there are two major pathways for bacteria, with and without oxygen
a septic system is w/o oxygen and uses anaerobic bacteria, like purple bacteria, and
products of anaerobes are ammonia, H2S or hydrogen sulfide and/or S, sulfur which is
very toxic to fish. when fish go down to the bottom to root around they are sucking
to get food and suck the toxins across their gills which toxes them out.
...With oxygen bacteria can break all the organic stuff down to H2O and CO2.
High organic loads can be do to one or all of the following: not enough oxygenation
of the water, poor circulation with dead spots in the pond, overfeeding or feeding
with high residue foods, a lot of extraneous organic matter getting into the pond,
like leaves.

Here is the experience of one person in her indoor TANKS.
"Jo Ann supplied the following observation and experiment she's been
running. Remember that this is a single incident AND it is in a tank.
This does not necessarily mean there are not unknown factors at work or
this applies to any other tank, water pH, condition, etc.
She super sterilized a tank prepatory to moving fish. Unknown
to her, her DH had put a small amount of Microlift (an organic waste
remover) into this tank to see if it would help reduce the ammonia levels
of these fish when they started spawning. The stuff had been sent to them
to try out.
The first thing she noticed was that peroxide did not clear the purple
sterilizing level of PP in the tank.
She then dumped all water, changed media and cleaned the gravel. DH
added a few more drops of Microlift to the tank (without telling Jo Ann).
This is classic example of a blinded study cause Jo Ann sure was in the
dark.
Jo Ann put in the fish. Soon she noticed the fish were lethargic and the
physical showed that the gills were liver colored purple. She immediately
checked the water parameters but the ammonia was not bad. She did a water
change anyway. Soon the fins were shredded and she moved the fish to fresh
water, did scrapes and found nothing. Some of the fish died, others
recovered after being moved to fresh water.
She dumped all the water in the tank again, left the media. She left the
tank for 2 weeks with no fish and then tested for ammonia which was now off
scale. She did another super PP treatment and once again the peroxide
wouldnt remove the PP. ONce again she dumped the tank, left the media.
The next day the ammonia was 0.1.
2 weeks later fish came in, put in the tank but didnt check ammonia in the
empty tank. 3 days later the fish were spawning and the ammonia was off
the charts. She did a 50% water. 3 days later the fins were shredding and
on the fish were on the bottom and lethargic. A scrape showed nothing,
gills were purple. The fish were moved out of the tank. Some of the fish
died, the rest have neural damage and probably wont survive.
She did 2- 100% water changes on the fishless tank, but the ammonia was
still off the wall 24hrs later. Did another 100% water change on the empty
tank, AND replaced the media completely and found ammonia at 0.1 later that
evening. DH now told her he had added the Microlift.
She ended up using bleach on the tanks to get rid of the bacteria.
Note: The bacteria in the Microlift is purple bacteria. Some species of
purple bacteria reduce nitrates to ammonia. Also, purple bacteria eat H2S
and so are sold in an H2S formula to keep em alive. All additions of
Microlift were less than the recommended dose. Jo Ann has acidic water,
adds a calcium buffer to the water and salt. This was the only tank the
Microlift was added to, no other tanks of fish (with no Microlift) have
these symptoms. "
Ingrid


"Olde Hippee" wrote:
Hi Gale, I'm interested in what you use as a beneficial bacteria. I
used to frequent this group all the time, but haven't been here
recently. We were looking at (now don't freak out), Rid-X as it is a
beneficial bacteria for septics.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
List Manager: Puregold Goldfish List at
http://weloveteaching.com/puregold/
sign up: http://groups.google.com/groups/dir?...s=Group+lookup
www.drsolo.com
Solve the problem, dont waste energy finding who's to blame
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I receive no compensation for running the Puregold list or Puregold website.
I do not run nor receive any money from the ads at the old Puregold site.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Zone 5 next to Lake Michigan