New tank owner/High nitrates in tap water?

[LithiumAndGold]

I've been reading this site for about 3 weeks now and I have found everything very helpful! I had (gold)fish once when I was young and found them to be a pain because my mom would make me completely break down the tank once a week to clean it. She didn't know and neither did I that you're not supposed to do that. So when I was looking at fish at Petsmart I told the young lady that I wanted a "low maintenance fish that can go in this (betta) bowl". She told me the only thing that could go in that 1 gallon bowl was guppies, and sold me 4 (which I now know is WAY too many fish per 1 gallon of water). Well 1 of them died that night and I returned it the next day and was speaking with another young lady who told me I cannot keep guppies in that bowl because they need a filter and heater, etc. So I'm upset because all I had in mind was something low maintenance and these fish are starting to sound very high maintenance. Anyway I ended up returning the whole mess that was sold to me, fish and all, and after some research I did want to try to breed some guppies. So after only 3 weeks (lol) we have 5 tanks. I have a 2 gallon that had 2 pregnant females, 1 just gave birth and was moved to a resting tank for a day and then put in with the male in a 1 gallon. I have 2 other 1 gallon tanks that I plan to use for breeding when I have more fish and I have a 10 gallon. Remember I'm new and I didn't know about fishless cycling until AFTER I had the fish, like most other new people. So I have only 2 of the 5 tanks with fish in them. At least I learned from my mistakes and I'm fishless cycling the other 3! I just got the API Freshwater test kit in the mail from Amazon 3 days ago and I tested the water in each tank. (I also added some kind of tank starter to each tank to speed the process up, I haven't seen that anywhere on here so I'm not sure if that was the right thing to do?) The 10 gallon and 2 1 gallon breeding tanks have almost cycled completely. Oh I bought some hornwort and put a little in each tank. My PROBLEM (after this long story, I know) is that I think I have a problem with my tap water. I've been doing water changes religiously twice a day in both tanks that have fish in them, admittedly at different amounts that range from 10-50%. I've practiced and practiced not to overfeed. My 2 gallon with the 16 2 day old fry and 1 pregnant female are pH 7.3, Ammonia .5, Nitrites 0, and Nitrates 80ppm! The 1 gallon is even worse! Last night it read pH 7.2, Ammonia 0, Nitrites 0, Nitrates 160ppm! So I started googling how to get rid of nitrates and the resounding answer was frequent water changes. Well I know that's not the answer in my case because I've been doing them twice a day. So I tested my tap water and the nitrates are 80ppm from the tap. I think it's because I live on a heavily fertilized farm. I don't think the hornwort can keep up with that many nitrates. So I freaked out and did ANOTHER water change last night with bottled water instead. I just read today that I probably should've done it slower because the pH is probably different and can shock the fish. I don't know about this reverse osmosis because it sounds expensive and I'm limited on space. I've also read you shouldn't put a lot of chemicals into your tank but I'm wondering if there's a trusted brand of some kind of nitrate remover I could add? Like everybody else I don't want to feel irresponsible and kill the fish or have them get sick. Also I have googled and found varying answers about this but my female that just gave birth, she had developed these black dots on the top of her head near her eyes and then gave birth 2-3 days after that and I don't see the dots anymore. Now my other female has them too and I'm wondering if this is a disease or related to pregnancy? Anyway thanks for reading my very long story and any help you can provide would be greatly appreciated!

 

[LithiumAndGold]

Oh yeah and the hornwort in the 2 gallon pregnancy tank is THRIVING it's nice and green and lush. I had put 2 hornwort plants in the 10 gallon and I'm guessing because it's newly cycling that there isn't enough nitrates to feed it so those plants are shedding everywhere. I took 1 out and put in the 2 gallon hoping it would help lower the nitrates and in turn help the plant to survive but big mistake because it turned even more brown and shed most of its needles all over my tank. Not sure how I'm going to get those out of such a small tank when I don't want to use the siphon vacuum thing in such a small tank (last time it removed 90% of the water in less than 1 minute) but I know I can't leave them in because the breakdown will cause an ammonia spike. I've looked at most of my local stores and can't find a stupid turkey baster anywhere! You'd think they'd be plentiful with Thanksgiving coming up but apparently not.

 

[Grand1011]

Bacteria that remove nitrates are not present in an aquarium so dealing with high nitrates can be difficult. The only options would be reverse osmosis or deionized water or having live plants.

 

[LithiumAndGold]

I don't think the plants are enough like I don't think I can put enough plants in a tank that small to deal with the problem. It MAY work itself out over time I guess if I stopped doing so many water changes. I've read that bottled water isn't good for fish so other than testing a relatives water and getting water from them, I'm at a loss for a cheap way to deal with this. I don't really want to make any more sudden changes to the water I'm afraid of killing the fry

 

[Grand1011]

It's very possible to do a 1 gallon planted tank. It does require some money but it will put the nitrates in line.

 

[LithiumAndGold]

Thanks for your help, btw. I do have a "bunch" of hornwort in the tank, as Petsmart sells it by the "bunch". And it is processing some nitrate because I do a nitrate test before a water change and it's always less than after the change. It takes up about a 5th of the 2 gallon tank for size reference. I'm afraid of adding any more plants because well the fish have to have room to swim lol

 

[Brilliant_Barbs_21]

Thanks for your help, btw. I do have a "bunch" of hornwort in the tank, as Petsmart sells it by the "bunch". And it is processing some nitrate because I do a nitrate test before a water change and it's always less than after the change. It takes up about a 5th of the 2 gallon tank for size reference. I'm afraid of adding any more plants because well the fish have to have room to swim lol

You'd be surprised. If I were you I would either get an RO/DI system, or fill your tanks with plants. 1/5 of the tank isn't enough. Just fill the back with plants. Fill 4/5 of of the tank. and also get a very high powered light so you can grow moss carpets, DHG carpets, or any other carpeting plant. IIMO, the RO/DI is easier and much better, but the plants are prettier. Do both if you want.

 

[Mebbid]

Plants are not going to be able to keep up with that high of a nitrate level sadly but they will at least help. Try some anacharis or water sprite. They are very good at absorbing nitrates. It's also definitely because of the fertilizers used on the farm. If I were you, until you can get ahomd of an ro system I would buy some 5g jugs and keep refilling them at the grocery store.

As for the Guppy breeding, doing it properly is a whole lot of work. You need to have 6 - 8 tanks running. 2 5g, 4 10g, and 2 as big as you can manage. You need to keep two separate strains going at the same time completely separated so that you can crossbreed them every 4 - 5 generations which will prevent birth defects. You also need larger tanks because the fry will grow faster with more water volume. The 2 5g tanks are for breeding. 4 10g tanks are for keeping the sexes of both strains separate. And the 2 large tanks are to grow out new fry. Larger tanks and a higher number of tanks makes the process of breeding easier but gives you more work.

Or you could just throw a bunch of guppies in tanks and let them go at it. However the resulting fry can't be sold and will get kind of ugly mixing colors and shapes.

I would like to add that I wouldn't store guppues in anything less than a 10g long term. Anything smaller than that just isn't enough.

 

[Grand1011]

No problem. Lower nitrates are more important than swimming room. Plants with low flourecent light and some seachems excel and the nitrates should decrease. Also think about using a different substrate like floramax.

 

[LithiumAndGold]

Thanks guys I will take all of your suggestions to heart you have all been so helpful!