Interested
Aquarium Advice Apprentice
Hope someone can help. I'm as confused as all get out. I have read here and other articles and talked to people at other sites about controlling nitrate levels. Everyone says the same thing. Partial water changes and vacuum the substrate. My tank is about 2 months old but I cannot seem to get the nitrate level down below 40ppm. I have been doing 20% water changes once per week and vacuuming the substrate for the last 3 weeks. Then today a guy at a LFS says that I should only do water changes once per month and that I should never, under any circumstances vacuum the substrate (I'm using aragonite). Here's the tanks info. I hope I haven't been wasting my time. btw, I only do 20% water changes because it takes so long to get 30 gallons of RO/DI water and storage space is limited. I only have 1 container.
135 Gallons
RO/DI water
PH = 8.2
Amonia = 0
Nitrite = 0
Ntrate = constant 40ppm
Salinity = 1.023
Two Fluval 404 w/no media
Protein Skimmer
Thanks in advance for any advice. If I'm headed in the wrong direction please don't hold any punches.
135 Gallons
RO/DI water
PH = 8.2
Amonia = 0
Nitrite = 0
Ntrate = constant 40ppm
Salinity = 1.023
Two Fluval 404 w/no media
Protein Skimmer
Thanks in advance for any advice. If I'm headed in the wrong direction please don't hold any punches.