Nitrification, denitrification and algae

m0jjen · May 1, 2019

Hey!

Been thinking lately about the role of nitrification and denitrification in our tanks. Reason behind it is that i recently rescaped and replaced some rocks (all cycled and fine) and while doing so i disturbed the sandbed and ALOT of old crap got released. I got dino and hairalgae within days.

Before the rescape i struggle to get readable No3 and Po4 for the whole year the tank was up. Eventho i dosed and feed alot, for reference: 3-4x cubes of mysis / brine. 2x dose of reef roids along with full dose of reef energy A & B daily.

Livestock is about 20 fishes, 3 tangs then smaller fish like anthias and blennies etc in an reefer 625XXL total volum about 700L with the fragtank

So to the questions. Now that i have hairalgae (and the dinos still left, living in the hairalgae). Im gonna go ahead and say that the equilibrium i had is gone between processing ammonia (nitrification) and other nutrients (denitrification). I got to thinking, what happens if we increase nitrification by alot. Like afew litres of siporax all going for nitrification? This in my thought would most likely compete with algae for their favorite type of nitrigen (ammonia). But is it a vialable idea to increase nitrification or would sand lr and whatnot already saturate the need for ammonia conversion?

Reasoning behind this is that i as previously stated always had low nutrients no mather what. Always had cyano no mather what, this to mean would mean that denitrification was going nuts and doing its thing. Pretty much stripping my system without much efforts. But we rarely test for ammonia so the nitrification might be lacking behind and the system had room to feed other organisms?

We can see this during the cycle and early stages of a tank where biological filtration isnt mature and ready for action aswell as mature older tanks that get neglected. I might be out in the blue and all wrong, I dont know!

tl:dr

Is there benefits to increased nitrification area in a tank to combate algae and pestorganisms our would and increased denitrification be preferable?

Can denitrification be to high without dosing e.g organic carbon?

Cory · May 1, 2019

Fwiw ive noticed a correlation between organics and dinoflagellets myself.

I think if you provide a more bacterial driven reef you will outcompete algae for sure. Bacteria need the same as algae just minus light.

I remeber back when bio ball trickle filters were the rage. But they became bad because they did their job too well producing too many nitrates. Deemed nitrate factories now. But was that bad having a very efficient ammonia converter? I remember tanks running them were pretty much algae free. Perhaps ammonia was being removed quick enough to outcompete algae? Today tanks running a long time seem to have a common denominator. They use uv lights and/or ozone. Ozone is effective at reducing ammonia. So maybe there is a correlation.

m0jjen · May 1, 2019

Cory said:
Fwiw ive noticed a correlation between organics and dinoflagellets myself.

Dino blooms and organics clearly has a correlation. Most likely the reason why they get severely weakened when we remove our sandbeds. I removed mine, rinsed it clean and put it back. Now i have a fine coat of diatoms instead, which i highly prefer to dinos :)

Cory said:
I think if you provide a more bacterial driven reef you will outcompete algae for sure. Bacteria need the same as algae just minus light.

I remeber back when bio ball trickle filters were the rage. But they became bad because they did their job too well producing too many nitrates. Deemed nitrate factories now. But was that bad having a very efficient ammonia converter? I remember tanks running them were pretty much algae free. Perhaps ammonia was being removed quick enough to outcompete algae? Today tanks running a long time seem to have a common denominator. They use uv lights and/or ozone. Ozone is effective at reducing ammonia. So maybe there is a correlation.

While bioballs probably trap alot of detritus a reactor with siporax and high flow clean easily and cab be flushed to keep it clean if the purpose is to keep it nitrifying. If nitrates coming from this process would come to problematic levels you could just add more siporax with lower flow which would lead it to denitrification, or a refugium or any other method for nitrate removal :)

Cory · May 1, 2019

Ive wondered as to the effectiveness of trickling water on bioballs as opposed to being constantly submerged. One example is an algae turf scrubber. The waterfall scrubber works amazing compared to a floating type. So i wonder if the same is happening with a trickle filter?

