UNDERSTANDING
Aquarium Nitrogen Cycle
Fish droppings, organic plants, and left over food will be turned into toxic Ammonia (NH3). Beneficial bacteria (Nitrosomonas) oxidize toxic Ammonia (NH3) into less harmful Nitrite (N02) utilizing O2. Therefore we need a sufficient biological filter to house as many good bacteria as possible to speed up this process.
Further more these beneficial bacteria oxidize Nitrites (NO2) into Nitrates (NO3). Nitrates (NH3) can benefit plants as fertilizer. Photosynthesis of plants generate O2 for fish. In tanks with less plants Nitrates (NO3) to be removed via time-consuming water changes.
Nitrates are not as harmful as Nitrite and Ammonia, but still harm our fish and slow the growth. Ammonia levels needs to be as low as possible, best 0, because it’s deadly for fish. Nitrate and Nitrites should be kept as low as possible.
Please note, that the PH will drop over time, because during the conversion of Ammonia (NH3) into Nitrite (N02), the Nitrosomonas (Beneficial bacteria) release other byproducts that lower the PH.
Germs, viruses and bad bacteria will definitely develop over time. You can’t see them, they are dangerous, not many people talk about it. Especially discus fish are very sensitive and will react immediately.
Good Filtration, Lesser Headaches & Maintenance
Basic Water Knowledge 101
Ammonia
Make sure your tank has sufficient biological media to quickly break down the toxic Ammonia.
If you have a sufficient filtration you will not need to measure Ammonia levels constantly, because there will be nothing to measure.
Nitrites
Make sure your tank has sufficient biological media to quickly break down Nitrites into Nitrates.
If you have a sufficient filtration you will not need to measure Nitrite levels constantly, because there will be nothing to measure.
Nitrates
Keep the Nitrate levels low. Therefore you can either install a Nitrate filter or conduct frequent water changes.
Once you figured out how often you need to recharge our Nitrate King you will stop measuring Nitrate levels constantly.
Ph
If the pH drops below 6, the beneficial bacteria (Nitrosomonas) will not process the ammonia fast.
We can either use choral chips or oyster shells to stabalizer the Ph of our tanks. Or we go with a Choral King.
FACT CHECK
Most fish keepers successfully manages to control the dangerous Ammonia spikes, Nitrite poisoning and Nitrate contaminations but seems to struggle with bacteria and virus infections or suffer from fish discolouration due to germs contaminaton.
DID YOU KNOW?
The Bacteria Bloom
Bacteria and other micro-organisms are living things. Unicellular organisms be more precise, which multiply by cell division and it is a pure mathematics how many bad bacteria you can get within a short amount of time. So one bacteria becomes two. Since the number always doubles, this is a very simple exponential growth. We start with a single bacterium.
Some bacterias only need 10 minutes to reproduce. That means we have 2 ^ 6 = 64 bacteria after only one hour, after two hours we have already 2 ^ 12 = 4096 bacterias.
Very often people misinterpret that if a fish gets bullied by another fish, it dies. Bullying is not the reason why the fish died. The main cause is due to bad bacteria. Over time, these bacteria weakens the fish immunity system which leads to its demise.
1×2 = 2^1= 2
1x2x2 = 2^2 = 4
1x2x2x2 = 2^3 = 8
1x2x….x2x2 = 2^10 =1024
Controling Bad Bacteria & Germs
TIP 1
Keep your tank clean. Minimal decoration is easier to maintain. The breeders and professionals keep their tanks even bare bottom. No dirt in the tank, hence nothing can get rotten.
TIP 2
Bacteria doesn’t like salt. If your fish is suffering from a bacterial infection, a large water change and adding aquatic salt will help, in most cases.
Tip 3
Large water changes help to flush bacteria and germs out. In addition, clean out your mechanical filtration frequently. There should not be too much risk of pollution in your tank.
TIP 4
Regardless of what filtration we are going with, there will be some water flow involved. If the water flow is correctly adjusted, we don’t even need to siphon, because dirt automatically will be transported into our mechanical filtration.
