Water changes and questions

reeftankdude · Mar 22, 2022

My experience with bottle bacteria has been different. Good luck OP

gbroadbridge · Mar 22, 2022

reeftankdude said:
My experience with bottle bacteria has been different. Good luck OP

It's called the placebo effect

3429810 · Mar 22, 2022

gbroadbridge said:
Bottle Bacteria does not contain anything live. It contains dormant spores which take a while to activate.

I don't think adding them would have any benefit, but it is unlikely to cause any harm other than to the wallet.

Ammonia consuming bacteria in the tank multiply quickly and will catch up before anything you can add.
Prime is a good idea to convert Ammonia to non toxic ammonium.

Could adding a ton of dormant bacteria not add to a bloom at some point? That was my thinking but maybe I’m wrong there. Not that a bloom is necessarily bad it just could be.

Freenow54 · Mar 23, 2022

bert236 said:
I believe op doesn’t have a sump or power heads so the filter is the only thing oxygenating the water. Correct me if I’m wrong op. My biggest concern was more that you told op to dump a ton of bacteria into a tank which can lead to depleted oxygen if there is a bacterial bloom without mentioning anything about that part. He hasn’t added any prime yet as far as I know and the levels he was at aren’t crazy high even if accurate so I doubt the bio filter will take long to catch up that’s why I suggested he look at it as an option. Also as far as I’m aware dr tims and stabilty both take a bit of time to work unlike turbo start or live bacteria so don’t think it would work faster than the bacteria in there can multiply at this point. Hopefully someone with more knowledge on bacteria can chime in here.

He has a skimmer. I asked him if he got it to behave. No answer on that