The Beneficial Relationship Of Bacteria to Nitrite and Nitrate
by John Yazo
In an aquaponic system there are basically three crops, fish, plant life and most important is beneficial bacteria. This bacteria is what converts toxic components of fish waste into a form of nutrient that plant life can use. There are several types of bacteria that exist in an aquaponic system, and all of them perform there own specific job. Without them, a healthy aquaponic system for food production would not be possible. These bacteria do not need to be introduced into a system, they occur naturally.
Aquaponic system grow beds are an ideal environment for these bacteria to flourish when designed to the proper depth of 1 foot. At shallower depths this bacteria will still colonize, but the environment will be less that ideal for them to perform at their best.
When an aquaponic system is constructed and put into service for the first time, there will be no beneficial bacteria present. The colonization of nitrosomans and nitrobacter needs to be established before an aquaponic system can work properly. This process of establishing bacterial colonies is referred to as cycling of the system.
Autotrophic bacteria is a term that describes two specific bacteria and functions. The first is nitrosomonas that uses oxygen to convert toxic ammonia into nitrite, and the second is nitrobacter that converts nitrite into nitrate. These two bacteria are crucial to a thriving aquaponic system due to the fact that both the ammonia and nitrite are toxic to fish. Nitrite being less toxic than ammonia can be tolerated by most cultured fish until it reaches high levels. Once this natural process with the autotrophic bacteria is complete, resulting nitrite ions are controlled by the plant life growing in the system.
Heterotrophic bacteria is a term that describes how specific bacteria go about converting solid fish waste into ammonia and other elements. Both of these two types of bacteria occur naturally in an aquaponic system, and habitat just about all parts of the system, like plant root systems, water, tanks, pipes, and media. Their density and growth are dependent on water temperature, pH level, surface area, flow rate and salinity of the system. These bacteria are not visible to the human eye, so they can not be measured or monitored. They only way that you will know if the bacteria crop in your system is healthy is by testing the levels of ammonia, nitrite and nitrate on a regular basis.
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