Preparing microbacter 7

[taricha]

@taricha, please comment on this idea.

Thanks for tagging me.
I messed around with culturing up bottled bacteria supplements for quite a while. What I found was that when presented with a food source, such as vinegar bacterial growth media, fish flake or whatever, the bottled heterotroph bacteria had some delay in their growth. Native aquarium bacteria, just from a drop of tank water, had no such delay.
So presented with the same food, mb7 would take 1 to 3 days (depending on concentration) before growth could be detected. Native aquarium bacteria responded in hours and often had reached almost maximum population in less than 24hrs.
This means that if you do what is suggested above, and mix tank water with the bottled bacterial product, and then add food, what you are doing is culturing up native aquarium bacteria, and you won't grow any detectable amount of the bottled bacteria product in the same time.
(I can share some data later, when I'm at a computer.)

 

[LeftyReefer]

I was under the assumption that the bacteria in bottled bacterial products was in some form of dormancy.... and would need a few days to become active again.... so I don't see how feeding it right out of the bottle and then adding it to the aquarium right away would do anything. You would have to culture up the bottled bacteria first, and then feed it before adding it to the aquarium.

 

[taricha]

(I can share some data later, when I'm at a computer.)

Here's some data I shared a while back. (Click through the quotes for the thread.)

Figure 5: LB Media diluted to 0.5% Inoculated with Waste Away, MicroBacter7, and Aquarium Water

Oxygen consumption (from oxidized Carbon), Ammonia production (from breaking down proteins), and pH drop (CO2 and/or other acid production) all tell the same story. Every sample inoculated with aquarium water showed activity between day 0.7 and 1.7, while the Waste Away samples showed activity by day 3.7. MicroBacter7 really wasn't interested in the stuff and showed no activity even after nearly 6 days.

Figure 6: Fish Flake 100mg/L (53mg/L protein) Inoculated with Waste Away, Pristine, Live Rock Enhance, Heat-Killed Pristine, and Aquarium Water

Oxygen consumption shows activity from Pristine and Live Rock Enhance between day 2 and 4, and from Waste Away after day 4. Ammonia production shows the exact same story - with the additional information that the aquarium bacteria releases far more ammonia from protein breakdown than the bottle products.
All this data is also consistent with a near-immediate response from aquarium bacteria but a 2-4 day lag time from the bottle bacteria products. (A separate test with same food & concentration also had MicroBacter7 showing activity at day 4.)

and here's another set....

Everything I've seen points to the idea that aquarium bacteria are already active and ready to respond to food, while bottled bacteria do not respond as quickly.
This makes sense considering they've been in a bottle without a food source for an extended time as @LeftyReefer mentioned. Other factors like preservatives or perhaps a the actual number of viable bacteria may also play a role.

 

[brandon429]

It is perfectly ok to select for the strains that respond to food/carbon additions in the early stages of reef cycling. All anyone cares about is ammonia control, safe bioload carry, and those strains give that ability


in time, after the first stockings from another reef, alternation of bac communities occur and those initial strains fade out to be replaced by selected biota and all of them carried the tanks bioload just fine during the transition


remarkable documentation of that shift

Build Thread - My SPS Waterbox Peninsula Mini 15

Hi all. Long time member (I think I joined right around when R2R started or took off years ago) but got out of the hobby for about 6 years and now I am back! I don't see many build threads for the PM 15 (mostly the 25) so thought I'd share my journey here. This post will be a bit behind...

www.reef2reef.com

 

[Big E]

Here's some data I shared a while back. (Click through the quotes for the thread.)







and here's another set....

Everything I've seen points to the idea that aquarium bacteria are already active and ready to respond to food, while bottled bacteria do not respond as quickly.
This makes sense considering they've been in a bottle without a food source for an extended time as @LeftyReefer mentioned. Other factors like preservatives or perhaps a the actual number of viable bacteria may also play a role.

Trying to wrap my brain around your comments on MB7.

From what I watched, Jack Kent said the 4 hours of leaving skimmer off when dosing is to give MB7 time to grab onto rock or a substrate. If you are testing the water with no signs of life that doesn't mean the bacteria isn't attached to a surface and alive sooner.

I have witnessed clearer water after dosing, usually the next day. So again this tells me that the bacteria are alive and growing easily within 24 hours.

He also does confirm that MB7 does not need a carbon source.

I would prefer not to carbon dose as this brings in the possibility of fueling the bad bacteria.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Trying to wrap my brain around your comments on MB7.