Subsea · May 1, 2019

Cory said:
Ive wondered as to the effectiveness of trickling water on bioballs as opposed to being constantly submerged. One example is an algae turf scrubber. The waterfall scrubber works amazing compared to a floating type. So i wonder if the same is happening with a trickle filter?

Yes, that is a good analogy except instead of photosynthesis you will have biofiltration.

Subsea · May 1, 2019

Cory said:
Fwiw ive noticed a correlation between organics and dinoflagellets myself.

I think if you provide a more bacterial driven reef you will outcompete algae for sure. Bacteria need the same as algae just minus light.

I remeber back when bio ball trickle filters were the rage. But they became bad because they did their job too well producing too many nitrates. Deemed nitrate factories now. But was that bad having a very efficient ammonia converter? I remember tanks running them were pretty much algae free. Perhaps ammonia was being removed quick enough to outcompete algae? Today tanks running a long time seem to have a common denominator. They use uv lights and/or ozone. Ozone is effective at reducing ammonia. So maybe there is a correlation.

Help me understand how ozone reduces ammonia.

Subsea · May 1, 2019

m0jjen said:
Hey!

Been thinking lately about the role of nitrification and denitrification in our tanks. Reason behind it is that i recently rescaped and replaced some rocks (all cycled and fine) and while doing so i disturbed the sandbed and ALOT of old crap got released. I got dino and hairalgae within days.

Before the rescape i struggle to get readable No3 and Po4 for the whole year the tank was up. Eventho i dosed and feed alot, for reference: 3-4x cubes of mysis / brine. 2x dose of reef roids along with full dose of reef energy A & B daily.

Livestock is about 20 fishes, 3 tangs then smaller fish like anthias and blennies etc in an reefer 625XXL total volum about 700L with the fragtank

So to the questions. Now that i have hairalgae (and the dinos still left, living in the hairalgae). Im gonna go ahead and say that the equilibrium i had is gone between processing ammonia (nitrification) and other nutrients (denitrification). I got to thinking, what happens if we increase nitrification by alot. Like afew litres of siporax all going for nitrification? This in my thought would most likely compete with algae for their favorite type of nitrigen (ammonia). But is it a vialable idea to increase nitrification or would sand lr and whatnot already saturate the need for ammonia conversion?

Reasoning behind this is that i as previously stated always had low nutrients no mather what. Always had cyano no mather what, this to mean would mean that denitrification was going nuts and doing its thing. Pretty much stripping my system without much efforts. But we rarely test for ammonia so the nitrification might be lacking behind and the system had room to feed other organisms?

We can see this during the cycle and early stages of a tank where biological filtration isnt mature and ready for action aswell as mature older tanks that get neglected. I might be out in the blue and all wrong, I dont know!

tl:dr

Is there benefits to increased nitrification area in a tank to combate algae and pestorganisms our would and increased denitrification be preferable?

Can denitrification be to high without dosing e.g organic carbon?

I don’t see the connection between denitrification and carbon dosing.

Perhaps we should define terms.
Nitrification is a two stage biofiltration process that reduces ammonia to nitrite to nitrate.

Denitrification is a biofiltration process in a reducing oxygen environment in which bacteria strip oxygen from NO3 to release free nitrogen gas to the atmosphere.

As a rule denitrification bacteria reproduce faster than nitrification bacteria. In a new tank the processes you describe are possible but not likely.

m0jjen · May 1, 2019

Subsea said:
As a rule denitrification bacteria reproduce faster than denitrification bacteria. In a new tank the processes you describe are possible but not likely.

Fast little buggers outgrowing them selves! (Joke aside) which is faster?

Subsea · May 1, 2019

m0jjen said:
Fast little buggers outgrowing them selves! (Joke aside) which is faster?

Sorry for typo. I corrected it on my post.

Denitrification bacteria mature & reproduce faster than nitrification bacteria.

m0jjen · May 1, 2019

Subsea said:
Sorry for typo. I corrected it on my post.

Denitrification bacteria mature & reproduce faster than nitrification bacteria.

Ah :) but the question still stands, would there be any benefit to increase and promote nitrifying bacteria by providing a high oxygen area and some media like siporax / marine pure block etc? Or will liverock and and so on saturate the need for that process? Im refeering go minimal scapes without other medias to compensate

taricha · May 1, 2019

So isn't the question where is the ammonia produced?
If it's produced in the water by fish, then you could nitrify wherever you wanted. In the sand or in a block in the sump.

