Washing Your Bio
- Thread starter benzjamin13
- Start date
I've been battling a nasty flu bug for the past several days, so I apologize if my focus is a bit lacking. If it is neutralizing disinfectant residuals after hosing that you are asking about, then yes, I already answered that. So why ask again???
BUT, the concerns that one should be having is IF they require neutralizing their disinfectant residuals, BEFORE they spray tap water on their bio-media, NOT after. Hence the WTF? I would think that if one has higher chlorine or chloramine residuals, and that is a concern (which obviously it is for some people) then rinsing in Prime after a good hose down, after the fact, is too late.
What you are describing is rinsing ones eyes out after they have potentially already been burned with chemical, what I am describing is being informed & cautious so that one does not burn their eyes with chemical to begin with.
For some strange reason, Jeff, you come across as though this entire discussion is about you, your hose, and your bio media. It's not. Nor is it just about my bio-media, and how I clean it.
Once again, I am not dead set against anything, except people offering one size fits all type advice. When I use the word people, I am referring to all people. Not just people named Jeff.
And had you not quoted but a small portion of my previous comment, that should already all be crystal clear. If you still don't get it, ask celebrist to interpret for you. He seems to have extra time on his hands.
Post # 106
"What you are asking about is residue after the fact, what I am discussing is disinfectant residual prior to the act of hosing it down. Prime is a reducing agent, so yes it will reduce any disinfectant residual after the fact.
All I am saying is this, unless one owns a crystal ball, they should not be attempting to give others advice on their tap water. Otherwise we are back to the same old question where someone asks how much Prime/Safe they should be using to treat their 100 gallon tank when performing a 50% water change. I can only answer what is reasonably safe to do in my neck of the woods.
Considering the global membership of MFK it only makes sense that not all of us would have identical tap water, and/or use identical methods to clean our bio-media. "
BUT, the concerns that one should be having is IF they require neutralizing their disinfectant residuals, BEFORE they spray tap water on their bio-media, NOT after. Hence the WTF? I would think that if one has higher chlorine or chloramine residuals, and that is a concern (which obviously it is for some people) then rinsing in Prime after a good hose down, after the fact, is too late.
What you are describing is rinsing ones eyes out after they have potentially already been burned with chemical, what I am describing is being informed & cautious so that one does not burn their eyes with chemical to begin with.
For some strange reason, Jeff, you come across as though this entire discussion is about you, your hose, and your bio media. It's not. Nor is it just about my bio-media, and how I clean it.
Once again, I am not dead set against anything, except people offering one size fits all type advice. When I use the word people, I am referring to all people. Not just people named Jeff.
And had you not quoted but a small portion of my previous comment, that should already all be crystal clear. If you still don't get it, ask celebrist to interpret for you. He seems to have extra time on his hands.
Post # 106
"What you are asking about is residue after the fact, what I am discussing is disinfectant residual prior to the act of hosing it down. Prime is a reducing agent, so yes it will reduce any disinfectant residual after the fact.
All I am saying is this, unless one owns a crystal ball, they should not be attempting to give others advice on their tap water. Otherwise we are back to the same old question where someone asks how much Prime/Safe they should be using to treat their 100 gallon tank when performing a 50% water change. I can only answer what is reasonably safe to do in my neck of the woods.
Considering the global membership of MFK it only makes sense that not all of us would have identical tap water, and/or use identical methods to clean our bio-media. "
Hello RD;
If we were friends, I would be concerned about you. My guess is you are what I think of as a "I am right" type fighter. My take being you are going to keep arguing how "right" (Use correct if you wish) your position is even if you have to twist things around.
I also am guessing you are a "last word" type.
For a brief time, I considered there was a simple misunderstanding or that we were talking past each other. I no longer think such is the case. It more seems that I and a few others have dismissed your lofty proclamations and this has riled you up some.
Near as I can recall neither I nor others have argued against the notion of water or the way utilities threat water being different in different places. Nor have we argued that everyone should use the same dose of water conditioner (PRIME or such) in all places.Yes, water and the way utilities treat water can be and is different in many places.
I now think you injected these things into the discussion in an attempt to derail the basic discussion about how some of us do successfully clean bio-media with tap water. I get that you do not approve of this and figure you are throwing everything on the wall to see what might stick, so to speak.
What this thread started out being about was rinsing bio-media with a garden hose. Turns out there are more of us doing such than I had previously thought. I take the point there can be some treatment residues (chlorine/chloramine) left on the damp surface of bio-media rinsed with tap water. You yourself have acknowledged this small residue can be neutralized with some PRIME or the equivalent.
