using tap water, my tank will have lots of nitrates?

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0000

Aquarium Advice Regular
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Sep 17, 2009
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MY TANK HAS HIGH NITRATES 160+ (fish are doing fine for a while)


For my water changes I am using tap water

I have tested my water quality (the tap water) multiple times

these are my results

Ammonia : 0

Nitrate : 0

Nitrite : 0

High Range PH: 7.4

I usually fill up the water in bucket, add Prime chemicals to remove chlorine, etc., then add the water to tank

What else do I need to test in my tap water?

is my tap water "ok" to use?


need help asap
 
Have you cycled the tank? If the tank is cycled you might want to have your LFS test your tap water and we need to know what kit you're using to test the water. What size tank? How many fish? What are you feeding and how often?
 
Have you cycled the tank? If the tank is cycled you might want to have your LFS test your tap water and we need to know what kit you're using to test the water. What size tank? How many fish? What are you feeding and how often?


I am using an API liquid test kit.

it is a 36 gallon, fully cycled tank.


currently there is clownfish, a fire fish and a blenny,

2 gobies got eaten today by a hermit crab :(

I feed them everyday, pellets,or frozen brine/mysis shrimp.
 
what do you have for filtration and are you washing the frozen food before feeding and i think everyday is too much feeding.
 
what do you have for filtration and are you washing the frozen food before feeding and i think everyday is too much feeding.

fluval 205 for filtration, just cleaned filter recently.

the frozen food, is those small cubes that is specially made for fish, sold at pet stores.

IT HAS TO BE WASHED???

HOW SO??
 
Soak it in RO or distilled water until it thaws and strain through a brine shrimp net (the super fine white ones)

If you don't have an RO/DI system, get some Home Depot 5g buckets & lids, rinse them out, and fill them up at a Culligan station at Wal-Mart or another RO water station at a grocery store (Hy-Vee up here in IA, Publix down south, etc). Call Culligan they'll tell you where they have them in your town.

Also I would beware of a false reading on your test kit. I'd be surprised if your municipal water source has 0 Nitrates. Around here, some have 20-30.

Without running a skimmer, refugium, ATS, or some other means of nutrient export, you're gong to have to up the frequency of your water changes drastically, it's the only way to reduce Nitrates.

How long has the tank been running?

What test kit are you using, and how old is it?
 
Another thing to think about, if your using the salt water API test kit to try an measure your tap water nitrate level before mixing any salt into it, it may be giving a bad reading. Mix up your water, then test it for nitrates and see what you get.
 
Nitrates at 160 isn't due to using tap water, or not rinsing your food. I'd hazard a guess that it's due to not enough water changes and a cannister filter that isn't being cleaned out very often. How often are you changing water and rinsing out the media in that cannister?

Absolute easiest way to reduce nitrates are water changes. If you do four 20% water changes over the course of a week, even with say 10ppm nitrate source water, your nitrates will be below 80ppm at the end of that week. Keep doing them until you get it reduced down to a level where you can figure out where the nitrates are coming from. Until you get the nitrates down, it's going to be impossible to see any results from changes in feeding, maintenance, etc.

For what it's worth, the API nitrate test kits are good for both freshwater and saltwater. You just have to use a different color chart for them. But they're the same chemicals.
 
I agree with Kurt. I was going through too many posts and missed that one about the canister. And yeah, after re-reading, I didn't see a mention of water changes...so 0000 are you doing PWCs?
 
Kurt's on the trail to the high nitrate solution.
Cut back on feeding, rinse the frozen before feeding, increase amount and schedule of pwc's as a start.
 
Im not a fan of tap I did it before in my early days but paying the extra money to buy an RO setup or going to hyvee getting culligans in the long run saved me more money but if you must use tap I'd use a product called Alpha aquavitro pour it in the water in a bucket or something before you put water in tank mix it in then pour in tank cause there's just a lot of things in tap water your test only cover certain things and they put a lot of crap in tap water but I hope everything works out for you keep us posted
 
You are still better off using RO or RO/DI. That stuff you are talking about wont get rid of heavy metals and alot of other stuff in tap water. I work for a large water municipality and I know what goes in there. They are good for people but not for our reefs. Stuff like nitrates, phosphates. silicates, Ammonia and like I said various heavy metals that nothing is going to take out except a RO/DI unit.
 
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