TwoTankAmin
Fish Connoisseur
Two things about the post above by Lanpenn.
First, the proper patent application was discovered. I have read this patent years ago. Now I will explain why Lan thinks lots of people/companies share the patent. The discovery of the Nitrospira in tanks was the result of work by Dr. Hovanec et. al. when he was running the lab at Marineland in Moorpark, CA. So, Marineland shared in the patent rights. Some years later Marineland was acquired by a conglomerate which had a pet division. One of the companies also a part of the pet division was Tetra.
When Marineland was acquired, the patent rights went with them. The parent company determined it would be Tetra which produced a product using that patent and that is why the Safe Start line has the right to use nitrospira in their bacteria starter product. Moreover, there was a predecessor product called BioSpira which was developed by Hovanec and Marineland. Marineland also owned Aquarium Systems which is the brand owner of Instant Ocean. Biospira was found to be best in sw tanks and Marineland transferred it to their Aquarium Systems division. Then in "2005 - Marineland, the parent company of Aquarium Systems, becomes part of Spectrum Brands."
So, basically all the patents for viable nitrifiers trace back to the same source Dr. Hovanec et. al. and Marineland. It is also important to note the et. al. part of things. In 2005 Dr. H. chose not to stay with Marineland and their new owner. So they parted ways. Dr. H. set up his company in the Maineland facility in Moorpark.
Second, about the last place I would go for accurate science on the nitrogen cycle and the microorganisms etc. involved would be a site like Reddit. *sigh*
Dr. Hovanec was a life long fish keeper before he even reached college age. For his Ph.D. thesis he decided to investigate what microorganisms were at work in aquariums handling the nitrogen cycle. Until this time it was believed that the ones which processed nitrite to nitrate were Nitrobacter winogradskyi. What Dr. H's thesis showed was what was thought to be in our filters was not there and when he reported this to the the professor overseeing his thesis, he told Dr. H. he was new to the testing methodoly and must have screwed it up. He told Dr. H. to go back and redo it. Dr. H . did and he got the same results.
Subsequently, Dr. H. and co-researchers investigated which bacteria were doing ammonia and notrite oxidation in tanks.
Dr. H. worked with Marineland and eventually ran their labs. You can see the timeline for it all here: http://web.archive.org/web/20070210...nd.com/science/biospira/biospira_timeline.asp
You can find links to all of the papers, articles and presentation done by Dr. H. over the years. Believe it or not I have read all of the ones dealing with the nitrifying bacteria and i have also read the patent application involved with Nitrospira and the probes needed to detect them. If you do the same you will understand why other starter products which do not contain Nitrospira cannot be a great help with cycling. Whatever they put into the bottle to handle nitrite will not persist in a tank and will be replaced by nitrospira by the end of the cyling process. Moreover, along the way doing the reasearch they tested the Fritz product of that era and discovered the baceteria in the bottle did not persist but was indeed replaced.
When we drill down to the microscopic level of cycling we discover there are a lot of variables involved which will have an effect on how long it might take to establish the cycle in any tank. There are factors we cannot see nor measure at work. While we can make certain assumptions and draw conclusion, this does not mean we actually know what caused things to happen as they did. All we have is the science.
A lot is known about the nitrogen cycle and the microorganisms involved. Do we have all the answers, no. But we do have a pretty good understanding. We know that the nitrifying bacteria in tanks are autotrophic. We know that they do not form spores but reproduce by dividing, We know they do this when there is more ammonia or nitrite than the need to thrive. We know that the nitrogen cycle starts with ammonia and ends when denitrification converts it back into Nitrogen.
So, when we look at a bottle of SeaChem Stability and we read that it contains only spores, how can this be the nitrifying bacteria that will be in our tanks once the cycle is established? If the nitrifiers do not form spores and must be alive to do what they do, how can Stability provide us with them? If, at this time, only Dr. Hovanec and Tetra (or whatever company Spectrum brands controls) can legally use Nitrospira in their product, so how can any other product not made by Dr. H or those conntected to Spectrum contain these bacteria? And it is most certainly not in the best interests of them to let others use it before their patent rights expire.
