Anyone Experienced Special Blend

[kevin82]

Hi All

I've come across 'Special Blend' and 'Nite-out 2' at my lfs and after a bit of research it claims to be able to cycle a tank instantly

after a little more reading it mentions to leave the lights off for 2 days to let the bacteria colonise but apart from that it claims to be instant.

http/www.microbelift.com/

Has anyone used this or heard reports about it as I am thinking about giving it a whirl on a 2ft Tank I acquired from AndyGordon on this site.

Thanks

Kevin

 

[shelaghfishface]

sounds like a recreational drug

or 2

even if it does work.. ( and i wouldnt think for one min that it does) why would you want to rush the process.. cycling via the fishless cycle is great for a few reasons two of being .. the learning process and the time it gives you to plan the tank and stocking

says she that has never cycled a tank from start to finsh ( ive alwyas cloned)

of course its your tank and your choice but id be inclined to say, save your money

shelagh xxx

 

[kevin82]

I fishless cycled my current 125L tank, but thought I'd find out if is as good as the guy in my LFS reckons.

If it turns out to be true then surely it can only be a good thing

 

[shelaghfishface]

all im saying that in the past "bactinettes" ( no longer availible) has caused massive debate as to wether or not they actually work.. the people who make it asre bound to say it wll, to stay alive this stuff needs to be continuosly kept refrigirated ( from factory to display) if someone cocks up then you are spending £ on a duff bottle

it cant harm to try it..good luck

 

[fatheadminnow]

I would say no to this as well.

Like stated above, the bacteria would need to be refrigerated at the very least in order to slow the bacteria's metabolism and prolong their life.

-FHM

 

[kevin82]

I would say no to this as well.

Like stated above, the bacteria would need to be refrigerated at the very least in order to slow the bacteria's metabolism and prolong their life.

-FHM

The manufacturers description states that it doesn't need refridgeration.

I'm not saying this definately will work because I've never used it. I would just like to find out if technology and modern methods may have finally had a break through

 

[fatheadminnow]

You can give it a try.

But the bacteria we need are living things, and living things die if there is no food.

When these bacteria are kept cold, they can have a shelf life for about a year or so.

The only product that was known to work was called "Bio-Spira" but this was dis-continued a couple years back.

-FHM

 

[waterdrop]

Wow, some help from Shelagh (from over in Wales.. I did remember right).. remembered also that you found TFF about the same time as me.

Anyway, I agree with the above. BioSpira and Bactinettes had their small percentages of successes for lucky few where the stars aligned to keep the refridgeration going. I vaguely think we had one case where Nite-Out 2 was reported by a beginner as having helped, but that's the only data point I can remember for either product. If you try it, keep a really good log so we can get some more data. Basically nothing's ever come close to mature media.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[OldMan47]

As others have already said, the only sure thing is mature media from the filter on a healthy tank. That is easy enough to find if you already have other tanks up and running as I do. Unfortunately, many of the products supplied by commercial manufacturers are not useful by the time they are in your home and ready to use. Although they may well contain some kind of live bacteria when they are bottled, the ability of the bacteria to survive living without any food and without much oxygen in their environment for more than a day is very poor. A sealed bottle full of perfectly viable bacteria quickly becomes a decaying bottle of organic matter without the oxygen and food sources that exist so ell in our filters. The methods of the past were to try to slow the metabolic rate of those bacteria by keeping them close to the minimum survival temperature for the bacteria and holding the temperature that low until you opened the bottle in your home. It worked often enough that bactinettes and Biospira each got a reputation for sometimes working. Since the Biospira is no longer made and the replacement products are not kept cool enough to expect any survival in the bottle, we no longer expect any of these instant cycle products to work at all. I have some experience with some of them and have never seen them actually affect the total time required for a cycle. Others give glowing reports of using this or that product but when you look at the times they are reporting for a cycle and the typical 4 to 6 weeks for a raw, unaided cycle, there is no statistically significant impact of using these magical elixirs.