FW Bacteria vs Salt Water Bacteria?

[the Undone guy]

Is there a difference betwen the bacteria for the bio filter for freshwater compared to saltwater? I have a red eared slider tank that has a filter full of bacteria and fully cycled, is this a totally different type of bacteria that i would want to use in something like my saltwater quarantine tank? thanks.

[Steven Pro]

The short answer is they are different. I you want to read a lot more on nitrifying bacteria, see the links on this webpage, http://www.marinelandlabs.com/science/nspira.asp

[the Undone guy]

from what I am reading he doesnt really distinguish between the two but groups them together most of the time. Would it help if i threw a fully cycled freshwater filter into a saltwater environment?

[Steven Pro]

The paper that is right on point is here, http://www.marinelandlabs.com/peerpapers/Hovanec1.pdf You need Adobe Acrobat to view it because it is a pdf file, but I will cut some of the relevant portions here:

"Six all-glass aquaria (capacity, 34 liters) were used along with a standard home aquarium filtration system (Penguin model 160B; Marineland Aquarium Products, Moorpark, Ca-lif.). There was no substratum or other material in the aquaria. In the model 160B system the main body of the filter unit hangs on the outside upper back edge of the aquarium. On the upper weir of the filter unit is the dedicated biological filter (BioWheel; referred to below as the biofilter), which sits per-pendicular to the water flowing back into the aquarium. The water flow causes the biofilter to continuously rotate such that it functions as a rotating biological
contactor, and, therefore, the filter surface alternates between a partially sub-merged phase and an air-exposed phase.

Initially, the tanks were filled with dechlorinated (activated carbon-treated) tap water; 5 mM ammonia (made with ammonium chloride) was added to each aquarium daily for the first 20 days and then every other day or so. Aquarium water was sampled several times a week and was analyzed by performing a flow
injection analysis (FIAstar system; Tecator AB, Ho¨gana¨s, Sweden) for ammonia (gas diffusion membrane method), nitrite (azo dye method), nitrate (cadmium reduction-azo dye method), and acid-neutralizing capacity (methyl orange to an end point of pH 4.5) as recommended in the manufacturer’s application notes. The pH was determined with an electrode and a specific ion meter (Orion Instruments).

After all of the aquaria were exhibiting nitrification, as determined by nitrate production, the water in one group of three aquaria was changed from freshwater to seawater (prepared with artificial sea salts [Marineland Commercial Aquariums, Moorpark, Calif.]). Three additional aquaria were also set up with artificial
seawater and filter units with BioWheels which had never been run. Water quality data were collected for the nine aquaria as previously described for another 75 days. At 43 and 72 days after the one freshwater group had been switched to seawater, the biofilm on each biofilter was sampled by cutting out a small piece of the filter. rRNA and ribosomal DNA were extracted as described
above. rRNA was analyzed by using oligonucleotide probes as described above.

The mean ammonia, nitrite, and pH data for the three groups of biofilters from aquaria that received different water treatments are presented in Fig. 3. It is clear that established freshwater aquarium biofilters experienced a complete loss of nitrification when the water in the aquaria was switched to seawater. This caused an increase in the ammonia concentrations in the aquaria (Fig. 3). After the switch to seawater, it took the previously fresh-water biofilters nearly as long to reestablish ammonia oxidation
as it took the newly set up seawater biofilters.

Nitrite oxidation was established faster in the newly set up
seawater biofilters than in the biofilters switched from fresh-water, with complete oxidation occurring by day 50 and by day
60 (after the switch), respectively (Fig. 3). Furthermore, the
nitrite concentration reached a much higher value and remained
higher for a longer period of time in the switched biofilters than in the newly set up seawater biofilters. The nitrite concentration in the continuously freshwater biofilters was low for the duration of the measuring period (Fig. 3)."