If it's produced by decomposition and things eating and being eaten in the sand bed then cyano and anything else near the sand is going to have a field day. And what you do in the sump may not make any difference. The bulk of the ammonia may not make it that far.

Guessing early on in a tank not much in the way of ammonia comes up out of the sand and later (old tank syndrome?) it's much more.

Nice thread discussion.

Cory · May 1, 2019

Subsea said:
Help me understand how ozone reduces ammonia.

Here is a quote from rhf

"Ammonia

Another of ozone's potential reactions and its byproducts with inorganic compounds in seawater is with ammonia. In fact, ozone is quite effective at converting ammonia into nitrate. The reaction is fast enough that if sufficient ammonia is present in seawater, it will happen preferentially to reactions that lead to bromate.3,12,13 An intermediate species in the process is bromamine (the bromine equivalent ofchloramine), but fortunately (because it is toxic) it usually is further oxidized to bromide and nitrate.

BrOH + NH3 --> NH2Br

NH2Br + O3 + 2OH- --> NO3- + Br- + 2H2O

Presumably it is not harmful, and may be beneficial to reduce the ammonia to nitrate more rapidly. It may lead to higher nitrate concentrations in the aquarium, however, and may also lead to a different ratio of nitrogen export via different mechanisms because some methods (such as growing some species of macroalgae) prefer ammonia over nitrate."

Cory · May 1, 2019

Subsea said:
Yes, that is a good analogy except instead of photosynthesis you will have biofiltration.

Yeah photosynthesis i meant. But what im curious about is the reason for an air/water mixture being more effective than being completely submerged in water. Perhaps gas exchange? Thats my assumption anyway.

m0jjen · May 2, 2019

taricha said:
So isn't the question where is the ammonia produced?
If it's produced in the water by fish, then you could nitrify wherever you wanted. In the sand or in a block in the sump.

If it's produced by decomposition and things eating and being eaten in the sand bed then cyano and anything else near the sand is going to have a field day. And what you do in the sump may not make any difference. The bulk of the ammonia may not make it that far.

Guessing early on in a tank not much in the way of ammonia comes up out of the sand and later (old tank syndrome?) it's much more.

Nice thread discussion.

That is also relevant of course. But what im thinking off is weather or not the nitrification process can be insufficient. If its insufficient we would have ammonia and possible nitrite buildups? Maybe not of significance to livestock but perhaps enough to encourage unwanted organisms.

Subsea · May 2, 2019

m0jjen said:
Ah :) but the question still stands, would there be any benefit to increase and promote nitrifying bacteria by providing a high oxygen area and some media like siporax / marine pure block etc? Or will liverock and and so on saturate the need for that process?

In some cases, differrent techniques work against each other. I don’t know enough specifics to give you an absolute yes or no. I doubt that the processes could be evaluated individually. A reef tank is holistic and to think you can segregate & evaluate biofiltration is difficult at best.

C

m0jjen · May 3, 2019

Lets paint up a scenario where my hypothesis will be applied.

I have a low nutrient tank, pretty much on the brink of starvation. The system has a minimal filtration, little rock, lets say 70 lbs rock to 180 gallons (asking for a friends okay! ;) ). Appropriate skimmer or oversized skimmer which is pretty common today. You have a pretty high bioload. You decide to increase the bioload by 20% and feeding by let say 50% (just fictional numbers). This would increase the biomass going into the system quite considerably and your bio filtration might not be up for the task until it has adapted. This is also a quite common occurrence in hobby.

This would lead to nitrification being put behind. More ammonia is produced that the system could handle. Probably staling every step of it. Meaning trace amounts of ammonia and nitrite probably will be present. This is where algae comes into the picture like that friend we all have that cant handle his licorice. "SUP HOMIE" and starts taking care of all your "problems".

