Nitrates shot sky high! Did I remove too much bacteria?

[nibor]

Thursday, I vacuumed out my tank and did a regular water change. Tested the water and slightly high Ammonia, but everything else was at 0

Saturday, I set up my 10 gal and took some water from my 29 gal to fill it. I also took the plastic plants (3) out of the 29 gal and put them in the 10 gal to try to seed the new tank.

Sunday morning, I added some new plants

Sunday evening, I test Ammonia still slightly high, barely registers. Nitrate a deep, dark red! Nitrite, 0. Changed out 20 gal tested again and it was still sky-high, about mid-point on the chart.

Did I throw things off by removing the plastic plants? Could the new plants do this? Should I put the plastic plants back? I have never had this happen before!

PS, the tank is pretty clean. I planted my new plants and moved things around earlier today and did not stir much up, nor did anything get stirred up when I did the water change. All fishies are accounted for as well.

 

[xsryman]

Try a couple of back to back water changes. That should re-create a water buffer

 

[librarygirl]

Have you tested your tap water for nitrate? If not, do so, they could be coming from there. If not, some larger water changes should bring them down. What are your normal nitrate readings?