Personal Disaster

[BGK]

I went the diy route for co2 and accidentally knocked the bottle over and didn't realize it until the following morning. The tank looked super cloudy and I found high dangerously high levels of nitrates in the water. I have changed out almost the entire tank and the water is still cloudy with hi nitrate levels.

You guys have any good ideas how to get it to clear up?

Thanks!

 

[TCTFish]

I'm not an expert with CO2, so I'll leave that up to someone else, but with the high nitrates you can put in a denitrate media in the filter to help absorb some of the excess nitrates. Keep up on water changes. Are there fish in this tank??? Test the CO2 levels. Though I don't know much about CO2, I do know it can be deadly.

Nitrates itself is not considered a toxin, but rather creates an ideal environment for disease causing bacteria and parasites. When saturated to the point when nitrites start to show, then you know you're at the 'breaking point' of the systems waste load (when the nitrogen cycle begins to fail). In this case, the excessive nitrates are a by product of the amount of CO2 in the system.

If CO2 can absorb itself into the substrate then you may need to rinse the substrate. As said before I don't know much about CO2. So perhaps someone else here who does know can help you with how to lower the CO2 levels.

Good luck.

 

[tropicfishman]

true, add some denitrate to your filter and you'll be ok, the cloudiness may take a couple weeks and a few water changes to clear up though

 

[Zagz]

Do as mentioned above and I'd actually do another water change immediately. It certainly won't hurt the fish.

 

[tropicfishman]

also, if your any good at carpentry or metal fab, make a sturdy bracket to hold the bottle so it doesn't tip anymore, when i was in welding class we had a brand new O2 tank fall over, talk about everyone ducking in case it blew the valve off lol is it a big tank or one of those you buy at a LFS for CO2?