If we were friends, I would be concerned about you. My guess is you are what I think of as a "I am right" type fighter. My take being you are going to keep arguing how "right" (Use correct if you wish) your position is even if you have to twist things around.
I also am guessing you are a "last word" type.
For a brief time, I considered there was a simple misunderstanding or that we were talking past each other. I no longer think such is the case. It more seems that I and a few others have dismissed your lofty proclamations and this has riled you up some.
Near as I can recall neither I nor others have argued against the notion of water or the way utilities threat water being different in different places. Nor have we argued that everyone should use the same dose of water conditioner (PRIME or such) in all places.Yes, water and the way utilities treat water can be and is different in many places.
I now think you injected these things into the discussion in an attempt to derail the basic discussion about how some of us do successfully clean bio-media with tap water. I get that you do not approve of this and figure you are throwing everything on the wall to see what might stick, so to speak.
What this thread started out being about was rinsing bio-media with a garden hose. Turns out there are more of us doing such than I had previously thought. I take the point there can be some treatment residues (chlorine/chloramine) left on the damp surface of bio-media rinsed with tap water. You yourself have acknowledged this small residue can be neutralized with some PRIME or the equivalent.
If you hose your bio media down with tap water, but you are fortunate enough to have low chlorine levels in said tap water, then you could very well be fine, as you have proved for years and years. I understand your point of view on that.
If you hose your bio media down with tap water, but you happen to have high levels of chlorine then that would be a potential disaster, which is what RD, quite correctly, is trying to put across.
However, I think the part that RD can't seem to get across to you is the fact that you are saying if you dose your tap water with prime then that would neutralise the residual chlorine, which is correct. BUT, BUT, BUT, how do you dose prime into tap water that is coming out of a hose!!! This is why RD is saying the damage has already been done.
Your point of view would carry more weight if it was somehow possible to dose prime into the water supply prior to turning on the tap. Which water supplier, anywhere in the world, would do this.
Hello; First let me thank you for a civilized response. I see what you question. Back in a couple of my posts I tried to address this but must have done a poor job of it. The following will repeat some of what I have already posted in this thread.
To your point, I have no way to treat tap water coming from a hose. If it has high chlorine or chloramine then the tap water may chemically kill the bb on the bio-media and there may be some removal of the film of bb by the physical action of the hose water pressure. My take is to accept this out come and I indeed do figure into the practice that all the bb may be killed. I was not in any way trying to say I could clean the bio-media and at the same time preserve all the bb.
My solution to the dilemma is to clean only a small portion of any bio media at one time. Example one of my tanks has a HOB with two chambers for media. I do one of the following. If replacing the throw away mechanical media I only replace one chambers at a time. I do the other chamber a week or few later.
After a long time I need to clean the more permanent surfaces including the bio-media. I will approach it in a few ways. Sometimes I remove a portion of the bio-media to clean but leave the rest in place and also leave the tubes and filter body parts alone. Some time later after I figure the cleaned bio-media has had time to be colonized with bb, I then will clean some other portion of the bio-media.
If I need to clean the filter body and/or the tubes then I do not clean any bio-media at the same time..I also keep some sponge filter bases in my filters all the time and figure they will have some bb.
Some of this has been posted by me already in the thread. I thought it was understood. I get that there was a brief discussion if bb might survive a hose rinse but I did not take part in that. I instead took the position of assuming the bb will be killed and taking precautions as I have just described.
I do not know if a brief rinse with a hose does in fact kill all the bb. I can see the possibility and do see as how such survival can depend on the levels of chemical in a particular water source. If the notion of thoroughly cleaning gunked up bio-media does not appeal then do the swish gently in old tank water. However I think gunked up bio-media is already compromised by smothered bb and a thorough cleaning from time to time is the better course. This also was posted pretty much already by me.
Riled me up some? Lofty proclamations? LOL
Jeff, just for the record, how you or anyone else cleans their bio media is entirely up to them. I wasn't the only person that came to the same conclusion early on in this thread.
"I agree with RD that your tap water disinfection residual will determine the bacterial die off, if/when you rinse bio media in tap water."
That was a post from Duane, a microbiologist that worked for a water treatment facility in the USA.
Early on dogofwar posted (in red bolded font) some text from the Poret foam company vendor that implied how using a garden hose was a non issue for EVERYONE, not some people, not just those with low residual levels, but EVERYONE because according to his non-expert opinion on water distribution systems: "The often repeated notion that this process would kill all the filter organisms is complete nonsense, because the residual chlorine concentration in drinking water is way too low to kill them all."
Says the doctor whose cities chlorine residual turns out to be 0.5-0.8 ppm. I took the time to actually look it up.
