Loaches Online Forum

Folk,
Is there some sort of "spore" form of our beneficial aquarium bacteria that persists when media is dried or goes anoxic?
I ask as I've been saving the crud out of my canister filter in a big jug. The O2 in the bottle doesn't stay very long, so it tends to go anoxic- methane etc... for a time, then all settles down and no more bubbles form.

Is this crud still at all useful for seeding new filters/systems, or is it best to just start afresh?
A

No, the Nitrospiros species does not enter a spore or any other dormant phase. Best to thoroughly clean the filter media and start fresh.
If you need to get this filter cycled pretty fast then take a little filter media out of each of your other tanks and add it to this filter.

I have taken as much as 25% of the media from a well cycled tank with no problem. There are a lot of other locations the bacteria live, so 25% of the media might represent perhaps 10% or so of the bacteria in the tank.

Annoying.... Not to worry- the filter needs cleaning again so there will be fresh high-bacterial-load "crud" next week.
Thanks
A