Bottle stuff why? Vibrant...cycle bottle stuff

[monkeyCmonkeyDo]

Whats with everyone dumping bottle cycle bacteria stuff in their tanks? What's with the vibrant kick? So many people adding liquid this or that to their tanks....see it as beneficial?
I come from a time when we cycled with fish food, or fish, or actually used a table shrimp piece to kick off our cycle.

What benefit do you really think these liquid additive "fix" bottles have? You cycle faster? You have a more diverse beneficial bacteria population?! Lol.
What is it? Tell me please? I feel like I'm missing out on something here... lol.
D

 

[monkeyCmonkeyDo]

What about vodka dosers? Hydrogen peroxide users? What and some of the negative effects of these being introduced?

 

[J1a]

A long the same vein, there is also two-part dosing, kalkwasser and CO2 into calcium reactors.

What I mean is, there are things which we need to do to maintain a conducive environment for out reef animals (and plants and bacteria). Some of these things which we do, involves adding things into the aquarium.

The main idea is to understand why, and how we should use these tools. As well as when and how not to use them.

 

[mdb_talon]

I think the answers are self explanatory. I mean vibrant users want to eliminate algae..... Bottled bac users want a faster cycle and or replenish bacteria diversity(after chemiclean for example)....etc. I mean there is no doubt many of these things(not all) work.

I also come from the days of cycling using fish food/shrimp/hardy fish. I certainly understand why the use of bottled bac though. I will never cycle a tank the old way again. Not when for ten dollars i can cycle much more effectively and much faster. I dont even have to monitor ammonia and my cycle anymore just dose ammonia, dump bottle in, add livestock a week later. So much less hassle. The old way still works fine too of course for those who prefer it.

 

[CayeCaulker]

I am in the process of starting a new system after a long long absence from the hobby. 15 years. This time unlike last time I will be building my own aquascape and starting with "dead" rock. So this thread interests me. I don't want to seed my system from another reefer's tank for fear of unwanted organisms but I want the biodiversity. My quarantine tank will be up and running first!

Hoping I can find the right cocktail of magic in a bottle to get things started. Like the Coraline age starter bottles. I may get some wet sand no sure yet. I am still a few months away from water. I wish I could get a bottle of sea water plankton and biology and throw it in.

I will probably kick off my cycle with a little golden flow.

 

[GARRIGA]

Putting Vibrant aside. Being that a rather hot topic at the moment. Let’s talk bacteria in other bottles.

I’m also old school. Damsels were my starters. Mid 80s. Even when I became aware of cycling with ammonium chloride I still cycled with damsels. Love the little buggers. For fresh I never even bothered cycling. Just dropped fish in. Don’t recall killing any but this was early 70s. My mind don’t often recall properly what I did that early in life. Sometimes. That’s a good thing.

These days it’s all about bacteria. Even in the late 70s I understood the concept of a natural approach and allowing bacteria to process everything including nitrates. Goal was zero and today we know that’s not good.

New theory is that old live porous rock taken from the ocean contained a diversified portfolio of bacterias. No clue how accurate this is and will this just be another fad but BRS put a video out on biome and the conceit that now because we can test for various species that we can start to understand why perhaps some tanks are more successful than others. Why I introduce bacterial products from different vendors. Assumption being they all have different species but no data to support it. Doubt it hurts.

Sad fact is today we struggle to obtain authentic live porous rock. What we now get is construction site rock dropped offshore to collect life. Yet this rock is not porous because it was created by corals. It’s just rock. Only has the diversified bacteria from a few localities. Not sure it will ever replicate the past. Granted if one’s rock was all collected from one site than perhaps the same lack of diversity yet I’d assume that rock being there longer might still have more diversification.

I’ve never had dinos or cyano outbreaks. Seems to be a frequent thing these days. Never had brown algae until latest new build. Perhaps not being so sterile in the past saved me from dinos and cyano. The recent diatoms I believe were silicate related. That was solved.

I’m still grasping at carbon dosing. How a tank without an area devoid of DO can process nitrates just because the carbon source is provided. I get the carbon source. Not the ability to convert nitrates without the absence of DO and I understand denitrification enough to know this just doesn’t make sense. Yet it works. Gotten to a point I no longer care why. Content knowing it does.

Oddly, I have that area where DO exists in the presence of nitrates and I capture detritus so that decomposition naturally provides that carbon source. Worked for a while. Nitrates remained under 5ppm. Phosphates under 0.25ppm. These days I have to dose carbon. Scratching my head over that one.

Beauty about bacteria in a bottle is that should there be an emergency then I can have a backup plan that will possibly save my tank(s) from crashing. Whether it’s a full restart or supplement an accidental overdose of food. That just recently happened and having both bacteria and carbon turned a potential disaster into a mild inconvenience.

Plus bacteria don’t die just because electricity shuts down for a week. Something that can happen in south Florida. Just agitate the effluent at the surface to gas off the hydrogen sulphate that likely built up as the autotrophic and heterotrophic bacteria exhausted all oxygen and heterotrophic bacteria exhausted all nitrates and sulphates. Remnants of that process might kill everything. Could just change the water in the filter as well. Bacteria went dormant. Plus a quick dose from that bottle will jump start everything again.

