Bacteria...let's really start understanding them! part one

[flampton]

I like your original post - BUT - Based on what I have learned from @AquaBiomics and some of those threads - there is no such thing as a 'correct' bacterial population in a tank. There is a fair bit of variability - depending on where and how samples were taken. In other words there are great looking tanks with bacteria xyz and terrible looking tanks with xyz. So - though it was a great review of the types of bacteria in aquaria - I was also unclear on where this was going? - and I still dont understand - after reading your last response. Unless you know what bacteria are in your tank - its impossible to know whether any product will help or hurt. There is a fair bit of information out there that adding bacteria to 'increase diversity' (as a goal) - does not help - either the bacteria that are in the tank out compete the newcomers - or the newcomers outcompete the established bacteria. From my understanding - contrary to what might be intuition - the longer a tank is running - the less diverse it can become.

Not sure where I said there was a correct bacterial population?

You definitely don't need to know what bacteria species are in your tank to predict whether a product will likely work or not. Not sure why you would think you would need to know. Now you do have to know about what's in the product you're adding.

Diversity is a buzzword that unfortunately doesn't mean anything. What you want is to establish a ecosystem that by design (and luck) will allow the flow of nutrients added or produced in the tank to benefit the organisms of interest while limiting the pest organisms. Which means that you'll likely have to add marine sourced substrates as there is no product on the shelves that has the organisms you'll likely need to be successful, especially early on. Now this could be said you're adding diversity. I get that. But I can also go in my backyard and grab some dirt and throw that in, again diversity.

 

[MnFish1]

Not sure where I said there was a correct bacterial population?

You definitely don't need to know what bacteria species are in your tank to predict whether a product will likely work or not. Not sure why you would think you would need to know. Now you do have to know about what's in the product you're adding.

Diversity is a buzzword that unfortunately doesn't mean anything. What you want is to establish a ecosystem that by design (and luck) will allow the flow of nutrients added or produced in the tank to benefit the organisms of interest while limiting the pest organisms. Which means that you'll likely have to add marine sourced substrates as there is no product on the shelves that has the organisms you'll likely need to be successful, especially early on. Now this could be said you're adding diversity. I get that. But I can also go in my backyard and grab some dirt and throw that in, again diversity.

Not sure you understood or got my points. But thats all good - Like I said - I thought you posted a great overview of bacteria in a reef tank - I'm still unclear on where you were going with it (as someone else said as well)? I agree with you on diversity.

 

[flampton]

Sorry about that @MnFish1 hope my article helps you understand why these microbes are things to be considered and not ignored.

 

[flampton]

Hi everyone I posted a new thread on cyano mat formers.

Check it out if interested

Cyano mat formers destruction the new way forward!

Hi all well you might have seen me in other threads arguing for understanding bacteria and better ecological ways forward. Well I'm here to introduce you to some new thoughts on cyano mat formers. I mean we all know it's an imbalance in the aquarium, usually cited as some nutrient issue...

www.reef2reef.com

Thanks,
Eric

 

[Auto-pilot]

Well I’ve been on here for a month or two and I've found a really heavy misunderstanding of bacteria in the aquarium and what they're actually useful for. This is NOT another cycling thread! None of this is opinion unless I say IMO.

Thanks for the write up! Ive been interested in bacteria and currently I have a microscope that I use to look and try to identify what I'm seeing in my tank. I am really curious about antibiotics and their usefulness on helping corals fight off infections. It seems like many hobbyists and people do not even consider this as an option. In my mind if you have a bacterial infection doctors give you antibiotics. I have done some experimenting with LPS and sps when brown jelly is present with good results many times. As a microbiologist what is your opinion on using antiobiotics on corals??? I have asked people what they think and many people have never seen the use of antibiotics on corals. Why not?

 

[taricha]

There are actually a few antibiotics I can think of that people do use occasionally in tanks or on corals. Erythromycin (for cyano), metronidazole (for fish parasites - also suppresses dinos short term), lugol's Iodine as a coral dip, and h2o2 (used a bunch of ways) are more generally antiseptics. There are others, especially fish meds.
But people would rather think that their solutions are "all natural", so products tend to not say clearly what they are. And people know the bacterial aspect of their tank is important, so without understanding what particular antibiotics might do to that, they'd rather avoid it.

 

[paintman]

Read the OP"s very first post. Got lost in the 2nd paragraph with " genetics and physiology of Gram-negative human pathogens. Moved on to another thread. LOL!

 

[AquaBiomics]

Diversity is a buzzword that unfortunately doesn't mean anything.

I have to disagree here, diversity has a clearly defined meaning.

And diversity has been strongly associated with ecosystem functions in a variety of settings, including coral reefs.

Intact, functional reefs have higher diversity in the water column bacteria than degraded reefs.

New tanks, or dry rock tanks, have far lower diversity than established or live rock tanks.

There are many questions to be asked about diversity, but its not a buzzword, its a concept that has been central to the study of Ecology for a century or more.

 

[AquaBiomics]

There is a fair bit of information out there that adding bacteria to 'increase diversity' (as a goal) - does not help -

As long as you're talking about bottled products, I absolutely agree. Of course live sand, mud, and rock add a lot of new microbial diversity.

From my understanding - contrary to what might be intuition - the longer a tank is running - the less diverse it can become.

