Cycling With Just Sand. Am I Just Being Silly?

[cainechow]

So my little pico tank has been filled with saltwater and 1" of dry sand for 5 weeks now and it has decomposed a variety of dead matter. I've been sitting at 1ppm ammonia for 9 or 10 days now and starting to wonder if I'm just being silly trying to get this thing to build up enough bacteria with just sand which supposedly has a lot of surface area.

My goal for the tank is one tentacled coral on a plug/rock on the sand bottom with some shrimp. I don't actually want any rock in the display area.

So I'm looking for opinions. Do I do one or more of the following?

• Wait it out? If I don't see proper ammonia processing by 8 weeks try some other stuff? Because I started with no seed bacteria is it gonna take forever to go this route?
  
• Add live rock rubble to one of my AIO sump chambers. If I don't light it will it stay live? This will need to be cleaned often which I'd like to avoid if possible.
  
• Add ceramic media/bio balls to one of the AIO sump chambers
  
• Take some of my sand and let it sit in a container in a friend's reef for a week and then transfer back to mine then play the waiting game some more. They have worms so I don't want to just take their sand?
  
• Add bottled bacteria.
  
• Add a chunk of live rock to the display. This is probably easiest but I don't wanna. Really :P
  
• Some other creative or maybe obvious to you solution/strategy.
  

All constructive criticism and comments are welcome

[cainechow]

Now that I've written that all out... I'm leaning a certain way, but I'd love to hear from you guys to see if my hunch is on or off before I share so as not to pollute your opinions.

Edited November 14, 2012 by cainechow

[jvision]

If you have a friend with an established reef, just grab some of his sand - or trade a handful. That should get you going.

Adding some kind of biomedia to your sump is a good idea, and if you're not trying to grow algae or plants, you don't need any light.

[Vitaminz]

IMHO, Because it is a nano tank, you want your parameters to be spot on... You have so little room for error and even less time to fix any issues once you get going and avoid a complete crash.

Bio balls I wouldn't do to be honest, been their done that...ripped them out...

Unless you are going to put a light on in the sump, wouldn't do live rock or rubble their.

The problem with getting live sand from another tank, is if they have issues you are just inheriting them as well...

I have always been a big fan of starting out on your own, that way you know exactly what is in it and no hitch hikers or any surprises. If it was me, I would add a light to your sump and put the live rock and or rubble their. Maybe even a bit of Chateo...

just my 2 cents worth...

Jeff

[cainechow]

Thanks for chipping in the opinions. I was leaning towards live rubble in one of the sump compartments. When syncro and I build the tanks we left the back wall clear so lighting wouldn't be an issue. However, when I went to do water chemistry tests tonight, I was greeted with 1ppm NO2 and something like 5 ppm NO3. So that dang tank IS building up bacteria. I'm going to give a while yet and see how far I get as it is now. No sense in adding more stuff when less might suffice right?

[Jayba]

I know nothing about salt water, but isn't 1ppm really low for ammonia?

*edit* darned autocorrect.

Edited November 17, 2012 by Jayba

[cainechow]

From what I've been reading reef inhabitants are very sensitive to ammonia. This ReefKeeping.com article seems to indicate anything over 0.25 ppm is cause for concern... which I have no idea how I can measure because most liquid kits kinda suck for colour separation including the API one I have. I think the best I'm going to be able to do with the API kit is to compare the colour of the tank water test to a control test with of RO water.

[Aysha]

Use an api kit. If the amonia monitor is sunshine yellow you're good. If it's green you're not so good.

You can't really cycle it with just sand it doesn't work all that well.

to cycle a tank easily esp a nano.

Add fresh sand.

Go to the LFS (Golds if in Calgary Red Coral in Edmonton) and buy a piece of live rock! It doesn't have to be a big piece but in a nano LR isn't too expensive. stack it on top of your base rock. Your tank should be cycled fairly quickly. The bigger the LR the faster the cycle.

Example I started a 30 gallon from scratch it took 3 weeks to cycle (standard)

When I moved to my 60 gallon cube with my 30 gallon sump I went and bought 20 lbs of dry rock (2.00 a lb baby!!!)

I went to Red Coral and bought a 15lb peice of LR (because I liked it)

I added all the rock from my old tank slowly (so as not to upset the balance of my old tank)

Realistically my tank was safe to use in 4 days. I waited 2 weeks because fish and coral are expensive should you happen to injure it.

Bioballs are a nitrate factory.

In a picto tank add 3lbs of LR go on canreef and pay 3.00 a lb for it.Heck you can prolly get enough sand,water and rock to get a picto moving for cheap.

When all your paramaters zero out?

add fishies!

You need LR! LR is your filter. your shrimp and corals will be happier.

when your coraline grows in and you mount a few corals to your rock you wont even notice it.