Filter bacteria growth under PH 5.

[Andy Love]

I’m glad that my link worked!

Bennie : all my filters have been seeded, chainwise, from my original Discus tank. Although that tank was decommissioned nearly fifteen years ago, all subsequent tanks (those that contained fish, anyway) have been of the soft/acidic variety, so I would expect that the original assembly of micro-organisms would largely have duplicated through the chain. Whether or not there was a mixture of bacteria and archea, it seems that archaea were at least dominant : that appears to explain why the filters’ nitrifying micro-organisms behaved in ways that bacteria simply could not have done.

Without rummaging through my notes I have it in my head that the nitrifying pathways of AOB and AOA differ : the former extract their carbon from carbonate ; and the latter from dissolved carbon dioxide. The more acidic the environment, the greater is the fraction of dissolved carbon dioxide present (I think I’m right in saying that), hence one reason why such environments tend to select for AOA.

[Jolanda Wisseborn]

Hello Vale, what if you don’t use any carbon in the filters, could this also be an influence of the AOA?

[Maurice Matla]

That is quite some interresting stuff to dig in too.

I have been absent for a little while we very recently lost my eldest sister at age 40. So i had other things on my mind.

But it is nice too see how this thread is developing.

[Author]

Posts