From what I watched, Jack Kent said the 4 hours of leaving skimmer off when dosing is to give MB7 time to grab onto rock or a substrate. If you are testing the water with no signs of life that doesn't mean the bacteria isn't attached to a surface and alive sooner.

I have witnessed clearer water after dosing, usually the next day. So again this tells me that the bacteria are alive and growing easily within 24 hours.

He also does confirm that MB7 does not need a carbon source.

I would prefer not to carbon dose as this brings in the possibility of fueling the bad bacteria.

Just a little commentary on how these two choices do different things.

If the MB7 is working for what you want it to, it's a fine plan, but adding bacteria and adding organic carbon are not identical processes. Added bacteria can only function and potentially reduce nutrients if there is an excess of organic carbon already present in the water. It could never work to make a large drop in nitrate, for example, because organic carbon will run out, while adding organic carbon can drop nitrate from any level.

 

[paintman]

Can someone please explain to me why you need to add MB7 to a small amount of tank water first before introducing it into the tank.
Thats like saying splash a litlle bit of faucet water on you before jumping into the shower.
what am I missing here?

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Thats like saying splash a litlle bit of faucet water on you before jumping into the shower.

You don't? lol

I do not know why that is recommended or if it is useful. Not all of Brightwell product descriptions are sensible.

 

[thatmanMIKEson]

You don't? lol

I do not know why that is recommended or if it is useful. Not all of Brightwell product descriptions are sensible.

Probably to give people a general way to add it to the aquarium, instead of a random way they can come up with, like loading it in a feeding syringe and basting corals with it. They make it sound like a special dosing method so maybe people think it's important and they follow that general way to add it, other than their homemade concoction way. Idk

 

[taricha]

Trying to wrap my brain around your comments on MB7.

ok, I'll try to add a little bit. Thanks for sharing the video. I hadn't seen it and I'll enjoy hearing the discussion of details about the product.

From what I watched, Jack Kent said the 4 hours of leaving skimmer off when dosing is to give MB7 time to grab onto rock or a substrate. If you are testing the water with no signs of life that doesn't mean the bacteria isn't attached to a surface and alive sooner.

turning off skimmer/UV when adding a bacterial product is solid advice. skimming or sterilizing would certainly reduce any future activity from the bacteria being added.

What I looked at was sterile tubes of nutrient sources (dissolved and particulate foods) that I added bacterial products to. I had a few different metrics (pH, O2, ammonia, cloudiness) for when the added bacteria became active and started doing things. Regardless of what product or what food or how I measured, there was consistently a delay in the bottled products showing activity, and no delay from aquarium water.
Even if the added bacteria go into an aquarium and land on a bit of fish flake stuck in a rock, that's probably not going to be a much faster response than when they landed on fish flake in the tubes I looked at.

I have witnessed clearer water after dosing, usually the next day. So again this tells me that the bacteria are alive and growing easily within 24 hours.

I would agree this can happen. A bottle of bacterial products may contain important things other than the bacteria themselves, the chemical nature of the media is often important. Carbon sources (like in Waste Away), flocculants, enzymes (that MB7 says it has) etc. Those could all show effects in a tank in less than a day, even if the bacteria themselves are much slower to respond.

He also does confirm that MB7 does not need a carbon source.

When I watch the video, I'll look to see the context of the statement. Since MB7 claims to have grunge-eating bacteria, then at least some of them are in fact heterotrophs and do need carbon. I presume he means no additional carbon is needed outside of what they can theoretically find in a tank.

 

[gbroadbridge]

Can someone please explain to me why you need to add MB7 to a small amount of tank water first before introducing it into the tank.
Thats like saying splash a litlle bit of faucet water on you before jumping into the shower.
what am I missing here?

The idea is that you give the bacteria spores time to activate before introduction to the hostile tank environment.

They also state to not introduce to pump intakes.

I assume that given that Brightwell are a reputable company there is some reason to the instructions given.

I would simply follow their directions, not introduce another carbon source, and see if it works for you.

I can state absolutely that introduction of MB7 made a big improvement to my tank. Ask me to explain how it did so, well, I just can't. Subjective.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

I assume that given that Brightwell are a reputable company there is some reason to the instructions given.

Brightwell clearly does not understand all of their own products and gives grossly incorrect info on some of them. For example, their pH boost + that is hydroxide not boosting alkalinity. Thus, I no longer give them the benefit of the doubt in instructions that seem unusual.

 

[Williamson’s Reef]

Can someone please explain to me why you need to add MB7 to a small amount of tank water first before introducing it into the tank.
Thats like saying splash a litlle bit of faucet water on you before jumping into the shower.
what am I missing here?