That comment, and those that followed from the same member, implied that EVERYONE has drinking water with residuals way too low to kill them all, and that a good blast from a garden hose would be safe, for EVERYONE, because well, it has been working for Dr. Tanner, personally, and his tap water @ 0.5-0.8 ppm chlorine.
That same academic scholar went on to say, "Sufficient microorganisms will survive this procedure to quickly re-establish the biology of the filter."
I never questioned the fact that even with high disinfection residuals a blast from a garden hose would most likely not kill 100% of ones bio-media, and that eventually the numbers would bounce back - but eventually is not good enough for some folks, and their set ups. This is where generalizations can get a person (or their fish) in trouble. As I pointed out earlier on, nitrifying bacteria are relatively slow at multiplying. It seemed like a rather cavalier attitude for an academic to take, with an EPA max residual of 4 ppm chloramine. (over 5 times the residual average of 0.7 ppm found in Dr. Tanners water report)
It's not a case of me not approving of anything, it's a case of outside of my own tap water, without more data I can't say one way or the other what is likely to work, or not work, for someone else. Why this is so difficult for you to grasp is beyond me? The only thing that I can think of in my current foggy haze, is that when I say residual, you are taking that to mean what's left "after" the media is hosed clean. Maybe?
Esoxlucius gets it. That is exactly what I am referring to. The disinfectant residual prior to spraying or washing, that will be the ultimate test, not rinsing off any residual after the fact. That makes almost no sense.
So Jeff, now you know why hoses came up in this discussion, it had nothing to do with your hose, or me not approving of this manner of cleaning. That was imagined by you. It had to do with me disagreeing with Dr. Tanner's comments, that another member posted here, that involved a garden hose.
I thought that was pretty obvious by my earlier comments.
Jeff, just for the record, how you or anyone else cleans their bio media is entirely up to them. I wasn't the only person that came to the same conclusion early on in this thread.
"I agree with RD that your tap water disinfection residual will determine the bacterial die off, if/when you rinse bio media in tap water."
That was a post from Duane, a microbiologist that worked for a water treatment facility in the USA.
Early on dogofwar posted (in red bolded font) some text from the Poret foam company vendor that implied how using a garden hose was a non issue for EVERYONE, not some people, not just those with low residual levels, but EVERYONE because according to his non-expert opinion on water distribution systems: "The often repeated notion that this process would kill all the filter organisms is complete nonsense, because the residual chlorine concentration in drinking water is way too low to kill them all."
Says the doctor whose cities chlorine residual turns out to be 0.5-0.8 ppm. I took the time to actually look it up.
That comment, and those that followed from the same member, implied that EVERYONE has drinking water with residuals way too low to kill them all, and that a good blast from a garden hose would be safe, for EVERYONE, because well, it has been working for Dr. Tanner, personally, and his tap water @ 0.5-0.8 ppm chlorine.
That same academic scholar went on to say, "Sufficient microorganisms will survive this procedure to quickly re-establish the biology of the filter."
I never questioned the fact that even with high disinfection residuals a blast from a garden hose would most likely not kill 100% of ones bio-media, and that eventually the numbers would bounce back - but eventually is not good enough for some folks, and their set ups. This is where generalizations can get a person (or their fish) in trouble. As I pointed out earlier on, nitrifying bacteria are relatively slow at multiplying. It seemed like a rather cavalier attitude for an academic to take, with an EPA max residual of 4 ppm chloramine. (over 5 times the residual average of 0.7 ppm found in Dr. Tanners water report)
It's not a case of me not approving of anything, it's a case of outside of my own tap water, without more data I can't say one way or the other what is likely to work, or not work, for someone else. Why this is so difficult for you to grasp is beyond me? The only thing that I can think of in my current foggy haze, is that when I say residual, you are taking that to mean what's left "after" the media is hosed clean. Maybe?
Esoxlucius gets it. That is exactly what I am referring to. The disinfectant residual prior to spraying or washing, that will be the ultimate test, not rinsing off any residual after the fact. That makes almost no sense.
So Jeff, now you know why hoses came up in this discussion, it had nothing to do with your hose, or me not approving of this manner of cleaning. That was imagined by you. It had to do with me disagreeing with Dr. Tanner's comments, that another member posted here, that involved a garden hose.
I thought that was pretty obvious by my earlier comments.
I understand now. If you stagger your cleaning of bio media then if the worse thing happened and you decimated your BB colony with one particular rinse, the overall effect on your total BB wouldn't be as drastic because you'd have the remainder, that wasn't washed, to fall back on. I can see how this would work, and obviously it has worked for you for years.
