Help with Nitrate after change is still high

[pettygil]

Help with Nitrate after change is still high. I am past 40 ppm after water change on my 6.5 gallon tank with one Betta. How do I lower the Nitrate.
Thanks.

 

[Aiken Drum]

Whats you typical water change schedule? How much, how often?

Are you overfeeding? Once a day no more than is eaten in 3 minutes.

Is there any nitrate in your tap water? If so, how much?

Nitrate can only be reduced by reducing ammonia, changing contaminated water for cleaner water, and having live plants. There are also chemical media you can put in your tap water that absorbs nitrate.

Are you seeing any issues with your betta?

While lower nitrate is better, fish are a lot more tolerant to high nitrate than they are to high ammonia and nitrate. People regularly sucessfully keep fish in high nitrate conditions. If you are taking reasonable measures to keep nitrate low, but your fish are fine, is it a problem?

 

[pettygil]

Whats you typical water change schedule? How much, how often?
I change every couple of days, like 50 percent of water.

Are you overfeeding? Once a day no more than is eaten in 3 minutes.. I
Yes. i only feed once a day, just a pinch of fish food.

Is there any nitrate in your tap water? If so, how much?
No nitrate in my tap water.

Nitrate can only be reduced by reducing ammonia, changing contaminated water for cleaner water, and having live plants. There are also chemical media you can put in your tap water that absorbs nitrate.

Are you seeing any issues with your betta?
No, betta seems fine to me.

While lower nitrate is better, fish are a lot more tolerant to high nitrate than they are to high ammonia and nitrate. People regularly sucessfully keep fish in high nitrate conditions. If you are taking reasonable measures to keep nitrate low, but your fish are fine, is it a problem?

My bettas seem fine. I checked on them both, they seem to be ok. I have 2 6.5 tanks for my bettas.

 

[Andy Sager]

The same thing applies to your small tanks as it did in your large tank thread. Ammonia/ammonium is the start of nitrate production. You must reduce those to reduce nitrate. There are nitrate removing products for filters ( i.e. Poly filter pad, API Nitra-zorb, Acurel nitrate absorbing pad, etc), certain live plants that use the nitrates more than others ( i.e. Marimo moss balls, Guppy Grass, Duck weed ( be careful with duck weed as it will get overgrown in a tank) ) or house plants like Pothos or these (

) that can help reduce your nitrates. The whole key however is to reduce the ammonia/ammonium because there is no nitrate problem until there is ammonia /ammonium. The nitrate level in your tap water is not going to increase much from just one fish as long as it's not overfed but will increase unless you do 100% water changes because anything less will just be adding to an existing level. Other options are to get a filter for your tap water that will remove the ammonia and nitrate before they ever get into the tank OR preparing water in a separate container that you filter to remove any ammonia & nitrate before it ever goes into the tank.