Nitrogen Cycle

The most important thing you need to know about your aquarium.

 

 

What is it?

 

The nitrogen cycle understanding is crucial to the understanding of your aquarium. It's basically the other half of your aquarium, and perhaps the most important half. This half services your aquarium like no service specialist can service. This is the backbone of any aquarium system and provides beneficial bacteria that break down harmful waste biproducts from your fish and other animals. 

 

 

Where is it?

 

The nitrifying bacteria lives everywhere in the aquarium but most commonly congregate where there is most surface area and most water movement. This is why with saltwater aquarium live rock is crucial because they act as a perfect place for good bacteria to live. And of course, they live in your filter.

 

 

How is it introduced to my aquarium?

 

It can be introduced from a already established colony (another aquarium if you transfer filter material or even some rocks) or it can be grown naturally. There is all sorts of bacteria floating around us all the time. In the case of the aquarium, we must wait for the arrival of 2 different bacterias. So, just sit back, drop some food (or a really hardy fish) and wait for the bacteria to arrive. It usually takes a week for freshwater and a month for saltwater for the bacterias to develop enough to support continual life support for the fish. 

 

What can kill my good bacteria?

 

Bacteria is surprisingly tough and will survive most conditions but there are still a lot of things that can kill it, mostly chemicals. Chlorine is the number #1 killer of good bacteria. You must keep in mind chlorine is meant to kill bacteria, good or bad. So if you let chlorine contact your filter it will kill your good bacteria and your aquarium will literally crash. This happens very often from owners over cleaning their aquarium. This is one of the reasons--if you don't know what you're doing--you should always hire professional aquarium service . It only takes one misstep and all the work goes down the drain.