Why dont I have an ammonia spike?

I set up a 45 gallon around 7 days ago. I put in new black sand, a ton of calarpa from my ref. so it was full of bugs and two crabs, the slug from 6 other tanks. I have now added 2 damsels and I still have no level changes. Is it possible to cycle a tank with no high levels of ammonia and nitrates??

Everything is possible.  Bacteria grows in exponential rates so if it was seeded well, and even calerpa can seed!

Connie - I also believe that you said your rock was cured already in another of your tanks.  If you don't have a lot of die-off from the rocks, generally you won't have spikes.  If you add the livestock into the system slowly, the nitrification process will be barely detectable.  The bacteria will reproduce just enough to nitrify the load that is in the system.

Connie wrote: That must be it... I put in 3 tonga branches and then 2 days ago a 5lbs rock from my main tank. With the water from other tanks and the plants..... Maybe this will be easier then I thought.....

I wish the books and the LFS's were up to date like Connie is on this. This past thread is interesting reading on the topic.
Aquarium startup - a sensible change

Tank startup can be fairly easy, when there is access to LS, LR, and LW from an existing tank. Also, lately, I'm discovering that in the absense of any or all of these three things, a good dose of greenwater with sufficient light, handles any and all nitrogen compounds at startup!

Congratulations to you Connie, you have come a long way, baby.

I think that this is a great lesson for many of us. Although Am spikes are rather quick and often undetected, an unbalanced chemistry has long been the downfall of many a newbie... myself included.

The one starts off with a pre-cultured system (adding LR, REAL LS, and LW) this phenomonen of new tank syndrome can be drastically reduced in period or eliminated altogether. Understanding and promoting this theory (well, it should be fact) will do wonders for the hobby if we can get the text writers on-board and documenting it.

 Connie!

I'll bet the book would be perfect!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1

I think the library is still a good thing to have.  When I was a newbie I read 3 books on setting up SW and Reef tanks cover to cover.  They all had much of the same info, but I read them for the little bit of different info anyway.  For those of us that are a little more advanced the more in depth books in the library are great.  Then there are the books with pictures in them.  Those are my favorite.  Seriously though I just got Dr. Burgess's Atlas of Marine Aquarium Fish used on E-bay just so I could look at the pictures.

 

jglover,  you might find this link interesting:  http://www.aquabotanic.com/plants_and_biological_filtration. htm

Aquatic plants are different then terrestrial ones.  Your grass might like nitrates but duckweed prefers ammonia/ammonium.  Whether or not this applies to marine plants I'm not sure, but I'd guess it does.

Jon where do you find this stuff?  That is great information. 

I wonder because I've seen many reports to the contrary???  Will we ever figure this world out?  So if Calerpa and other macros use up ammonia for structure what do mangroves use?  nitrates???