Cycling my tank

[Roach]

Ok so I finally got my tank set up. Put in my sandbed and seeded it with about 30 lbs of live sand. Added 50 lbs of rock and I'm going to leave the light off for about a week. Is there anything else I can do while I'm waiting? Can I add anything to the tank such as trace elements, Black Powder, Specta Pure, ect? Right now there is zero ammonia, >10 Nitrates, and about .2 Nitrites. Any help would be great.

 

[2poor2reef]

If it were me, I would not use any additives. I would feed the sand bed lightly with live phto and/or golden pearls or even pellets or flake. You have a nice amount of live sand and you want to keep it that way. I don't understand leaving the lights off either. A reduced photo period maybe. Algae cycles are inevitable and you can add a crew to help with that as soon as your nitrites hit zero. I would want to maximize the life in the rock if it were me.

 

[Roach]

Yeah, well unfortunately my light went on back order so it won't be here till next Tuesday. Then I'm going to move everything from my forty gallon over so there will be plenty of more live sand. I was just wondering if I should add some Black Powder to the tank to help feed the rock and sand.