Adding Media To Increase Filtration?

[ldsdbomber]

I am a beginner, so bear with me. I see the sponge ring inside some kind of housing with water inflow and outflow obviously directing the water and associated chemicals through the sponge where presumably a lot of the beneficial bacteria will live. I also know that the fishless cycling routine is designed to feed latent colonies of bacteria in the water possibly, and they grow on this media and the substrate etc. How much benefit is there in simply putting extra media in the tank to provide more surfaces for bacterial growth, is it impeded greatly by not being in direct currents? If you squeeze an extra sponge into the casing, does that potentially allow twice as much bacteria to get a hold, or are you risking reduced flowrate through the whole sponge area. Also, since bacteria are microscopic I assume a single sponge can hold a lot of bacteria, but since clumsy cleaning or rinsing of sponge and substrate can affect a less than mature cycle, is there any benefit to simply providing more material for it to take hold. The Biube I have comes with a very coarse, almost rocky ceramic media and the current of water passing over and through that must be quite small, though clearly important. What if I just covered that with another substrate like the Eheim substrate pro that is also like porous media? Is there a way to quantify an amount of media in terms of its bacterial loading capacity or is it just a stupid quantity since the amount is essentially infinite when discussing microbial life on a macro object?

 

[fatheadminnow]

The Autotrophic bacteria (beneficial bacteria); about 99% of them live in the filter, where the remaining 1% is scattered among the glass, substrate and decor. Putting a sponge in the tank, where there is little to no water movement, is not going to do much. The A-bacs (autotrophic) like to colonize in ares that have a nice amount of water movement, such as your filter, so the water movement is constantly and consistently bringing them a source of ammonia to munch on. Squeezing an already established filter from another tank, into your filter, will allow the A-bacs to fall off into your new filter. This is a good method to jump starting your cycle.

There are limits to the size of our filter, however I do not know of ways to measure the limit of our filters related to the capacity of our tanks, in terms of fish producing ammonia and such. If you filter came with your tank, and you do not over stock your tank, then that filter will most likely be just fine, in terms of allowing enough Autotrophic bacteria to colonize to properly handle all the ammonia and nitrite in your tank.

The rocky ceramic media you are referring to is actually the bio-media. This is the media that your bacteria are going to colonize on the most because it is designed in such a way that the bacteria will have optimal living capabilities/conditions.

-FHM

 

[ldsdbomber]

The Autotrophic bacteria (beneficial bacteria); about 99% of them live in the filter, where the remaining 1% is scattered among the glass, substrate and decor. Putting a sponge in the tank, where there is little to no water movement, is not going to do much. The A-bacs (autotrophic) like to colonize in ares that have a nice amount of water movement, such as your filter, so the water movement is constantly and consistently bringing them a source of ammonia to munch on. Squeezing an already established filter from another tank, into your filter, will allow the A-bacs to fall off into your new filter. This is a good method to jump starting your cycle.

There are limits to the size of our filter, however I do not know of ways to measure the limit of our filters related to the capacity of our tanks, in terms of fish producing ammonia and such. If you filter came with your tank, and you do not over stock your tank, then that filter will most likely be just fine, in terms of allowing enough Autotrophic bacteria to colonize to properly handle all the ammonia and nitrite in your tank.

The rocky ceramic media you are referring to is actually the bio-media. This is the media that your bacteria are going to colonize on the most because it is designed in such a way that the bacteria will have optimal living capabilities/conditions.

-FHM

that would explain a lot, I thought my cleaning after the cycle had been quite careful but now I realise that I did not rinse my filter sponge in old tank water, but also SQUEEZED it once. I am guessing that means I basically threw away a good deal of the bacteria did I? I am amazed at how sensitive these colonies are. For example, at one point after dumping more than 5ppm ammonia into my tank and having a huge Ph crash and nitrite spike, I left alone for 2 days, the nitrite cleared very rapidly after that, from unmeasurably high to 7.5 one day, then 7.5 to 0ish in a day, that is a lot of nitrite clearance! I then maintained only 0.5 to 1ppm ammonia, I now think that was a mistake, but coupled with mistakenly thinking the cycle was OK (it was clearing that amount in 12 hours), the cleaning and water change AND SQUEEZE took place, and then all of a sudden, 1ppm ammonia was lingering slightly longer but the nitrite was not clearing very fast at all.

 

[fatheadminnow]

Sounds like the tank was still cycling to me. Once ammonia, from 5ppm, and nitrite go to 0 ppm in 12 hours, your tank is cycled.

-FHM