White Fur On Cycling Live Rock

[ClaireR]

A week ago we got set up with sand and salt water, yesterday we bought the live rock (£160 on “just rock” made some entertaining conversation ) Its surprising just how long you can spend just watching the things on the rock! A few snails from yesterday have moved from their rock home to around the tank and a black “fan like thing” keeps popping out of a hole and going back in.

This morning though, a white “fur” has started forming on two of the rocks.. i don’t think it was there last night, but i cant be 100% sure (even after spending hours just watching the rock!). Its about an inch in diameter. Any thoughts on what this is and is it ok? Is it just the first part of the cycling process? There are also lots of tiny a (few mm) worm things crawling about.

Should I keep the light on or off during the cycle process.

One other question.. We also have a freshwater tank, can i use the same water testing kit or does the marine tank require different chemicals to test for the ph, ammonia, nitrate and nitrites?

Thanks for any help on this!

 

[fishlover500]

You will have to look to see if your test kit is only freshwater or fresh & salt

 

[ClaireR]

Foolishly, I had got rid of the “stuff” that came with the kit (Its a 4 month old kit I use for the freshwater tank), its just the bottles which have details on how many drops to put in etc which don’t specify if I can use it for marine... I think I’ll get a marine kit, just to be on the safe side!

Any thoughts on the white fur?

Thanks

 

[ben1987]

i also had the white fur which disapeared before the tank was fully cycled. i think it may be something to do wih the die off on the rock but im not sure