But it is important to understand that science doesn't stand still. For many years we thought the bacteria were not the ones actually in tanks. But then the science learned differently. It used be thought that only bacteria did the ammonia oxidation in water until they discovered a strain of Ammonia Oxidizing Archaea living under a rock in a public aquarium. And yes, these are found in some tanks, even doing most of the ammonia oxidation in some.
And then it was discovered in the basement tank in a lab that Nitrospira are capable of converting ammonia directly to nitrate. The science never stands still, which is why it works so well over tiem. We get better and smarter as we go, We develop ways to see and study things we could not before.
Now here is the real secret about cycling any specific tank. How long this will take depends on how much bacteria is present at the start and how much ammonia etc. microorganisms must handle. Live plants are the one variable that can change the answer.
Due to what I do in the hobby it has been a regular occurrence that I need to produce cycled tanks rapidly. I mean in under two weeks. Morover, these tanks will not be planted, so they rely 100% on microorganisms (usually bacteria). So I do not cycle tanks, I cycle filters. I started cycling using household ammonia from the super market and now use dry ammonium chloride and mix my own solution. When I sold as a vendor or room seller at weekend fish event, I brought tanks, cycled filters and my portable RO/DI unit. And the filters had to handle overstocking. I also set up summer tanks at home for selling fish. growing out fish and quarantining new fish. I cycled the filters not the tanks.
Trust me when I say cycling 15 filters for 8 tanks holding a total of 220 gals is much less work than cycling 8 tanks and filters on their own. But, it is a lot harder to do. Basically, you are turning 220 gals into about 40 which means many of the rules we follow for a single tank will not work in a bio-farm where one may need to be dosing as much as 20+ ppm of ammonia a day. Things can go off the rails pretty fast if you do not understand the process very well.
The first thing I do is seed a ton of the right bacteria. My goal is to get everything cycled and ready to use in about 2 weeks or a bit less.
https://www.fishforums.net/threads/...o-go-into-8-summer-tanks.481266/#post-4177728
edited for spelling and typos
First, the proper patent application was discovered. I have read this patent years ago. Now I will explain why Lan thinks lots of people/companies share the patent. The discovery of the Nitrospira in tanks was the result of work by Dr. Hovanec et. al. when he was running the lab at Marineland in Moorpark, CA. So, Marineland shared in the patent rights. Some years later Marineland was acquired by a conglomerate which had a pet division. One of the companies also a part of the pet division was Tetra.
When Marineland was acquired, the patent rights went with them. The parent company determined it would be Tetra which produced a product using that patent and that is why the Safe Start line has the right to use nitrospira in their bacteria starter product. Moreover, there was a predecessor product called BioSpira which was developed by Hovanec and Marineland. Marineland also owned Aquarium Systems which is the brand owner of Instant Ocean. Biospira was found to be best in sw tanks and Marineland transferred it to their Aquarium Systems division. Then in "2005 - Marineland, the parent company of Aquarium Systems, becomes part of Spectrum Brands."
So, basically all the patents for viable nitrifiers trace back to the same source Dr. Hovanec et. al. and Marineland. It is also important to note the et. al. part of things. In 2005 Dr. H. chose not to stay with Marineland and their new owner. So they parted ways. Dr. H. set up his company in the Maineland facility in Moorpark.
Second, about the last place I would go for accurate science on the nitrogen cycle and the microorganisms etc. involved would be a site like Reddit. *sigh*
Dr. Hovanec was a life long fish keeper before he even reached college age. For his Ph.D. thesis he decided to investigate what microorganisms were at work in aquariums handling the nitrogen cycle. Until this time it was believed that the ones which processed nitrite to nitrate were Nitrobacter winogradskyi. What Dr. H's thesis showed was what was thought to be in our filters was not there and when he reported this to the the professor overseeing his thesis, he told Dr. H. he was new to the testing methodoly and must have screwed it up. He told Dr. H. to go back and redo it. Dr. H . did and he got the same results.
