. I think all the bacteria is dead?

I'm wondering if I need to do another water change, and this time, what use poland spring water, (only type of RO water or at least not tap water) I could find in the grocery store?

Second question: Should I buy even more live nitrifiying bacteria? To possibly reseed the tank?

Only good thing is if all the bacteria is dead, I have more live rock in the tank now, so more places for new bacteria to grow on?

 

[oro50]

Yeah I might not actually mind to sit down and talk about this process. It is really annoying now. I thought after 4 weeks at max my tank would be nearly cycled, and I feel it's not ready at all.

 

[ReefWreak]

Realistically you should be okay with bacteria. They're actually incredibly resiliant. The liverock that came with my tank was sold as dead rock because it had been out of water for a month or so. Lo and behold, as soon as I added it to the tank, within a few days it was producing nitrate, and I never saw ammonia after adding food to the tank.

It's still producing nitrate, and now I'm in the everlasting battle against nitrate.

The powerhead and HOB filter will help oxygenate the areas, which should help the aerobic bacteria to break down the ammonia.

Going forward, I would only use distilled water from the grocery store (or RO/DI is better, but not easy to find, apparently any in-store water filling container thing is supposed to be an RO/DI unit, so maybe you can find one of those). Don't use spring water, they're just as bad as city water for different reasons.

You can try buying more bacteria, but really just with a powerhead and HOB filter you should be okay, and again I'm pretty sure some bacteria survived. If you live near an LFS, you can ask for a small piece of rock, and maybe some sand, and buy those (should be less than $20, which is less than "bacteria in a bottle") and they'll be better for your tank than bottles.

Now I think you're kind of stuck waiting even longer. I wish there were a consensus or a good thread on ammonia dosing to start a tank, but I haven't found many, only a few articles that weren't very thorough. You would have been better off doing it the old fashioned way, or even just buying one rock to seed the tank.

Do a water change with quality water (maybe buy 5 gallons, one of those 4 gallon nutri-seas jugs, or 2 1 gallon containers) from the LFS. That may help

 

[Cu455]

Nothing wrong with HOB and cainster filters. Under the stand therenis and fx5 amd sun sun.

 

[AreUaBadFish2]

Welcome to MR. I was reading most of the thread but not all of it. I think its great you decided to start ur first tank with a 20 gal long bc i started mine with a 32 gallon long and love the display it gives you. I am using and have been using since the beginning two canister filters one on each side. Never had a problem with nitrates ever. Also it gives a great flow in the tank having both filters on opposite ends. I also added a power head to add extra flow. The power head will solve any oxogen issues concerned about if u angle it right. I do weekly water changes n change the filter pads every 2 weeks. I recommend u do water top offs and water changes with RO water. Even tho u are using drops it wont always purify everything and u have to check the Alk level once in a while as this could be a problem in the future. U should be able to safely put a fish in if you want to but i would start with a clean up crew as others suggested just to be on the safe side n so they can do there little thing getting anything u dont want in there i.e some algae or something.