Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Ammonia is down to zero, nitrites down from almost 2 to .25. Should I wait for zero on Nitrites also. Do my bacteria "starve" if they don't get fed the same amount?

I would start it back up with half the normal amount and keep monitoring. If you continue to see it decrease even at half amount, then I would slowly step it back up to full feed. I assume water temps are above 70 now so the bacteria will be reproducing rather quickly and should be able to handle increasing feeding as long as you do it slowly. From what I have read online in scientific research, the two main types of bacteria double every 15-20 hours. So that would dictate a ramp up over 2-3 days to full feeding again.

Just my .02

thanks Eddie!

Good question Coach. I will be following this to see what folks advise .

Since adding trout, after an initial spike which worked itself out by stopping feeding then gradually ramping it up again, my ammonia and nitrites have been going along at >0 to ~0.25 ppm. I monitor regularly and would reduce feeding if they crept above my arbitrary figure of 0.25. Not sure if there are any long term implications for the fish . My pH constantly goes down and I regularly adjust it to keep it between ~6.4-6.8 so ammonia shouldn't be an issue for the fish, and I have salted to 1 ppt to help with nitrites. My nitrates are high at ~200 ppm waiting for a the cool season plants to kick on and use some up.

My Nitrites were back to zero this afternoon, and I fed at about 60%. Will test again in the AM, and see whats going on.

Slowly ramping up the feed like this is probably a good way to handle it. I know it's already been considered here but for anyone else thinking about doing this - Whether you have salted for nitrite poisoning and whether you have any Ammonia showing should also be considered.

The bacteria are pretty durable and they'll likely just go dormant without enough food around. I'm basing this on having bagged used media from my old system before a move and not having any delay on cycling a new system using this media 6 months later (It was moist and out of the sun the whole time in the bag).

Do you think the bacteria in the bag were still alive? I know the bacteria are naturally occurring and show up whether you "seed" them or not. My nitrite and ammonia are both back at zero yesterday. Had pretty much normal rates by the PM feeding. Will check again this AM. Still trying to get breeder aquariums going and pepper buckets, but need to do some jobs first.

I have to concur with Scotty, I had clay balls that I had used in a previous grow bed sit outside for 4-5 months, I then reused in a grow bed and it cycled in less than a week. I suspect they go dormant and then fire back up when exposed to water and ammonia/nitrites.

Yes, probably there were many that died but a large number survived. I'm not certain what conditions have to be met to keep them this way so I only can say what worked for me - that if they are stored moist and relatively cool with enough air, they can survive for months. It's possible that they went dormant or that they kept alive by feeding off of the breakdown of their dead neighbors.

I hadn't planned on keeping the bacteria going and expected to have to cycle my system again so it was a bit of a surprise that it was already cycled.



Yep, they are all over the place. They take time to get established and are relatively slow to multiply compared to some bacteria but if you start out with greater numbers less or no time is required to cycle.

Cheers