Would it make sense to combine dark and dry start?

[Pepere]

Personally, I like to be in control over how much ammonia is being dosed into the tank.

Ie I am dosing a known amount of ammonia at 2ppm, looking for when the bacteria colony has developed sufficient to metabolize that challenge to 0 ammonia, 0 nitrites within 24 hours of dosing.

Other methods of adding ammonia such as ammonia leaching from aquasoils, or as a response to fish food decaying in a tank or from the aquarist adding urine to the tank does not give you the knowledge as to how much ammonia the beneficial bacteria can handle per day.

 

[Beza]

Yeah I get that testing regularly is the only precise way of doing it. I am kinda still hoping to get away with a somewhat less precise way... My tank isn't very big (55l), and I am trying to keep it low budget as much as possible. But I am not planning any fish, just some shrimp and snails, so the bio load won't suddenly go up by a substantial amount.

 

[ElleDee]

Yeah I get that testing regularly is the only precise way of doing it. I am kinda still hoping to get away with a somewhat less precise way...

There are many ways to keep a tank, and I always prefer the less fussy routes. Precision is not a prerequisite. Keep in mind you don't have to do any of this stuff. You can just plant the tank right away and slowly add livestock after a few weeks.

But I do find some pre-planting prep helps with the start up period and opt to do a short dark start. I use active substrates (though never ones with a huge ammonia burst at the start) and seed the new set up with established media. Then I give it a couple weeks. I check to make sure there's no ammonia in the water, do a big WC, and then plant.

Other than that final check, I don't focus on ammonia at all. My goals for a dark start are 1) keep my plants out of the initial chaos that happens when you first submerge the substrate, 2) give the bacteria from my seeded media a first crack at getting established, 3) have some amount of nitrogen cycling going, 4) to remove the most labile elements (the fastest decomposing organic matter and the initial release of solutes) of my active substrate. But I can't measure most of these things, so I just give it time.

It all sorts out with time anyway. The most useful microbial community are the ones that work in the environment specific to your tank. You can introduce bacteria from elsewhere, but if it prefers a different environment it won't thrive.

 

[Beza]

I haven't been in a hurry so far with this tank, and am quite happy to give it time to do a decent dark start. Currently pre-watering the wood which is leeching a lot of tannin, so it won't float as not all of it is fixed to stones. Once it stays down I'll get the actual dark start going. Will be exciting to finally have water in there

 

[Pepere]

There are many ways to keep a tank, and I always prefer the less fussy routes. Precision is not a prerequisite.

I will admit that the way I do things may well have much more to do with my own neural wiring than need.

 

[Naturescapes_Rocco]

Also want to add some extra thoughts for all reading:

Just because nitrifying bacteria reach a stable place doesn't mean the microbiome of your tank is fully stable! Our tanks take MONTHS with plants, fish, bacteria, water changes, and everything in between to achieve a microbial homeostasis. Plants like Bucephalandra will still melt even if you have zero ammonia in a new setup, as they seem to be susceptible to melting in immature setups.

A dark start just gives you those extra few weeks to help the tank reach a more stable state. Startup algae is normal in immature tanks. Most tanks I've made seem to reach a good place biologically after 2-3 months, so a 1 month dark start has helped smooth all sorts of things out for me.

 

[Koan]

always prefer the less fussy routes. Precision is not a prerequisite. Keep in mind you don't have to do any of this stuff. You can just plant the tank right away and slowly add livestock after a few weeks.

And alternatively, if you do know what variables you have introduced, it can help you untangle problems later when they occur

Some aquarists are bakers, some are cooks / Precision can be very functional, if that's how your mind works best

Or, letting things work themselves out can be functional, if you don't mind messy outcomes and successive approximations. I personally tend to fall into that category but over time I have found that for me, some more precision gives me more fun and fewer / shorter failures.

What's most important is that you have fun with the process, and not become quickly frustrated and burned out!

If you are extremely disappointed when algae grows, then taking a more methodical, precision oriented approach can help you limit that.

Or if you have more fun learning from experience and aren't intimidated by some setbacks, great!

Set your expectations in advance that no matter what you do , it's not going to be perfect for the first three to six months And keep asking lots of questions!

 

[techman81]

....to achieve a microbial homeostasis.

The very first thing that came to mind when reading that.
Big Bang

 

[Pepere]

Just because nitrifying bacteria reach a stable place doesn't mean the microbiome of your tank is fully stable! Our tanks take MONTHS with plants, fish, bacteria, water changes, and everything in between to achieve a microbial homeostasis. Plants like Bucephalandra will still melt even if you have zero ammonia in a new setup, as they seem to be susceptible to melting in immature setups.

I agree. I dark started for about a month, then planted heavily with easier plants from trimmings from my other tanks similar parameter's and added some fish to continue the maturing process before adding in more finicky plants. I also had seeded the tank by washing out media from my canister filters from established tanks to seed some diverse bacteria…

Doing it this way I avoided the young tank algae issues on the past two thanks I have started…

 

[ElleDee]

I will admit that the way I do things may well have much more to do with my own neural wiring than need.

And alternatively, if you do know what variables you have introduced, it can help you untangle problems later when they occur

Some aquarists are bakers, some are cooks / Precision can be very functional, if that's how your mind works best

Or, letting things work themselves out can be functional, if you don't mind messy outcomes and successive approximations. I personally tend to fall into that category but over time I have found that for me, some more precision gives me more fun and fewer / shorter failures.

What's most important is that you have fun with the process, and not become quickly frustrated and burned out!

If you are extremely disappointed when algae grows, then taking a more methodical, precision oriented approach can help you limit that.

Or if you have more fun learning from experience and aren't intimidated by some setbacks, great!

Set your expectations in advance that no matter what you do , it's not going to be perfect for the first three to six months And keep asking lots of questions!

Absolutely. When I say I like to keep things simple, the unsaid part is "I can be scatterbrained and am stressed out by failure, so I have to keep the number of moving parts manageable and celebrate my smallest achievements or this isn't any fun for me." I like learning from people who approach their tanks differently, in part because it does give you a little window into their mind and other people are neat. I believe the people who are the happiest in this hobby don't necessarily have the best aquariums, whatever that means, but have the aquariums that closely match their personalities and circumstances.