Subsequently, Dr. H. and co-researchers investigated which bacteria were doing ammonia and notrite oxidation in tanks.
Dr. H. worked with Marineland and eventually ran their labs. You can see the timeline for it all here: http://web.archive.org/web/20070210...nd.com/science/biospira/biospira_timeline.asp
You can find links to all of the papers, articles and presentation done by Dr. H. over the years. Believe it or not I have read all of the ones dealing with the nitrifying bacteria and i have also read the patent application involved with Nitrospira and the probes needed to detect them. If you do the same you will understand why other starter products which do not contain Nitrospira cannot be a great help with cycling. Whatever they put into the bottle to handle nitrite will not persist in a tank and will be replaced by nitrospira by the end of the cyling process. Moreover, along the way doing the reasearch they tested the Fritz product of that era and discovered the baceteria in the bottle did not persist but was indeed replaced.
When we drill down to the microscopic level of cycling we discover there are a lot of variables involved which will have an effect on how long it might take to establish the cycle in any tank. There are factors we cannot see nor measure at work. While we can make certain assumptions and draw conclusion, this does not mean we actually know what caused things to happen as they did. All we have is the science.
A lot is known about the nitrogen cycle and the microorganisms involved. Do we have all the answers, no. But we do have a pretty good understanding. We know that the nitrifying bacteria in tanks are autotrophic. We know that they do not form spores but reproduce by dividing, We know they do this when there is more ammonia or nitrite than the need to thrive. We know that the nitrogen cycle starts with ammonia and ends when denitrification converts it back into Nitrogen.
So, when we look at a bottle of SeaChem Stability and we read that it contains only spores, how can this be the nitrifying bacteria that will be in our tanks once the cycle is established? If the nitrifiers do not form spores and must be alive to do what they do, how can Stability provide us with them? If, at this time, only Dr. Hovanec and Tetra (or whatever company Spectrum brands controls) can legally use Nitrospira in their product, so how can any other product not made by Dr. H or those conntected to Spectrum contain these bacteria? And it is most certainly not in the best interests of them to let others use it before their patent rights expire.
But it is important to understand that science doesn't stand still. For many years we thought the bacteria were not the ones actually in tanks. But then the science learned differently. It used be thought that only bacteria did the ammonia oxidation in water until they discovered a strain of Ammonia Oxidizing Archaea living under a rock in a public aquarium. And yes, these are found in some tanks, even doing most of the ammonia oxidation in some.
And then it was discovered in the basement tank in a lab that Nitrospira are capable of converting ammonia directly to nitrate. The science never stands still, which is why it works so well over tiem. We get better and smarter as we go, We develop ways to see and study things we could not before.
Now here is the real secret about cycling any specific tank. How long this will take depends on how much bacteria is present at the start and how much ammonia etc. microorganisms must handle. Live plants are the one variable that can change the answer.
Due to what I do in the hobby it has been a regular occurrence that I need to produce cycled tanks rapidly. I mean in under two weeks. Morover, these tanks will not be planted, so they rely 100% on microorganisms (usually bacteria). So I do not cycle tanks, I cycle filters. I started cycling using household ammonia from the super market and now use dry ammonium chloride and mix my own solution. When I sold as a vendor or room seller at weekend fish event, I brought tanks, cycled filters and my portable RO/DI unit. And the filters had to handle overstocking. I also set up summer tanks at home for selling fish. growing out fish and quarantining new fish. I cycled the filters not the tanks.
Trust me when I say cycling 15 filters for 8 tanks holding a total of 220 gals is much less work than cycling 8 tanks and filters on their own. But, it is a lot harder to do. Basically, you are turning 220 gals into about 40 which means many of the rules we follow for a single tank will not work in a bio-farm where one may need to be dosing as much as 20+ ppm of ammonia a day. Things can go off the rails pretty fast if you do not understand the process very well.
The first thing I do is seed a ton of the right bacteria. My goal is to get everything cycled and ready to use in about 2 weeks or a bit less.
https://www.fishforums.net/threads/...o-go-into-8-summer-tanks.481266/#post-4177728
edited for spelling and typos
Last edited:
