8.0 Ammonia for almost two months

brandon429 · May 28, 2019

how about not derailing for once, the tank is cycled and I stated a way to measure that if needed or even better, 4 years of cycle work all in one thread to save the effort.

show some of your cycle work, Im curious to see it even if its brief and to the point.

Pdash · May 28, 2019

brandon429 said:
how about not derailing for once, the tank is cycled and I stated a way to measure that if needed or even better, 4 years of cycle work all in one thread to save the effort.

I'm not derailing, needlessly confusing writing makes a successful outcome for the people you want to help less likely.

brandon429 · May 28, 2019

---> this thread has some neat comparisons in our cycling thread. a few similar dry surface + live rock starts...blended cycles.

Isnt it amazing science that he helped his bacteria become established vs harming them? pretty neat. I find it more amazing how little we've progressed in cycling science in the hobby, in fact the 80s had a better concept than we do now of how bac work. we kinda backslid

poll ten people on how to get multi thousand dollar Jason fox sps corals to grow, responses are pretty on track and fairly consistent in how to attain those ends

but poll ten people on cycling completion...what kills bac vs what they tolerate, and it ranges so much you couldn't pinpoint an answer at all. variations in understanding here drive retail purchases (many time unneeded) and they cause all kinds of headaches in the hobby. Im amazed our hobby doesn't have a better command of cycling, I find it all pretty interesting. People will literally sit there and let any numbers of invaders take over a system out of fear they'll kill the bacteria by cleaning out the tank...cycling affects so much we do. cycling info was about to cost the OP more money, or not.

Deezill · May 28, 2019

Irishman said:
Just asking questions to help out. Not lurk and critique other people’s thought process.

I was thinking of this too. Having enough live rock to create enough bacteria to convert NH3 -->NO2 -->NO3. Make sense?

Deezill · May 28, 2019

Hemmdog said:
I’m not sure. But reefs need 0 tds water, with an RODI unit. You just adding more liquid to your salt mix over and over again when topping off. When your using tap the heavy metals and other bad things accumulate eventually turning catastrophic. Sometimes you can get away with it for a little bit if you water source is great, but in most cases it’s a nightmare. You really need RODI water, most LFS’s sell it, I still buy mine and lug 50gals of water every week.

This is correct. You want your water to be 0 total dissolved solvents. Your salt will add just about everything that you need to the water. such as Ca, Mg etc. Hemmdog is correct with what he said about heavy metals in the water. Now I have heard of people using tap water within a QT

Water Dog · May 28, 2019

Contrary to what has been stated above, an ammonia level at 8ppm or higher is highly toxic to the beneficial nitrifying bacteria that we are trying to grow, which is why many have indicated a stalled cycle and test results by the OP of 0 nitrites and 0 nitrates.

Empty the tank, rinse everything, rocks and sand with RODI. Make new saltwater using RODI and start over. As someone stated earlier, read the stickies in the beginner forums as there’s a wealth of information and wisdom available to you if you’re willing to do the research.

brandon429 · May 28, 2019

why do you take the stated measures as accurate, we linked about 20 example threads where they weren't accurate as initially stated.

where do you get your 8 ppm info/lethality info from, again, we linked a study where 300 ppm didn't stop nitrification? Why didn't that sterilize the algae and prevent greenwater? you are thinking that algae is present but no bac

You don't have to start over the cycle, its done. You can replace all the high TDS water with reef water, however, and when you do you are still cycled as the hallmark of a completed cycle is no amount of water changes undoes it

Before recycling all over again, assuming your bac are dead, how about testing as stated above Vic73, you'll be prime set for that after the full water change?

You could do a lot for cycling science in general if you'd test as stated above, the easy four steps from post #59. you could literally put to rest the matter, again (this matter is already linked in that thread and well-tested using API in other similar setups and yes an 8ppm one from nano-reef.com cycled just fine/was using rotten shrimp)

Deezill · May 28, 2019

@brandon429 I see what you are saying and there may be proof on the Nh3, however, would it not be better just to start off correctly using RODI? It is my opinion, my 1 cent that your tank will only be as good as the water you start with. Why start with Nh3 that high? As a biology major, I do agree with Nh3 at those levels are toxic to certain bacteria Once again I'm just saying

brandon429 · May 28, 2019

Deezill well said

we're within a quarter centimeter of being able to actually test both sides of this claim. We all agree his current water is too high TDS for reefing, so change it. That's the exact thing I cannot get anyone to do when they're arguing about cycling lol, but he has to since we all agree we don't want his corals in tap water/algae issues are predictable.

When he changes out all the water, he w be adding back water on top of 60 day bioslicks. Based on the pages in the thread, we're either about to make one heckuva wrong call or /

when the tank is refilled with the most pristine ro di/ .023 reef water, he can then run a simple oxidation test using liquid ammonia and in 24 hours we'll have the matter at rest. That's another reason I love cycling threads, easy to measure accuracy. When you calibrate the titrations lol

see post #59 steps*** don't dose the new tank to 2 ppm and create wastewater all over again. You add the ammonia until your tester moves up one discernible increment, then stop, retest in 24 hours. You can get most titration tests to work when arranged like that

brandon429 · May 28, 2019

welp Vic, the entire weight of microbiological cycling science circa 2019 rests on your shoulders... let us know what that API ammonia says on the round two buddy.
B

*let the scrolls show, only one voter says you are cycled, you only need to align testing to see it. currently, the testing is unaligned and we only need to know what ammonia does to stamp the cycle done or not.

Vic, if you'll do this specialized round 2 testing using that ammonia kit, you will be impacting some pretty big deal stuff.

With one little adjusted ammonia test after your water change we can know if you had bac ready all this time. Take good pics of the recalibrated test and the redose color change/24 hours test if you can

vetteguy53081 · May 28, 2019

Add rock and bacteria supplement, reduce feeding amounts and add carbon and what filtration do you have?

brandon429 · May 29, 2019

8.0 ammonia was directly tested here, and shown not to kill bac. I didn't realize he just ran some ammonia upper-level tests. Wanted to show how what people think about bacteria doesn't line up with calibrated testing many times.
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/bacteria-in-a-bottle-myth-or-fact.403226/page-86#post-6108648

MnFish1 · May 29, 2019

brandon429 said:
8.0 ammonia was directly tested here, and shown not to kill bac.
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/bacteria-in-a-bottle-myth-or-fact.403226/page-86#post-6108648

Thats what I said already Brandon - the Fritz 900 worked at 8 PPM but other brands did not (but they did work at lower levels - 2ppm and 4ppm). The Fritz to my recollection worked faster in the lower ammonia levels. But you're ignoring the important fact -Fritz themselves recommend 5-6 ppm - but thought it would be ok at 8. My guess is that and 12 or 14 or 16 the cycle would be slower. As to your study concerning 300 ppm ammonia in 'dirt' check out this study - and note the comments on the effect of pH and ammonia on nitrifying bacteria. What was the pH of the substrate when 300 ppm 'ammonia' didn't affect nitrifiers?

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S096085240500180X

Then there's this one:

https://www.jstor.org/stable/25038971?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents

Inhibition of nitrification by un-ionized ammonia (${\rm NH}_{3}$) (FA) and un-ionized nitrous acid (${\rm HNO}_{2}$) (FNA) was evaluated by using data from studies of municipal, agricultural, and industrial wastes. Inhibitory concentrations of FA and FNA were identified and ranged from 0.1 to 150 mg/l for FA and 0.2 to 2.8 mg/l for FNA. FA inhibition to nitrobacters occurred at concentrations lower than those that inhibited nitrosomonads. The inhibition was not permanent and could be relieved by adjusting operational conditions such that the FA and FNA were less than inhibitory concentrations. An operational chart was developed to assess the performance of nitrifying systems.

brandon429 · May 29, 2019

Glad you were able to summarize that clearly, when I first read your posts here they seemed to state the opposite take, seemed to hesitate based on the nitrate and nitrite readings prior. Not anyone in this thread felt his cycle was ok- it was a resounding stalled cycle call.

