StringerBell wrote:
The ammonia has been pretty steady at .25 for about 11 days now. Is this
fairly normal? Should I still play the beer-drinking waiting game? (dont
mind it so much 
Two weeks is not unheard of, but it should start dropping soon.
Or is there some action to take?
You could change 25% of the water, but the decrease in ammonia will be
temporary. You just need to wait out this part of the cycle. IIRC, you don't
have fish yet, so there's no need to worry about it.
FWIW, I added 30 lbs of rock to my 125 on 9-1 and another 40 lbs on 9-21 (I
already had about 70 lbs). I don't measure ammonia; just nitrites. The nitrites
didn't go up until I added the second load of rock, but they hit 1.6 on 9-22. As
of yesterday, they're down to 0.2 and seem to be going down about 0.1 every 48
hours.
This is the first time I've cycled live rock, but I've cycled FO tanks before.
IIRC, nothing would happen for about a week; then the ammonia would start to
climb. It would peak after about another week, stay stable for another week
after that, and then start a fairly rapid decline. In the meantime, the nitrites
would start to climb about two weeks in (right before the ammonia level peaked).
They would top out about a week later, stay high for about two weeks, and then
start down. This was in the days of undergravel filters (about 1980), so my
memory may not serve me as well as I would like.
I do recall well that a 50% water change from an established tank would have the
expected effect (a 50% reduction in ammonia), but the level would be right back
up there about 3 hours later in a small tank.
Lots of pods,snails and little feather dusters have emerged. Also a lot of
plants springing up.
Great! I've got some pods I'm feeding, some things that look like they might
turn into aipstasia (hope not), something that looks like tiny sea fans, and one
or two other items that look like they will be interesting. My oldest rock has
sprouted some bivalves and a plant that seems to be spreading. No feather
dusters yet (I'm envious), but one can hope.
George Patterson
All successes in conservation are temporary. All defeats are permanent.