TIP 5
A good way to keep germs and floating bacteria by the bay. Very efficient to prevent algae. High electricity bill to be expected. For a 500 l discus tank you need to calculate at least with 50 W. Bulbs have to be changed every year and are not cheap either.
TIP 6
Ozone is the most efficient and economic way to fight germs, bacteria, viruses. The Ozone King set runs with only 7 w. For smaller tanks we can recommend installing our silicium bead king, which acts similar to sand filters but can be backflushed easily.
THE INVISIBLE ENEMY
Threats Which We Don’t See
BAD BACTERIA
A bacteria bloom comes fast and is deadly. Some leftover food slowly rottens and cause a whole tank to collapse in no time.
If you insist on a heavily planted tank with many rock and wood, you want coarse soil and have a heavy stocked tank, be prepared to put in a lot of effort siphoning and moving decoration around to reach the dirt.
GERMS
Invisible, very dangerous.
Germ tests would be required, but most of the Fish shops don’t sell them.
We take a look at our tank, we have done all the cleaning, the water looks clear and yet the fish get some fin rot, hole in head, don’t eat, we can confirm there must be germs evolved.
VIRUSES
Viruses are many times smaller than bacteria and therefore impossible to filter, yet they are even more mortal.
Likewise, you cannot destroy them easily with antibiotics. The immune system normally of the body has to take over when you are infected.
RECOMMENDED PRODUCTS FOR PROBLEMS
UNDERSTANDING WHAT IT MEANS
Overview Nitrogen Cycle
Ammonia
Make sure you chose the right media and enough to run your tank properly. Your biological filtration will take care of the Ammonia.
Nitrite
Make sure you chose the right media and enough to run your tank properly. Your biological filtration will take care of the Nitrite.
Nitrate
Nitrate King can assist to keep low Nitrate levels and filters out phosphate from the water. Phosphate normally gets into tank by feeding frozen food.
PH
Just toss a net with choral chips or oyster shell directly into your tank.
You can consider installing a Choral King if you want to adjust the PH accurately.
Bad bacteria
The Silicium Bead King is ideal to reduce bad bacteria for smaller tanks up to 300l.
For bigger tanks you can consider the Ozone Kings set to eliminate bad bacteria or go with multiple Silicium Bead Kings.
GERMS
The Silicium Bead King is ideal to reduce germs for smaller tanks up to 300l.
For bigger tanks you can consider the Ozone Kings set to eliminate germs or go with multiple Silicium Bead Kings.
Viruses
The Ozone King set even ellimites viruses, and all sort parasites and chemical substances.
So far their is not similar product in the market for such an innovative solution
Silicate
Excess of silicates, an abundance of nutrients, and too little oxygen can cause Brown gravel algae. Silicates can come from live rocks or sand.
The Demineralizer Kings help to filter the Silicates.
Unwanted substances
Natrium, Potassium, Magnesium, Calcium, Chloride, Sulfate, come into our tanks while feeding or adding chemicals.
The Demineralizer Kings help to filter out these unwanted substances.
Remove unwanted substances
Demineralizer Kings
The 2 stage filtration Demineralizer King system for purest water is easy to install.
The Demineralizer Kings filtration system, produces water with a conductivity of 0 -10 micro siemens.
All common minerals such as Chloride (CL), Sulfate (SO4), Nitrite (NO2), Nitrate (NO3), Potasium (K), Calcium (CA), Natrium (NA), Magnesium (MG).
You basically can create water with 0 Kh and 0 GH which is ideal for wild species living in South America.
WHY CHOOSE LSL AQUATICS?
Complete Package
Complete product portfolio to run your tank stable and smooth
Unique Products
Unique Products no common fish store offers
One Stop Solution
Filtration, Fish food, water conditioners, electronics, consulting
Efficiency
Run tanks with lesser effort changing water
Sustainability
Lesser water waste, lesser time maintenance
Healthier Fish
There is no doubt about good water will heal your fish.