I agree. I just pour it into my return section in my sump.

 

[AKL1950]

This is a new guy question, but I can’t help myself.

There are around 100 trillion bacteria in each of our guts. More comes in everyday from the food we eat. Half of the dry weight of our poop is dead bacteria being removed from the system, but the balance in our gut stays about 100 trillion. Taking a probiotic everyday won’t do diddly squat to the total numbers.

Isn’t our reef the same? if there is something that has disrupted the bacterial structure of the system, I can see adding supplemental “good” bacteria, but if it’s running fine, why add more. That’s like creating a bacterial overgrowth in your intestines which creates its own problems. Good bacteria tries to compete with bad bacteria, but good bacteria can also creat bacteria bloom as well whenthere is too much of it. Does adding more on a regular basis actually help or is it just something to do?

Jetson

 

[gbroadbridge]

Brightwell clearly does not understand all of their own products and gives grossly incorrect info on some of them. For example, their pH boost + that is hydroxide not boosting alkalinity. Thus, I no longer give them the benefit of the doubt in instructions that seem unusual.

Do you have a better bio-chemical understanding of the product than the manufacturer ?

I understand that in terms of chemistry you may.

I simply made a subjective determination that in the case of my tank, it made a huge difference.

Based on your opinion I may well treat their additives with more objectivity and testing;.

 

[thatmanMIKEson]

Do you have a better bio-chemical understanding of the product than the manufacturer ?

I understand that in terms of chemistry you may.

I simply made a subjective determination that in the case of my tank, it made a huge difference.

Based on your opinion I may well treat their additives with more objectivity and testing;.

Randy is great, but if you couldn't tell he's always been a little biased against brightwell, he has a little bit of the broken hearted lover sound when referring to them, its cute.. your the man randy THE MAN!

 

[taricha]

Just wanted to comment on this idea, and how to think about product descriptions and directions.

Do you have a better bio-chemical understanding of the product than the manufacturer ?

We do not need to know the exact strains of bacteria that went in the bottle, nor do we need to have witnessed the manufacturing process, looking over their shoulder to understand that getting pulled through aquarium pump intake will not significantly affect the bacteria survival.

They also state to not introduce to pump intakes.

Statements like this from Brightwell do us a favor by reminding us that product bottles may be treated like scientific communications, but they are - in part - advertising documents. It'll contain some important instructions to be heeded, and others that need to be taken with a grain of salt.

Based on your opinion I may well treat their additives with more objectivity and testing;.

This is a fine approach for this manufacturer and others

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Do you have a better bio-chemical understanding of the product than the manufacturer ?

I understand that in terms of chemistry you may.

I simply made a subjective determination that in the case of my tank, it made a huge difference.

Based on your opinion I may well treat their additives with more objectivity and testing;.

Which product are you talking about?

If you mean Boost pH+, absolutely I have a better understanding of what it does.

If you mean bacterial products, I do not know who understands them better since I do not know what they know or don't know.

But given their history of misunderstanding their own chemical products based on their own statements, I do not give Brightwell the benefit of the doubt for other products.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Randy is great, but if you couldn't tell he's always been a little biased against brightwell, he has a little bit of the broken hearted lover sound when referring to them, its cute.. your the man randy THE MAN!

lol

Not biased, just annoyed at their misstatements.

I've had fine conversations with Jack after he took over from Chris Brightwell about some of these issues, and Jack corrected a biggie (claiming more magnesium than was in their magnesium product by a factor of 2!). That as a misunderstanding that was literal false advertising, yet was trivial to prove based on their own statements of the composition.

 

[gbroadbridge]

Just wanted to comment on this idea, and how to think about product descriptions and directions.


We do not need to know the exact strains of bacteria that went in the bottle, nor do we need to have witnessed the manufacturing process, looking over their shoulder to understand that getting pulled through aquarium pump intake will not significantly affect the bacteria survival.

Statements like this from Brightwell do us a favor by reminding us that product bottles may be treated like scientific communications, but they are - in part - advertising documents. It'll contain some important instructions to be heeded, and others that need to be taken with a grain of salt.


This is a fine approach for this manufacturer and others

I am not for one second attempting to second guess Randy on this, he's the reef chemist, and I am an engineer and do physics for a living before I retired

I think there is a great deal of unknown variables, and that the field is expanding rapidly.

What was impossible 10 years ago in terms of bottled bacteria is a reality now.

If I offended I apologise