Question about my tank cycling

[sumfingwong]

Hello all,

My fahaka recently passed So I decided to try salt. Its about 3 weeks into the cycle. I have yellow tail damsels in the tank to help with the cycle. I have about 50 lbs of live rock, and about 40 of it was from an established tank. With the live rock, I had about 3 full buckets of tank water from the established system.

For the last 3 weeks, I have had 0ppm ammonia, 0 ppm nitrate, and it started out with 5 ppm nitrate.

As of today, its:

Ammonia: 0 ppm
Nitrite: 0 ppm
Nitrate: 20ppm

Is my tank cycled? I brought my water to a LFS yesterday and they said the tank is ready. But heres the thing, I never experienced an ammonia spike, and no algae blooms. Is it possible that my tank didnt go through a cycle, since the 40 lbs of LR had enough bacteria? Thats what the LFS suggested. The damsels are nice and bright, they dont seem to be stressed. I feed them twice a day, and I over feed the tank with flake food since I have about 10 hermit crabs (came with the LR), a crab and some snails.

I also left a small crab trap to try and catch a hitch hiker crab, so a piece of shrimp was left in the tank for about 8 hours.. and still.. no ammonia.

I am thinking that the tank is cycled.. what do you guys think?

[J-P]

if there is no ammonia or Nitrite, and there are fish feeding it sounds like it is cycled. On the other hand, Nitrates in SW set ups are a no-no apparently. People go to great lengths to remove those in SW systems. I have a feeling the LR or live sand play a role in that also.

[Mek0ng]

20ppm nitrates isnt bad for a FOWLR. The tank is cycled, do some water changes and see if you can get the nitrates under 10 if you are going to try corals. Sorry to hear about you fahaka, good luck with the salt!

[sumfingwong]

Thanks all.. I was thinking the same about it being cycled. I havent done a water change because I didnt want to prolong the cycle (if it was in the process of cycling)

I will prep some water tonight.