cquin1;1099472 wrote: Hello everyone! After a 2 year hiatus I am back. I just put together this 125 gal tank with @ 100+ of rock that I used to have in a 80 gal tank.
I had this rock in storage and after getting it out I soaked it in some bleach and 1-3 pieces and soaked in muriatic acid... I let them dry and rinsed 4x
No live rock/ sand inside and I have been "ghost feeding" the tank for the past week Just checked ammonia and I am still at 0. My PH though is at 7.4
I put a small chunk of publix tuna...hopefully this will kickstart the cycle.
PH is normal or am I being paranoid about the acid ?
(Regretting using it now)
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The acid is fine as long as it did not include surfactants. I am not sure about the number of rinses though since muriatic acid is quite strong. Many people have used muriatic acid successfully, so I am sure it works fine as long as it was diluted and rinsed well after soaking. I am curing about 150 pounds of rock atm myself to go in my 90 gallon and used 2 gallons of bleach in 36 gallons of water, soaking for about 24 hours. The rock was partly live and I almost just used it with all of the coralline, gsp, mushrooms, and other stuff on the rock...but I chose to clean it after hearing stories from a few other members. When I bleached it and there was quite a bit of stuff left on the rocks after bleaching, but most of it scrubbed off at that point.
I have not heard of using tuna before, but assume it works fine since it will break down like anything else. It takes 2 to 3 weeks for the bacteria to start developing on it's own while temperature, aeration, Ph and level of nitrates etc... affect the speed it starts and continues to grow.
I have now cycled a few tanks (3 fresh and 2 salt) using pure ammonia to start and feed the process with great success. The process with ammonia is much quicker than using solids, you just have to be careful there are no additives. The only place I have found additive free ammonia is at Dollar General, but I am sure there are other stores - just not Kroger, Publix, Home Depot, Lowes, Target, etc... since the ammonia I found at all of these stores had surfactants or fragrance. Using ammonia also does not add stuff that has to break down after the bacteria starts up which is a plus - but you do have to keep feeding more ammonia every few days.
This is the first time I have used microbactr7, but it seems to be working well. I am not in a particular hurry to setup my tank, so I am fine with a long curing time and the microbactr use is only for tons of dead organics I know are left in this rock.
Your Ph seems a bit low, but I think it is OK as long as there is only rock in the tank. Aeration helps speed things up a bit and certainly affects Ph, but you need to ensure it is completely dark or there will be an even larger algae bloom if you are aerating. The ideal temperature during curing is between 80 and 82 degrees F to help speed the cycle along as well.
I like your rock work, there are lots of ledges and knooks. I will unfortunately be laying out my rock after it is pretty much cured, which means I will likely start a second brute to cure for a few more days after picking my rock out. Good luck with the new tank and welcome back to the hobby!
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