Vic, any chance of getting that updated test? you can see from whats linked here, you are unlikely to have killed the bac we want to measure after you change the water.

When I read the first post here and saw the pics, am seeing indirect indicators of fat and happy bac colonies. that was certainly the minority take...this drastic difference in beliefs about bacteria uncovers the need for better science in our hobby, that's why this thread interests me so much. I cant imagine an environment in a home setup where bacteria cannot populate water/surfaces fully and quickly, but that certainly wasn't agreeable to anyone else here so far. I had forgot that Dr Reef had already directly tested 8 ppm setups, what a quick recent reference~~

MnFish1 · May 29, 2019

brandon429 said:
Glad you were able to summarize that clearly, when I first read your posts here they seemed to state the opposite take.

You seemed to hesitate based on the nitrate and nitrite readings prior. Not anyone in this thread felt his cycle was ok, till now, perhaps we can collect a few more skeptics that his cycle didn't complete.

Vic, any chance of getting that updated test? you can see from whats linked here, you are unlikely to have killed the bac we want to measure after you change the water.

Brandon - if you read the studies I showed you - you would have read that the inhibition of the nitrifiers does not 'kill' the bacteria - they recover once the ammonia goes back to sub inhibitory levels. So - if you are implying that 10ppm ammonia kills bacteria - no one is saying that.

Dr. Reef · May 29, 2019

I just simply skimmed over the OP's statement on first page.
Some of you may know i have done real deep and detailed study and testing on 9 different bacteria manufacturers and have seen some good results and found a lot of good info over the course. I am still in process of testing a different way soon.
Anyways, in my testing 8 ppm will stall most bacteria but Fritz turbostart 900 was able to oxidize it in 2 days.
Others were not able to due to a flaw in the testing, Hetrotrophis bacter require carbon source to oxidize ammonia and in my sterile tanks there was no carbon. In further studies we did introduce carbon source in stalled tanks and for results tanks that had been sitting at high ammonia for days after adding food suddenly oxidized ammonia within 24 hrs.
So 8ppm is not high for baceria to be killed or die off but it takes time for them to oxidize.
My take on this OP is testing error and i doubt ammonia is 8ppm

MnFish1 · May 29, 2019

Dr. Reef said:
I just simply skimmed over the OP's statement on first page.
Some of you may know i have done real deep and detailed study and testing on 9 different bacteria manufacturers and have seen some good results and found a lot of good info over the course. I am still in process of testing a different way soon.
Anyways, in my testing 8 ppm will stall most bacteria but Fritz turbostart 900 was able to oxidize it in 2 days.
Others were not able to due to a flaw in the testing, Hetrotrophis bacter require carbon source to oxidize ammonia and in my sterile tanks there was no carbon. In further studies we did introduce carbon source in stalled tanks and for results tanks that had been sitting at high ammonia for days after adding food suddenly oxidized ammonia within 24 hrs.
So 8ppm is not high for baceria to be killed or die off but it takes time for them to oxidize.
My take on this OP is testing error and i double ammonia is 8ppm

If you go further down he shows the vial of his tap water (which he used ) was like .5 - and his tank water is far far far darker green than upper limit of the test - his testing was also verified at least once by his LFS with a different test. In any case - to repeat no one thinks that 8 ppm kills nitrifiers - the question is 'does it inhibit them'. and what if it's 16ppm etc etc.

He also used the bacteria supplement that came with the salt he used - so who knows what is in that...

Dr. Reef · May 29, 2019

I have not tested ammonia more than 8-10ppm (from what i could observe) so in that range bacteria does bounce back. not sure how much far up the level it can survive. Its part of my new study to test soon. It will make a good experiment.