baking soda?

[eldaldo]

I am cleaning out my spare tank right now to put in a wounded T. karelinii. I always try and keep everything separate between my notos and my T. karelinii because I am pretty sure that the notos are wild caught (i got them from a biological supply) and I am afraid that they might have parasites that could spread to my CB karelinii. I kept the notos in my spare tank for a week this summer because of the moving process that i went through. I am using baking soda to disinfect the tank, which is what i have used my entire life since I got my first newt in 3rd grade. does anyone know if this actually works as a safe disinfectant?

 

[t_summ]

I have always used baking soda to clean out any of my aquariums. I had some fish that were sick and used baking soda and really hot water then let it dry overnight and rinsed again with hot water before using it again. From my experiences, it seems to get the job done with no harm to the inhabitants afterward.

 

[Abrahm]

As a disinfectant? No, baking soda (sodium bicarbonate) is not effective. A disinfectant by definition is a chemical that is used to kill lifeforms on a surface or object. Most of these are by their very nature quite harsh and examples include quaternary ammonia compounds, bleach, ethanol, and phenol. I'm sure there are some that are not so harsh, but I am not that familiar with them.

Baking soda is a good cleaning agent as it helps remove stains and other optical impurities but it is not a disinfectant.

 

[JWERNER]

Its always scary but the best agent is bleach. There is some stuff that will disinfect just as good but clean it up better, but you can get rid of bleach easier. Use a little bit, let it soak with some hot water over night in the garage or something, then rinse it. I mean rinse it alot, then rinse it alot more. After you have rinsed it out alot let some dechlorinator soak, use alot of that stuff. If I am cleaning a tank up I usually get a big bottle and use the whole thing. Then I let that sit over night again and rinse it good in the morning

 

[coendeurloo]

I've heard a strong tonic salt solution could be effective, such as this one: http://www.petplanet.co.uk/product.asp?dept_id=1237&pf_id=4977

 

[eldaldo]

yeah I see what you mean. I am probably being paranoid about the parasites anyway, but hopefully the baking soda cleaned off any sort of stuff on the surfaces of the tank that was there from earlier this summer. Thanks for your comments.

 

[Bellabelloo]

I've always used salt to 'disinfect' tanks and around the home...and more lately as I am trying to be more organic and chemical free I also use lemon juice and/or vinegar with it, so far I haven't caused up set with the pets or the various humans with in the home. Baking powder is good for removing some deposits, which in them selves may home bacteria etc. Having said this, I would resort to 'chemicals ' if neccesary, I just hope with what I do now will prevent any thing ' nasty' happening!

 

[Ed]

While chlorine is a great disinfectent, chloride (the ion found in salt) is not... If you think you are disinfecting with salt, you are actually having little to no effect....

Ed

 

[MRIGUY]

The salts and baking soda's are great for cleaning and removing scale especially when mixed with lemon juice. They do not have very good disinfectant properties however. As others have stated, a dilute bleach solution is ideal and rinses clean. I know some people have used alcohol as well but I have no experience with it and as such cannot recommend it.

 

[eldaldo]

Yeah, in my lab the only things we use as disinfectant are bleach or an ethanol wash followed by a lysol wash.

However, do you think that a very high salt concentration would mess with osmotic balance and kill micro-organisms the same way that pure DI and distilled water kills micro-organisms. I am just wondering.

Also, I was thinking. Perhaps extremely carbonated beverages like gingerale and coke would do some serious damage because of their acidity. Even better, a swift change in pH by adding a base like baking soda might wreak havoc on bacteria and other similar organisms. Has anyone ever done anything like this? Carbonated drinks and baking soda both seem safer than bleach or detergent to me.

 

[gnomonlove18]

I've been doing fish tanks for many many years and granted they are different but the environment is the environment and natural development of chemistry and unfortunately parasites is something that just happens. My rule of thumb always when cleaning a tank is to never use any of those chemicals.

Get a nice new green scrubby pad and scrub that tank til your blue in the face. Just use hot water and elbow grease. The reason I say this is because like we all know that once you use a chemical or cleaning agent its never 100% gone afterward. It's going to get somewhere and its going to be either be bad or never harm a thing...but why chance it. Right?

