ATM Colony - Snake Oil???

[shepe]

So I’m coming from the freshwater world where cycle in a bottle is 100% snake oil and doesn’t work, however the general consensus I’ve seen is that in the marine world the bacteria in a bottle works.

I’ve added 1 gallon of ATM colony to a 300 gallon tank on Friday, ammonia has been dosed to 2ppm however after 5 days nitrite is still coming in at 0 which to me suggests that atm is also snake oil???
Pretty annoyed to have dropped £90 on something that simply doesn’t appear to work

 

[JTP424]

You dosed to 2 ppm but where is the ammonia sitting now? Still at 2ppm? Nitrates?
If your ammonia has dropped and there are nitrates your cycle is complete.

 

[shepe]

Ammonia hasn’t dropped and there’s no nitrite or nitrate showing

 

[56longroof]

I am of the opinion its all snake oil.

 

[shepe]

I am of the opinion its all snake oil.

Same

 

[JTP424]

Yea.... I can't find a whole lot of GOOD information surrounding it from within the last 2 years...
*That's not to say it doesn't work... just not a whole lot I can find.

 

[56longroof]

If you really want to add something. Buy some real live rock or sand. Another option is some sand or dirty filter media from a established tank.

 

[twentyleagues]

IDK I have used microbacter 7 on both sw and fw and it worked fine. Same with xlm and prodibio. So to say its all snakeoil I dont think thats true. Some stuff takes longer but it still works. I set up a 180g fw in 2015 after being out of keeping any tanks for 5 years. I added about 10 fish in two weeks using MB7 as directed, no ammonia issues what so ever no seeded media of any kind either. I have used that method on a few tanks over the years and it works every time.

 

[Acroholic89]

Ive used it. dont really have an opinion of it works or not. Best to just use dr tims, or microbacter etc. Those are all proven products.

 

[Marc G-L]

I am using ATM colony to startup in an UNS R 120 (122 gal) outfitted with 80 lbs of bare marco rock and special grade Aragonite sand 2.5-3" deep. I placed a variety of ceramic media, and pieces of Marco rock rubble along with two air stones for increased O2. My LFS recommended crank the temp up to 82F and gave me a mixture of fertilizer, calc powder and trace elements to add. after dosing (They said the bacteria consume a lot of that from my Ocean Reef salt.

Ok, Dr. Tim reports increased temp and lower salt 1.20 salinity increases the bacteria's ability to replicate. After dosing 40 drops of Fritz NH3 on day one things have been progressing fast. So, I'm at least sure it's not snake oil. On day 2 the NH3 dropped to 0.9 on my Hanna Marine Multitester, Nitrate came in at 1.4. and Nitrate at 1.1 ( really? Nitrate on day 2? Well, I got bold and added another 40 drops of Fritz NH3 on day three and the NH3 is now at 0.9, Nitrite hit 10 (yikes!!) and Nitrate 1.1 again.

I don't want diatoms/alagae or other things chewing of that Nitrate while the bacteria do their thing a ND replicate. My solution was to rubber band about a foot of ULVA macro algae to three pieces of Maro rock rubble in the fugue, to absorb the Nitrate. Should work, I had a small piece the size of a quarter that I took from the shore 5 weeks ago and it has grown 15x in a plastic container w/ 5 watt LED lighting. Using an identical LED system over the ULVA macro in the sump now.

On day three I also noticed that, my pH had dropped from 8.5 to 8.11 . So I added a tablespoon of kalkwasser powder pH has now stabilized @ 8.11 and the dkH registers @ 7.7. on day 4.

Stay tuned, maybe I am on a quicker cycling journey. Time will tell.

 

[Gnop1950]

I used Dr. Tims and Fritz Turbo Start 900 with dry rock and dosed Ammonia to 4 ppm using Dr. Tims Ammonium Chloride. It took only a couple of days for Nitrite to start climbing and Ammonia to start dropping. I also added some live Rubble Rox, but that was pretty much after the tank had already cycled, and ammonia and nitrates were almost undetectable even with the Hanna kits. It took about a month for the cycle to complete.

I had to look up ATM colony, I had never heard of it. I've also done fishless cycles on a number of freshwater tanks. The fastest using FritzZyme 7 was cycled in about 2 weeks, and the slowest took almost 6 weeks. Cycle times, at least my experience with freshwater tanks, can vary widely depending on a lot of factors.