Agreed, this pattern is still holding up in the data I have in hand. (Although there are so few old tanks that the high end of the curve remains sparser than I would like)

 

[Auto-pilot]

There are actually a few antibiotics I can think of that people do use occasionally in tanks or on corals. Erythromycin (for cyano), metronidazole (for fish parasites - also suppresses dinos short term), lugol's Iodine as a coral dip, and h2o2 (used a bunch of ways) are more generally antiseptics. There are others, especially fish meds.
But people would rather think that their solutions are "all natural", so products tend to not say clearly what they are. And people know the bacterial aspect of their tank is important, so without understanding what particular antibiotics might do to that, they'd rather avoid it.

I'm talking about treating corals in solutions not the whole tank. An example would be this meat coral I picked up was doing great in my aquarium. One day I noticed that it was not looking great and I tryed a bunch of dips only to tick it off even more. Upon close inspection I noticed it wouldn't close its mouth and the oral disk was damaged. I took a sample of the tissue inside the coral with a needle and a syringe and it looked to be like bacteria under my microscope. I then let the coral soak for 2 hours in an solution with antibiotics that I just made up because nobody had any advice. The next day it looked better. So I continued that prossess for a week and boom bam it started to heal up and I never had problems with it again. Since then I've used this process and saved a couple of corals

 

[GlassMunky]

I'm talking about treating corals in solutions not the whole tank. An example would be this meat coral I picked up was doing great in my aquarium. One day I noticed that it was not looking great and I tryed a bunch of dips only to tick it off even more. Upon close inspection I noticed it wouldn't close its mouth and the oral disk was damaged. I took a sample of the tissue inside the coral with a needle and a syringe and it looked to be like bacteria under my microscope. I then let the coral soak for 2 hours in an solution with antibiotics that I just made up because nobody had any advice. The next day it looked better. So I continued that prossess for a week and boom bam it started to heal up and I never had problems with it again. Since then I've used this process and saved a couple of corals

Antibiotics like cipro are commonly used for treating anemones with bacterial infections as most show up from the wild with one.

 

[taricha]

I'm talking about treating corals in solutions not the whole tank

You'll probably find @andrewey pretty heroic work here on brown jelly to be of interest.
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/brown-jelly-disease-current-treatment-strategies.714440/

 

[MnFish1]

As long as you're talking about bottled products, I absolutely agree. Of course live sand, mud, and rock add a lot of new microbial diversity.

BUT - how many of those 'added bacteria' survive long term - and is there any known benefit (aside perhaps feeding coral) to just 'increasing microbial diversity'? I guess the second question that comes to mind - do the 'new bacteria' out compete the 'old bacteria' - resulting in no net increase in diversity. Either of these two outcomes have been what I've read in the literature...?

 

[AquaBiomics]

BUT - how many of those 'added bacteria' survive long term - and is there any known benefit (aside perhaps feeding coral) to just 'increasing microbial diversity'? I guess the second question that comes to mind - do the 'new bacteria' out compete the 'old bacteria' - resulting in no net increase in diversity. Either of these two outcomes have been what I've read in the literature...?

The question about benefits is the harder one. That kind of experiment is inherently difficult.

The persistence question is more tractable. At least in the short term, both my live sand and live rock experiments showed stable, persistent effects.

I've continued to sample all the relevant tanks, I've just been swamped and havent done the comparisons lately. But at least we can say these effects lasted quite a while, weeks to months.

Looks like I have samples from 1 year after the treatment for both live rock and live sand experiments, one of these days, I'll have to set aside some time to write those up.

 

[Vette67]

The question about benefits is the harder one. That kind of experiment is inherently difficult.

The persistence question is more tractable. At least in the short term, both my live sand and live rock experiments showed stable, persistent effects.

I've continued to sample all the relevant tanks, I've just been swamped and havent done the comparisons lately. But at least we can say these effects lasted quite a while, weeks to months.

Looks like I have samples from 1 year after the treatment for both live rock and live sand experiments, one of these days, I'll have to set aside some time to write those up.

I'd be happy to help show persistence. We have a baseline of mine, before and after addition of live mud / sand, and if I do another test in a year, we can see what has degraded over that time. I'd be curious to know about persistence as well; how long these increases in bacterial diversity can be expected to last.

 

[MnFish1]

The question about benefits is the harder one. That kind of experiment is inherently difficult.

The persistence question is more tractable. At least in the short term, both my live sand and live rock experiments showed stable, persistent effects.

I've continued to sample all the relevant tanks, I've just been swamped and havent done the comparisons lately. But at least we can say these effects lasted quite a while, weeks to months.

Looks like I have samples from 1 year after the treatment for both live rock and live sand experiments, one of these days, I'll have to set aside some time to write those up.

the one problem as I think you remember - one test from my tank showed one of the least diverse. another from mt tan was one of the most diverse... I thin different measurement parameters in the same tank can give widely divergent results

 

[brandon429]

Who here has seen bacteria they think are in a sample and are not using oil immersion?

if you're not on leica you aint seeing bacteria (in someone's home, aware labs might have other approaches though I don't know of any. it had to be oil immersion/ $1500 scope back when I was in the game at a meatpacking plant)

 

[Hans-Werner]

It is not difficult to see bacteria of the genus Beggiatoa with the bare eye, without any microscope.

Did I misunderstand the question?

 

[brandon429]

Is that genus found in reef tank samples

 

[Hans-Werner]

I am not sure whether it is found in samples. It can be found in reef tanks, it is a hydrogen sulfide oxidizing bacterium. It grows on fresh live rock, especially on dying sponges, and other places where dead organic substance causes rot and hydrogen sulfide production. It looks like a white fungus or mold. The white color is caused by sulfur particles in the bacterial filaments.