 

[A Young Reefer]

I used vibrant to combat bubble algae, it worked. However every time I dosed it my nutrients would bottom out and all euphyllia would be irritated. Before the whole trend thing and speculations going around I figured out that there must be more than just bacteria in that stuff, As a result I stopped using it. Since I don't dose chemicals to my tank, like to go the "Natural route".
using bottled bacteria for cycling is much more effective and faster than just putting a source of ammonia and waiting for the beneficial bacteria to culture.

 

[Spare time]

You need to be more specific as to what bacterial products you have in mind. They do different things. If you want to name specific products I can answer it and reasons why some use x instead of y and so on. For example, dr tim's one and only is different than microbacter 7, microbacter 7 is different than micro bacter clean, dr tims waste away is similiar if not the same as microbacter clean dr tims eco balance is different than all of those

 

[Cell]

We pay for speed and convenience all the time. Paying a small premium to cycle a tank in a matter of days vs. weeks is one of many examples.

 

[Jeeperz]

You need to be more specific as to what bacterial products you have in mind. They do different things. If you want to name specific products I can answer it and reasons why some use x instead of y and so on. For example, dr tim's one and only is different than microbacter 7, microbacter 7 is different than micro bacter clean, dr tims waste away is similiar if not the same as microbacter clean dr tims eco balance is different than all of those

If you can explain the difference to me and when to use one or the other I would appreciate it, send me a pm. Like would dr.tims be useful if my nem has a possible bacterial infection? I used biospira to start 4 tanks successfully 2 with fish, 2 by dosing ammonia. I currently am using h2o2 and microbacter7 along with pods and phyto to fight Dino's in 2 tanks. It's working, for now.

 

[REEF EXCLUSIVE]

Hey!
The easiest way to repopulate and renew the bacterial flora in an aquarium is to use detritus from a well-functioning reef system.
Just ask a friend to collect Detritus for you from a good working reef.
Only one problem, Detritus cannot be stored for a long time, it can go rotten.

 

[Spare time]

If you can explain the difference to me and when to use one or the other I would appreciate it, send me a pm. Like would dr.tims be useful if my nem has a possible bacterial infection? I used biospira to start 4 tanks successfully 2 with fish, 2 by dosing ammonia. I currently am using h2o2 and microbacter7 along with pods and phyto to fight Dino's in 2 tanks. It's working, for now.

Sorry I didn't see this. Basically any of them that are advertised as cleaning or waste reducing bacteria are typically a bottle of heterotrophic bacteria that consume detritus, breakfast down waste, and decrease the amount of nitrogen and phosphate that these waste items put into the water column via building body mass. Eco balance is a bunch of bacteria (bacillis if I'm spelling it right), of which fight other bacteria for space (bacteria do that and can "attack" eachother). So if there is an infection, eco balance might try to "shove out" the nasty bacteria. Cycling bacteria (ammonia and nitrite "removers") are just that, bacteria to convert ammonia to nitrite and then another for nitrite to nitrate. Some bacterial blends have anaerobic bacteria that turn nitrate into nitrogen gas. There are others that do a combination of things, like pns probio.

 

[Cell]

For under $10 I can cycle my tank in a matter of days vs weeks, why not? We pay a premium for speed and convenience everywhere else in our lives.

 

[SlugSnorter]

Whats with everyone dumping bottle cycle bacteria stuff in their tanks? What's with the vibrant kick? So many people adding liquid this or that to their tanks....see it as beneficial?
I come from a time when we cycled with fish food, or fish, or actually used a table shrimp piece to kick off our cycle.

What benefit do you really think these liquid additive "fix" bottles have? You cycle faster? You have a more diverse beneficial bacteria population?! Lol.
What is it? Tell me please? I feel like I'm missing out on something here... lol.
D

Instead of harming/killing fish to cycle, you can use bottled bacteria to A.) cycle tank faster and without fish, B.) increase bacterial diversity and combat harmful microbes (Cyano, etc).

Vibrant was marketed as bacteria, but is basically rebranded overpriced algaefix. Not many use it anymore

 

[monkeyCmonkeyDo]

U can cycle a fish tank with a table shrimp. From your freezer. Lol.
The diversity thing is more hype and lies. Just like the vibrant people aes finding out about.
Lol
D

 

[Cell]

U can cycle a fish tank with a table shrimp. From your freezer. Lol.
The diversity thing is more hype and lies. Just like the vibrant people aes finding out about.
Lol
D

We could also still deliver mail by horseback if we wanted. But there are faster, more convenient methods now.

 

[monkeyCmonkeyDo]

At least when I add the table shrimp I know what I'm putting I'm my fish tank. Lol.
D

 

[monkeyCmonkeyDo]

And the speed it up thing? Is that really for the benefit?
D

 

[Cell]

Yes, people pay for speed. Time is money.

 

[Spare time]

U can cycle a fish tank with a table shrimp. From your freezer. Lol.
The diversity thing is more hype and lies. Just like the vibrant people aes finding out about.
Lol
D

Vibrant has nothing to do with this. It's a scam algecide. Not bacteria.



I don't think your argument is very well sorted. You said cycle with a shrimp, but that's one part of the equation.
Using shrimp has nothing to do with bottled bacteria vs not using bottled bacteria