The critical part of your success with this is to stagger your washes. However, i'd still say that if you had a big bio load with big big messy fish, and you relied on every ounce of BB doing their job, then even a small downturn in your BB colonies could result in a mini crash. As I understand it from past posts you don't run particularly high bio load set ups. So it's hardly surprising why your bio cleaning routine has been so successful for years.
I think we got there in the end, phew!
Agreed, and I never once questioned the manner in which Jeff personally cleans his bio-media. I understood what he was saying several pages back. Hola
BTW Jeff, if your mind wanders again, this is what you posted to me way back in post # 65.
"Hello; Entirely up to you as to how this is done. Much of the time I can follow who or what you are going on about, but clearly I did think you were going on about me when apparently it was about Matt. In the end I do not think it will make much difference in terms of understanding each other. I do get your points. I do however have a different opinion in this case. "
So I can only assume that you keep repeating your method, as though somehow I missed some details early on. I didn't.
"Hello; Entirely up to you as to how this is done. Much of the time I can follow who or what you are going on about, but clearly I did think you were going on about me when apparently it was about Matt. In the end I do not think it will make much difference in terms of understanding each other. I do get your points. I do however have a different opinion in this case. "
So I can only assume that you keep repeating your method, as though somehow I missed some details early on. I didn't.
This was my procedure yesterday, and is what
S
skjl47
is explaining in above post.
Yesterday I cleaned 1 of 2 Fx6 filters on my 180 gallon.
One filter I took outside and sprayed off casing, bio-media ( they were getting very layered with mulm) and hoses. The sponges I rinsed and squeezed in dechlorinated water because I had replaced all my sponges in this filter three months ago.
I know I have diminished my bio-filters capacity temporarily; however, I am not concerned because the nitrifying bacteria will reestablish itself very quickly.
Over the next week, instead of 1- 60% water change, I will do 2.
The other filter will be cleaned in a month, I rotate them ( every three months) so as I always have the other to repopulate the other with bacteria that has been cleaned. What I have deduced from this is that the bacteria rebuilds itself rather quickly. My unscientific guess is in about 72-96 hours.
What I have learned from RD from this exchange is that at certain times of the year chlorine levels are different- higher and lower. Also, that the above procedure has many variables that, well, vary.
Maybe everyone else reading this already knew of the varying chlorine levels in tap-- It was something I had never considered. I am a very unscientific person, water chemistry is understood by me through my 30 years of fish-keeping. It is more by "feel." I have enough experience to know all the balls I have to have in the air to never put my delicate, wild fish i danger. This could be, however, a recipe for disaster for those who have not yet developed the experience or "feel" for fish-keeping needed to keep all these "balls in the air," so to speak. But, it can be done- I routinely do it, like I said, for many years.
* I know my nitrifying bacteria will be put back by my cleaning procedure.
* I know that it will rebuild within a week.
* I know that I have to have 2 filters or some bacteria unexposed from cleaning that will repopulate the cleaned media.
This is not for beginners because it doesn't have a "one size fits all set of procedures."
It is not a "better" method. It is a method. It works for me.
Yesterday I cleaned 1 of 2 Fx6 filters on my 180 gallon.
One filter I took outside and sprayed off casing, bio-media ( they were getting very layered with mulm) and hoses. The sponges I rinsed and squeezed in dechlorinated water because I had replaced all my sponges in this filter three months ago.
I know I have diminished my bio-filters capacity temporarily; however, I am not concerned because the nitrifying bacteria will reestablish itself very quickly.
Over the next week, instead of 1- 60% water change, I will do 2.
The other filter will be cleaned in a month, I rotate them ( every three months) so as I always have the other to repopulate the other with bacteria that has been cleaned. What I have deduced from this is that the bacteria rebuilds itself rather quickly. My unscientific guess is in about 72-96 hours.
What I have learned from RD from this exchange is that at certain times of the year chlorine levels are different- higher and lower. Also, that the above procedure has many variables that, well, vary.
Maybe everyone else reading this already knew of the varying chlorine levels in tap-- It was something I had never considered. I am a very unscientific person, water chemistry is understood by me through my 30 years of fish-keeping. It is more by "feel." I have enough experience to know all the balls I have to have in the air to never put my delicate, wild fish i danger. This could be, however, a recipe for disaster for those who have not yet developed the experience or "feel" for fish-keeping needed to keep all these "balls in the air," so to speak. But, it can be done- I routinely do it, like I said, for many years.
* I know my nitrifying bacteria will be put back by my cleaning procedure.
* I know that it will rebuild within a week.
* I know that I have to have 2 filters or some bacteria unexposed from cleaning that will repopulate the cleaned media.
This is not for beginners because it doesn't have a "one size fits all set of procedures."
It is not a "better" method. It is a method. It works for me.
