TJ: Mini-Sea: #5

Aquarium Status

Cycling, Day 7 - Cycling Done? No!

Tested my water today. Here are the results:

Test results on 25/01/2015, approximately 46 hours after the last addition of pureed seafood mix.

Ammonia:0.25ppm
Nitrite:0ppm
Nitrate:0ppm
Phosphate: 8-10ppm
pH:8
kH: 9
Calcium: 620ppm

Compared to yesterday,  there's been a huge drop in ammonia, nitrite and nitrate. This is great news, as it shows that the system is being able to filter the water well. Looking at these results, one would think that the initial cycle is nearing an end...

But! It is not. Let's take a look at the results again. ANN is low, but phosphate is high. Not as high as it was before though. Today I checked, and the color wasn't as dark of a blue as previously. I was curious as to what the exact numbers were, and so I decided do a serial dilution to get more precise numbers. The result is somewhere between 8-10ppm.

How did that result? See my guide on measuring through serial dilution here.

This is a very important factor to consider, as if I were to add live stock now, there could be major issues. The macroalgae don't seem to care less, fish perhaps not, but corals definitely. And anemones too. And a host of other organisms.

So if your live stock is dying right after adding them after you think your cycle is done, then consider this.

Macroalgae Status

As for my macroalgae, they are still alive.

It seems like their recession has stopped completely. They still have bits and pieces of dead tissue attached to them, just waving back and forth in the water. But otherwise, they are looking great!

There are more and more nodules growing all over. Someone else have identified them as air sacs, to keep them upright.

So we now have theories saying:
-They are results of infection.
-Tumor growth.
-Spore sacs.
-Normal growths (that will extend into branches).
-Air sacs.

I am in the process of confirming with each person about how they got to the above opinions. Once I get a conclusive result, I'll post it here.

Equipment Changes

I made some changes to the lighting. I wasn't happy with the layout of the LEDs in one of my ComboRays (the one towards the back) so I swapped the LEDs around. Initially a cyan was to the right side of the tank, and it just looked odd. So I moved the cyan to the third spot from the left, the cool white left of it, and the violet to the end where the cyan was.

Here are the comparisons:

Before and after. Ahaha excuse the fact that there are diatoms or something growing all over in the current picture, and the cloudiness of the first.

Anyways, more importantly:

I felt that previously it was a lot brighter towards the right side (as most of the brighter LEDs were to the right. Just so happens... lol.

Now the color is a lot more evenly distributed. :D

That's all for today's update. Let me know what your thoughts are!