Ceramic media in your biorb
The ceramic media in your biorb performs the very important task of bio-filtration. No biorb should be without ceramic media. Do not - on any account - be tempted to use gravel in place of it. Usage of gravel risks scratching your biorb sides, and gets into your filter area, making difficult to remove and replace. I made the mistake of putting a combination of gravel and ceramic media in mine and have been regretting it ever since. The gravel bits just keep on getting stuck in the filter catches so that when I turn my filter to remove it it sometimes doesn't move past a certain point. Short of taking my goldfish out completely and up-turning the biorb to remove it I'm not sure what I could do. I've been patiently removing the little gravel stones by hand but they always manage to get back in.
Worst of all gravel is not as good a home as the ceramic media for your ammonia- and nitrite-removing bacteria. Both are absolutely critical when even attempting to keep your goldfish is such a limited environment as the biorb. Without these bacteria there is practically no chance of your goldfish surviving for long unless you are dedicated enough to perform daily water changes. This is because not only does gravel not have as much surface area as the ceramic media, it's more likely to be packed together resulting in less oxygen being available to the bacteria living on the gravel surfaces.
Once your bacteria is established, do not ever let your biorb touch chlorine or clean the ceramic media. Use of a siphon to suck up waste during water changes is fine, but no more.
Let's have a look at the chemistry of bio-filtration and the nitrogen cycle in your biorb.
The process goes as follows:
Plant - is eaten by - Fish - produces waste - Ammonia NH3 / Ammonium NH4 - is converted by bacteria into - Nitrite NO2 - is converted by bacteria into - Nitrate NO3 - is used by plants for growth
And there we are back to plants again.
Fish food introduced into the biorb will of course get ingested by fish and result in poo, the rest of the cycle remains the same.
These nitrifying bacteria are affected by oxygen, pH and warmth in particular. Nitrifying bacteria require a lot of oxygen so it is absolutely important that you make sure your pump is pumping air into your biorb. Your filter stone may get calcified (blocked up by calcium deposits) and that's when it needs changing. Otherwise not only will your fish be gasping for air, your bacteria will start dying off and will take a long time to re-establish.
That's why a bio-wheel (unfortunately not part of the biorb) is such a good filter - since it brings the bacteria up in contact with the oxygen available in the air.
Optimum nitrification occurs at about a pH of 7.2 to 8-3, then falls at higher values. Below 7.2, the nitrification rates drop to 50% at pH 7 (!!) and 30% at pH 6.5.
Temperature-wise nitrification rates increase as temperature increases. This needs to be considered with the fact that oxygen content in water decreases when temperature increases, so may prove a limiting factor.
In fact a little known fact is that aquarium plants tend to prefer ammonium and ammonia for growth, instead of nitrate, and will only use nitrate when there is no more ammonium and ammonia left. So having plants in your aquarium may help some with any ammonia spikes in your biorb. Even better it gives your fish something to munch on and adds fibre to their diet, hence reducing incidences of constipation.
Worst of all gravel is not as good a home as the ceramic media for your ammonia- and nitrite-removing bacteria. Both are absolutely critical when even attempting to keep your goldfish is such a limited environment as the biorb. Without these bacteria there is practically no chance of your goldfish surviving for long unless you are dedicated enough to perform daily water changes. This is because not only does gravel not have as much surface area as the ceramic media, it's more likely to be packed together resulting in less oxygen being available to the bacteria living on the gravel surfaces.
Once your bacteria is established, do not ever let your biorb touch chlorine or clean the ceramic media. Use of a siphon to suck up waste during water changes is fine, but no more.
Let's have a look at the chemistry of bio-filtration and the nitrogen cycle in your biorb.
The process goes as follows:
Plant - is eaten by - Fish - produces waste - Ammonia NH3 / Ammonium NH4 - is converted by bacteria into - Nitrite NO2 - is converted by bacteria into - Nitrate NO3 - is used by plants for growth
And there we are back to plants again.
Fish food introduced into the biorb will of course get ingested by fish and result in poo, the rest of the cycle remains the same.
These nitrifying bacteria are affected by oxygen, pH and warmth in particular. Nitrifying bacteria require a lot of oxygen so it is absolutely important that you make sure your pump is pumping air into your biorb. Your filter stone may get calcified (blocked up by calcium deposits) and that's when it needs changing. Otherwise not only will your fish be gasping for air, your bacteria will start dying off and will take a long time to re-establish.
That's why a bio-wheel (unfortunately not part of the biorb) is such a good filter - since it brings the bacteria up in contact with the oxygen available in the air.
Optimum nitrification occurs at about a pH of 7.2 to 8-3, then falls at higher values. Below 7.2, the nitrification rates drop to 50% at pH 7 (!!) and 30% at pH 6.5.
Temperature-wise nitrification rates increase as temperature increases. This needs to be considered with the fact that oxygen content in water decreases when temperature increases, so may prove a limiting factor.
In fact a little known fact is that aquarium plants tend to prefer ammonium and ammonia for growth, instead of nitrate, and will only use nitrate when there is no more ammonium and ammonia left. So having plants in your aquarium may help some with any ammonia spikes in your biorb. Even better it gives your fish something to munch on and adds fibre to their diet, hence reducing incidences of constipation.
posted by cylche at 5:59 pm
1 Comments:
Thank you for sharing these informative tips, if I own a biorb aquarium and for to lessen the cleaning of fish waste, I put a janitor fish on tank.
Post a Comment
<< Home