In theory we could provide habitat for a nitrification larger than actually needed to complete the process (unless im overthinking it and everything is regulated by access and demand hence regulating the nitrification and rendering it useless since there is no chance to keep it up without alot of effort.). So an sudden change could happen. Stirring a lot of the sand bed for example without the tank taking a hit and putting it off balance as much as it would have been without the excess nitrification.

This habitat probably needs continues seeding to be kept running since we do have the access and demand portion of how nature works.

The question itself arise from me stirring my sand bed and rescaping leading to alot of hairalgae. Now im in a pretty curious situation where i have harialgae on all my glass, some on rock which most of my tangs are happy to help with. In the hairalgae on the glass i have dinoflagellates killing snails and tangs wont touch it. Im manually removing with i can reach and sucking it out. But over time it coming back. If i dose nitrate and phosphate which is zero i get more hairalgae faster. If i dont everything grows, just not as fast.

So im thinking what if i introduced other means of competition like good bacteria and housing for it? If i had it to begin with would a potential ammonia spike be consumed faster and all this algae and pests would never take place?

taricha · May 3, 2019

m0jjen said:
That is also relevant of course. But what im thinking off is weather or not the nitrification process can be insufficient. If its insufficient we would have ammonia and possible nitrite buildups? Maybe not of significance to livestock but perhaps enough to encourage unwanted organisms.

In that case the seneye ammonia tracking thread is likely on point here. I don't remember precisely, but I think that users reported finding measurable amounts of ammonia even in mature systems in response to pretty modest changes like large feedings or getting a new fish.
If that is so, (and I don't recall for sure) then that goes toward proof of concept for your idea.

m0jjen · May 3, 2019

taricha said:
In that case the seneye ammonia tracking thread is likely on point here. I don't remember precisely, but I think that users reported finding measurable amounts of ammonia even in mature systems in response to pretty modest changes like large feedings or getting a new fish.
If that is so, (and I don't recall for sure) then that goes toward proof of concept for your idea.

Yeah, i've also seen reports of this. Meaning there are room for improvement in most cases when it comes down to ammonia. So as just described in my post there is a high probability that a huge influx of nutrients and organics can and will overwhelm your bio filter and pretty much turn around a nice tank to a near crash when the algae gets a hold. Questions is if its preventable with precautions such as biomedia with the soul purpose to nitrify.

Subsea · May 3, 2019

m0jjen said:
Lets paint up a scenario where my hypothesis will be applied.

I have a low nutrient tank, pretty much on the brink of starvation. The system has a minimal filtration, little rock, lets say 70 lbs rock to 180 gallons (asking for a friends okay! ;) ). Appropriate skimmer or oversized skimmer which is pretty common today. You have a pretty high bioload. You decide to increase the bioload by 20% and feeding by let say 50% (just fictional numbers). This would increase the biomass going into the system quite considerably and your bio filtration might not be up for the task until it has adapted. This is also a quite common occurrence in hobby.

This would lead to nitrification being put behind. More ammonia is produced that the system could handle. Probably staling every step of it. Meaning trace amounts of ammonia and nitrite probably will be present. This is where algae comes into the picture like that friend we all have that cant handle his licorice. "SUP HOMIE" and starts taking care of all your "problems".

In theory we could provide habitat for a nitrification larger than actually needed to complete the process (unless im overthinking it and everything is regulated by access and demand hence regulating the nitrification and rendering it useless since there is no chance to keep it up without alot of effort.). So an sudden change could happen. Stirring a lot of the sand bed for example without the tank taking a hit and putting it off balance as much as it would have been without the excess nitrification.

This habitat probably needs continues seeding to be kept running since we do have the access and demand portion of how nature works.

The question itself arise from me stirring my sand bed and rescaping leading to alot of hairalgae. Now im in a pretty curious situation where i have harialgae on all my glass, some on rock which most of my tangs are happy to help with. In the hairalgae on the glass i have dinoflagellates killing snails and tangs wont touch it. Im manually removing with i can reach and sucking it out. But over time it coming back. If i dose nitrate and phosphate which is zero i get more hairalgae faster. If i dont everything grows, just not as fast.

So im thinking what if i introduced other means of competition like good bacteria and housing for it? If i had it to begin with would a potential ammonia spike be consumed faster and all this algae and pests would never take place?