Fishguy2727
10-02-2007, 11:22 PM
There are some common misunderstandings that are repeatedly published or posted and leads to a continuation of this misunderstanding. These concern the types of bacteria in the nitrogen cycle and their place in that cycle. To start with is Bacillus spp. which are the main type of bacteria that breakdown waste into ammonia. These are the bacteria responsible for the cloudiness in the tank during cycling and ‘re-cycling’. These bacteria are heterotrophic. The nest step turns ammonia (from the waste from heterotrophs and directly from fish from the gills) into nitrite. This is called ammonia oxidation (adds oxygen, hence the need for oxygen for your biological filter media), which turns ammonia into nitrite. The bacteria responsible for this step is Nitrosomonas marina. The next step is nitrite oxidation. This is done by Nitrospira spp., which turns nitrite into nitrate. From here there a few routes for nitrate elimination from the system. The most common is water changes. These remove dissolved nitrate from the tank along with other pollutants. The more natural methods are in the form of biological processes. These are plants (which consume ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate as their source of ammonia), and anaerobic bacteria (which consume nitrate and give off nitrogen gas (N2)).