Bacteria in a bottle, Myth or Fact

[FishyFishFish]

I found Bio Spira to be useless in establishing nitrite oxidation. Did I get a bad bottle?

Ammonia reduction occurred rapidly, starting within 2 hours of mixing the product with 1 ppm NH3 as ammonium chloride in Instant Ocean.

I just popped in here to say exactly the same thing.

I haven't read all of this thread but I was trying to conduct an old school cycle just using ammonium choride with no bottled bacteria. Everything was going well but then the winter storm hit Texas. I lost power for 4 days and the tank temperature plummeted. I had to leave my apartment so removed about 75% of the water, as I was concerned about it freezing. When I returned, I refilled the tank and tried to carry on.

I dosed some more ammonium chloride and the next day returned a dark purple nitrite test result (with API this could have been anything from 2ppm upwards). I was hopeful that this meant that some of the bacteria had survived the low temperatures and the ammonia test did appear to drop again but then became 'stuck' at 0.25ppm for several days. I then thought that maybe the nitrite reading was just left over from the small amount of water that was present in the water that I had left in the tank from the earlier cycling attempt. I have read about the problems with the API ammonia test and have also read that nitrite levels might not be relevant, but I was hoping for a nitrite drop to show that my disturbed cycle was still progressing, as I was unsure what was going on considering the strange circumstances. With CUC and some corals already ordered I wanted to get the parameters under control ASAP so bought a bottle of bio-spira.

Within 12 hours my Ammonia read 0 using the API test (which did give me some renewed confidence in the API test). 2 days later and nitrite is still the same. Now this might be because it got so high that it is taking time to come down, or it could be that the bio-spira has done nothing to help the nitrite levels.

So I am 50% convinced. It did appear that the bio-spira did get my ammonia levels under control very quickly, so my tank presumably can now support livestock, but it also says on the bottle that it 'reduces nitrite toxicity'. I've no idea what this means in practical terms and whether it does anything to speed up the reduction in nitrite levels.

 

[brandon429]

Nitrite Toxicity

Hey guys I have an aquarium system that has about 45gallons of water cycling so I Let it cycle for about week and I added seeded marine pure ceramic balls and the bacteria in a bottle. I had no choice but to add my 2 clownfish from my quarantine into the tank.. because I needed to put a sick...

www.reef2reef.com

in thousands of cycles online tracked, I haven’t seen nitrite matter one single iota in any case for a display tank if that helps. Not owning the kit altogether seems better than owning the kit due to its neutrality in reefing it seems. Agreed that nitrification is complete when nitrites are controlled but that doesn’t affect reef convention start dates, our detailed seneye experiment above, or when two clowns will be safe in someone‘s fish-in cycle.

whatever the date says on the bottle bac label, we can bet it’ll carry fish on or before that date safely and ethically.

 

[Dan_P]

I just popped in here to say exactly the same thing.

I haven't read all of this thread but I was trying to conduct an old school cycle just using ammonium choride with no bottled bacteria. Everything was going well but then the winter storm hit Texas. I lost power for 4 days and the tank temperature plummeted. I had to leave my apartment so removed about 75% of the water, as I was concerned about it freezing. When I returned, I refilled the tank and tried to carry on.

I dosed some more ammonium chloride and the next day returned a dark purple nitrite test result (with API this could have been anything from 2ppm upwards). I was hopeful that this meant that some of the bacteria had survived the low temperatures and the ammonia test did appear to drop again but then became 'stuck' at 0.25ppm for several days. I then thought that maybe the nitrite reading was just left over from the small amount of water that was present in the water that I had left in the tank from the earlier cycling attempt. I have read about the problems with the API ammonia test and have also read that nitrite levels might not be relevant, but I was hoping for a nitrite drop to show that my disturbed cycle was still progressing, as I was unsure what was going on considering the strange circumstances. With CUC and some corals already ordered I wanted to get the parameters under control ASAP so bought a bottle of bio-spira.

Within 12 hours my Ammonia read 0 using the API test (which did give me some renewed confidence in the API test). 2 days later and nitrite is still the same. Now this might be because it got so high that it is taking time to come down, or it could be that the bio-spira has done nothing to help the nitrite levels.

So I am 50% convinced. It did appear that the bio-spira did get my ammonia levels under control very quickly, so my tank presumably can now support livestock, but it also says on the bottle that it 'reduces nitrite toxicity'. I've no idea what this means in practical terms and whether it does anything to speed up the reduction in nitrite levels.

I have started a study of three nitrifying bacteria products, Biospira is the first product. When I have all three tested, I will post the results.

Very preliminary results. Biospira removes ~0.5 ppm ammonia in 48 hrs at 72 F. It starts to work immediately. Nitrite formation is detected within 1 hour. It removes ammonia at this concentration whether or not PO4 is detectable.

Nitrite oxidation is another story. The reason I started this study was that nitrite oxidation did not seem to be happening even after a month. Odd. So, a controlled study was started.

Three important points about nitrite oxidizing bacteria: (1) nitrite oxidizing bacteria do not grow well in saltwater, there limit of growth is roughly 40 ppt salinity, (2) they grow faster at higher temperature, and (3) phosphate might (?) be required if nitrite oxidation seems stuck.

Since nitrite oxidation takes so long to start, it might be another month before I have results.

By the way, the zero point for API ammonia test is variable, ranging from yellow to green. The only way to partially deal with this is to use a 10 mL sample and add 6 drops of the first reagent, 5 drops of the second one and then let it sit one hour. The color chart cannot be used with this modification but you will see a near colorless zero point and a slight blue color for 0.05-0.1 ppm total ammonia. Higher concentrations produce a deeper blue.

 

[brandon429]

In my opinion this summary below is a neat application of this soon to be 100 pages:


what is the known incidence of dead bottle bac here—extremely low. when we buy a bottle we know it’s alive not dead.


how many instances did a given test run have two completely dead/inert bottles found? Zero times. In a hundred pages of feedback


in every cycle thread I’ve ever seen in the postverse since 2001 we never had a failed cycle, or a dead bottle, this thread was the first Id ever heard about inactivated bottles/ poor shipping etc

so the takeaway is that any saltwater tank having sand and rock attachment points adding doses from 2 different brands here, along with two nice pinches of food grinded up, waiting ten days then changing the water for new is cycled and doesn’t need to test for a single param. No way will two separate brands of purchase bottle bac be dead, it statistically won’t happen. And each of those tested here given ten days and feed will cycle by that time, we see.

we are seeing on seneye in above posts that in hours the ammonia is controlled, ten days was massive wait boost.

it’s a way of using this thread’s data to reveal a completely testless dry start system. Params will not matter, only the wait. Go fifteen days in the stew if you want to knock it out of the park. 100% of cycles that apply this will complete, a two separate bottles dose is guaranteed to work with no tests ran for any param.

We now have a way to start dry start reefs on time, without any testing whatsoever. I have zero concern about one strain warring another etc, it’s a double dose of horsepower.

one could put a third and final hedge into place on a testless dry start cycle, wait thirty days and give a pinch of feed. Look below how powerful some feed as Dr. Reef mentioned and 30 days from a cycling chart can be, no bottle bac needed

Build Thread - My SPS Waterbox Peninsula Mini 15

Beautiful build and scape!

www.reef2reef.com

 

[brandon429]

Bump

for debate on testless dry start cycling post #1904, the bane of any decent reef aquarist (we are trained to think cycling without testing is impossible and heretical)


does the data presented above and contextually in this thread make testless cycling ethical? I’d say so. What a neat change lol for the hobby: take your cycle test kits and drawer them this round.

In the above arrangement, a cycle will complete on time, known before the tank is even assembled. Two different brands of bottle bac will make it nearly instant skip cycle, per the seneye thread posted below. Omitting the bottle, feeding and waiting a month also works. The need for bottle bacteria at all is balanced in the link from post #1904, and so we don’t actually have to test to cycle a dry system. The makers of cycling charts already have.

Is anyone with a mindstream or seneye ammonia reader willing to co-fund a cycling experiment with me

@Dan_P can you let us know if you feel that prior copper treated substrates would affect nitrification testing. I wouldn't think the old rocks would, was mainly concerned about the actively-dosed system altering the reading. lots of people reef with prior copper rocks and can't keep snails, but...

www.reef2reef.com

 

[MnFish1]

In my opinion this summary below is a neat application of this soon to be 100 pages:


what is the known incidence of dead bottle bac here—extremely low. when we buy a bottle we know it’s alive not dead.


how many instances did a given test run have two completely dead/inert bottles found? Zero times. In a hundred pages of feedback


in every cycle thread I’ve ever seen in the postverse since 2001 we never had a failed cycle, or a dead bottle, this thread was the first Id ever heard about inactivated bottles/ poor shipping etc

so the takeaway is that any saltwater tank having sand and rock attachment points adding doses from 2 different brands here, along with two nice pinches of food grinded up, waiting ten days then changing the water for new is cycled and doesn’t need to test for a single param. No way will two separate brands of purchase bottle bac be dead, it statistically won’t happen. And each of those tested here given ten days and feed will cycle by that time, we see.

we are seeing on seneye in above posts that in hours the ammonia is controlled, ten days was massive wait boost.

it’s a way of using this thread’s data to reveal a completely testless dry start system. Params will not matter, only the wait. Go fifteen days in the stew if you want to knock it out of the park. 100% of cycles that apply this will complete, a two separate bottles dose is guaranteed to work with no tests ran for any param.

We now have a way to start dry start reefs on time, without any testing whatsoever. I have zero concern about one strain warring another etc, it’s a double dose of horsepower.

one could put a third and final hedge into place on a testless dry start cycle, wait thirty days and give a pinch of feed. Look below how powerful some feed as Dr. Reef mentioned and 30 days from a cycling chart can be, no bottle bac needed

Build Thread - My SPS Waterbox Peninsula Mini 15

Beautiful build and scape!

www.reef2reef.com

I have never owned an ammonia kit, or a nitrite kit...

 

[brandon429]

I’m just trying to get everyone who would otherwise vote heck no in a poll to agree

if I knew how to make polls / wouldn’t have to sub the results heh

I do a lot of virtual polling

but imagine this poll: you can cycle your reef tank without any testing yes/no

its 99-100% slanted to the side of the wrong answer, fascinating. What kind of training got the hobby here

 

[MnFish1]

I’m just trying to get everyone who would otherwise vote heck no in a poll to agree

if I knew how to make polls / wouldn’t have to sub the results heh

I do a lot of virtual polling

but imagine this poll: you can cycle your reef tank without any testing yes/no

its 99-100% slanted to the side of the wrong answer, fascinating. What kind of training got the hobby here

Its easy to make a poll - you just create a thread and click the button that says 'make this a poll'. Then the place where you can enter questions, etc - comes up

 

[Msteven1]

Hello all! What a read this was. Great timing for me, as I'm about to cycle (or not) my 40 breeder. Here is the status:

Dec 25, 2020
Dry Reef Saver rock added.
Added Caribsea Argonite natural sand (Not Live). Rinsed with tap water until no clouding.
RODI mixed saltwater using Reef Crystals salt added. Adjusted to 1.025 sg, apporx 50 gallons system total.
Started up sump, tank temperature 77 to 80 degrees. 230 gph flow.
No lighting except ceiling lights for a few hours a day. (Located in basement, blackout conditions when we are not down there)
In Mid January, I did set up an auto water change using Apex DOS, just to test function. I was changing a pint a day, drawing from a Brute trash can reservoir.
I have not tested anything to date except salinity.
Nothing added (intentionally) to the tank.

Today
My plan was to test for ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, alk, calck, mag this weekend, and then dose pure ammonia I purchased from Ace Hardware, to 2 ppm. Then add Microbacter 7 per instructions. Test ammonia until zero and then dose back to 2 ppm. Continue until oxidized in 24 hours.

Since the system as been running over 2 months, Am I accurate in assuming that I could dose ammonia without adding bacteria and achieve 0 ppm in 24 hours?

Here is a pic of my tank

 

[flampton]

I have started a study of three nitrifying bacteria products, Biospira is the first product. When I have all three tested, I will post the results.

Very preliminary results. Biospira removes ~0.5 ppm ammonia in 48 hrs at 72 F. It starts to work immediately. Nitrite formation is detected within 1 hour. It removes ammonia at this concentration whether or not PO4 is detectable.

Nitrite oxidation is another story. The reason I started this study was that nitrite oxidation did not seem to be happening even after a month. Odd. So, a controlled study was started.

Three important points about nitrite oxidizing bacteria: (1) nitrite oxidizing bacteria do not grow well in saltwater, there limit of growth is roughly 40 ppt salinity, (2) they grow faster at higher temperature, and (3) phosphate might (?) be required if nitrite oxidation seems stuck.

Since nitrite oxidation takes so long to start, it might be another month before I have results.

By the way, the zero point for API ammonia test is variable, ranging from yellow to green. The only way to partially deal with this is to use a 10 mL sample and add 6 drops of the first reagent, 5 drops of the second one and then let it sit one hour. The color chart cannot be used with this modification but you will see a near colorless zero point and a slight blue color for 0.05-0.1 ppm total ammonia. Higher concentrations produce a deeper blue.

Yes nitrite isn't a great concern, however to cycle quicker it is best to run warm with low salt. You can start a tank at 1.016-1.018 @ 82F , speed through the cycle and the lower temp and raise the salt up. You can also cycle outside the tank no problem as it is all about surface area and not total water volume. So can start a couple weeks before the tank even arrives. I was playing around with that a bit, thinking of selling tankless cycling kits. Maybe I'll get back to that...

 

[brandon429]

You are already done ill bet

nothing further required. You're twice past the one month cycling period.

I wouldn't bet you'd hit zero ammonia in a day, due to reasons Google has pages of ammonia test misreads

But what I would bet, is life will live in the cycled tank if you add some

It's been feeding on room fare. The reasons I have to clean blinds and dust

 

[Msteven1]

Great to hear Brandon, until reading this thread I never understood how bacteria is everywhere and doesn't need an ammonia source to stay "alive".

I'll do my little ammonia test and finalize my fish list so I can start adding next week.

 

[brandon429]

We still need that test you've made another rare arrangement

Not to 2 ppm. We should calculate from this helper a much smaller dose, known accurate, to see if the tester can pick it up then we watch for movement back down:

Calculator

I'd use the dose it takes to attain half a ppm in the system. Completely naturally sourced and fed bacteria don't have to win like bottle bac concentrates to be still very awesome

 

[NeonRabbit221B]

Nitrite Toxicity

Hey guys I have an aquarium system that has about 45gallons of water cycling so I Let it cycle for about week and I added seeded marine pure ceramic balls and the bacteria in a bottle. I had no choice but to add my 2 clownfish from my quarantine into the tank.. because I needed to put a sick...

www.reef2reef.com

in thousands of cycles online tracked, I haven’t seen nitrite matter one single iota in any case for a display tank if that helps. Not owning the kit altogether seems better than owning the kit due to its neutrality in reefing it seems. Agreed that nitrification is complete when nitrites are controlled but that doesn’t affect reef convention start dates, our detailed seneye experiment above, or when two clowns will be safe in someone‘s fish-in cycle.

whatever the date says on the bottle bac label, we can bet it’ll carry fish on or before that date safely and ethically.

I would like to counter this with Nitrite matters a single iota in the fact that it allows me to know when my bacterial population have converted any amount of ammonia into nitrite. For example I tested nitrite for the first time yesterday when I realized I overdid it with an ammonia source and wanted to verify that my bacteria that was 1+ year old was still viable. It told me I had .25 ppm nitrite which means I had some nitrifying bacteria. Now the test is a paperweight

 

[Msteven1]

We still need that test you've made another rare arrangement

Not to 2 ppm. We should calculate from this helper a much smaller dose, known accurate, to see if the tester can pick it up then we watch for movement back down:

Calculator

Gotcha,

I will dose 1 ml. Per the calculator I'm using that should give me about .7 ppm and watch for color change vs the test before adding ammonia

 

[Dan_P]

Yes nitrite isn't a great concern, however to cycle quicker it is best to run warm with low salt. You can start a tank at 1.016-1.018 @ 82F , speed through the cycle and the lower temp and raise the salt up. You can also cycle outside the tank no problem as it is all about surface area and not total water volume. So can start a couple weeks before the tank even arrives. I was playing around with that a bit, thinking of selling tankless cycling kits. Maybe I'll get back to that...

Two thoughts.

1) Great idea
2) There must be something in the economics of such a product that it isn’t a product already. For example, is nitrifying ready sand less stable to storage than bottled bacteria or is the shipping cost of wet sand beyond the tipping point for a profit. Why is there no instant cycled aquarium sand?

 

[Msteven1]

We still need that test you've made another rare arrangement

Not to 2 ppm. We should calculate from this helper a much smaller dose, known accurate, to see if the tester can pick it up then we watch for movement back down:

Calculator

I'd use the dose it takes to attain half a ppm in the system. Completely naturally sourced and fed bacteria don't have to win like bottle bac concentrates to be still very awesome

Oh, and I'm going to test for phosphate using Hanna ULR. That's the reason I've had the rock just running in the system. The theory that dry rock leeches phosphates. I just skipped the cure in a trash can for curing in my tank.

 

[Msteven1]

Ok. Bad news, my Red Sea kits have expired so no alk reading today. API test kit expires 11/21.
Ammonia, nitrite, nitrate read zero.
My phosphorus reagent expires this month. I did two tests. First .0400 phosphate, second .0415.
I just dosed 1 ml 10% ammonium hydroxide directly to tank.
how long should I wait to ensure ammonia is through system?

 

[brandon429]

I think that is a very important post. @Dan_P why is api not picking that up


also I didn’t check the online calc

did it say to input only one mil given your volume

 

[Msteven1]

Ok. Bad news, my Red Sea kits have expired so no alk reading today. API test kit expires 11/21.
Ammonia, nitrite, nitrate read zero.
My phosphorus reagent expires this month. I did two tests. First .0400 phosphate, second .0415.
I just dosed 1 ml 10% ammonium hydroxide directly to tank.
how long should I wait to ensure ammonia is through system?