This is how I've always done my tanks and I've had perfect tanks my whole life. Let the biology and germs and parasites work themselves out...like in the environment. Clean it good but the rest is left up to natural selection. Those are just my thoughts.

And as for the soda like ginerale or cola...those bad boys can clean the dirtiest of pennies quicker than silver cleaner. and yes you could probably use them but again...your risking screwing with mother nature and the natural biology of tanks. Just a thought for you. Have Fun!

 

[Otterwoman]

What about vinegar? When I took microbiology in nursing school we had to wash our desks every day after the class with "acetic acid" (he made it sound so formal) and that's all we ever used.

 

[JWERNER]

Carbonated drinks and baking soda both seem safer than bleach or detergent to me.

The thing with that is that you risk the chance of it never washing out and leaving some sort of residue behind, the bleach can be cleaned out with dechlorinator found at a pet shop. Its what people have been doing for years as well as myself, my customers and the shops I worked at and no one ever had a problem unless bleach was left behind by not decholrinating it and at that I still never had a complaint. But like I said you can get rid of it for sure a lot easier in my opinion.

 

[coendeurloo]

Since no one is replying on my message about a tonic salt solution, is this a silly product? It seems like it does the job on an aquarium-friendly way.

 

[Abrahm]

If you want to truly disinfect then using a tonic salt solution isn't going to be all that effective either. Protozoan cysts, and the spores of bacteria and fungi should all be suitably protected from the effects of a salt solution. Extreme pH solutions are also problematic for the same reasons, though I would imagine concentrated strong acids would do reasonably well.

 

[MRIGUY]

Anything that effects the osmotic balance of an organism has the potential to kill it. One of the safest and best therapies for certain vascular malformations is a direct infusion of a 50% dextrose solution. It pulls fluid from the vessel and sclerosis it closed thereby solving the problem. The problem with using this method is that it only works reliable with the more compley organisms. Virus, spores, and bacteria are much more protected from such things and since those are the target organisms anything that relies on disruption of osmoregulation will not be the best choice.

 

[eldaldo]

This is all very interesting stuff. I agree that many bacteria, protist, and fungi spores have those very thick cell walls making them hard to kill. Heck, you can freeze bacteria and yeast at -80 degrees C and they still have the potential to grow when you heat them up. Perhaps bleach is the only sure thing "disinfectant." But, I imagine that some of the other things people have mentioned do a pretty good job as well.

 

[freves]

I've never tried baking soda. I have always used a a bleach solution (app 10 %). If the tank that I plan to clean has had soil in it (with lots of hard residue) then sometimes I have used a very small amount of dish detergent with lots of rinsing afterwards. I usually do not worry too much as long as the tank is clear and dry afterwards.
Chip

 

[Abrahm]

This is all very interesting stuff. I agree that many bacteria, protist, and fungi spores have those very thick cell walls making them hard to kill. Heck, you can freeze bacteria and yeast at -80 degrees C and they still have the potential to grow when you heat them up. Perhaps bleach is the only sure thing "disinfectant." But, I imagine that some of the other things people have mentioned do a pretty good job as well.

We commonly used stocks of competent yeast that were stored at -80 degrees C. These cells are "weak" and are still able to survive freezing. We've also kept animal cell cultures in cold storage in liquid nitrogen (~ -170 degrees C in the flask) long term and used them to start new cultures. Some organisms are also quite resistant to chlorine and bleach. The stuff of life can be as amazingly resistant as it is fragile.

 

[Ed]

An example of a infectious organism that is resistant to bleach is Cryptosporidia..(but salt regardless of the concentration or baking soda isn't going to work either, only full strength house hold ammonia or live steam works) however most of the amphibian pathogens are readily dealt with by using a standard disinfectant solution of bleach (just follow the directions on the bottle).
There are several factors that affect the ability of any disinfectant such as organisms hidden under in crevices or under organic contaminants (if the tank isn't clean then you are probably not going to affect anything under the debris), concentration and contact time. Increasing the concentration of some disinfectants will shorten contact time but there are limits how much this can be changed.

Tonic salt solutions are not going to work for most pathogens or parasites that have a dormant or resting phase. They can be of use in helping to deal with some (but not all or even most) external parasites.

Ed