Nitrate problem.. need help fast

[Coel]

so it seems my water company may have changed something my tap is testing for 20-30 nitrates using API. can anyone recommend a plant that will sponge them up fast?


thanks

 

[tim_s]

Did it rain?

What is the tank measuring?

What is the live stock?

 

[Coel]

it rained heavy a few days ago,

tank is a 55 running a AC 70 with peatmoss to lower the ph and hardness

stock is heavy but my pwc is normally approx 30% a week

ammonia and nitrite are both testing 0
nitrate is testing at like 80 2 days in a row.

normally i change carbon every month and peat every 2-3 weeks

stock list

5 emerald cory
5 spotted cory
9 pygmy cory
10 harlequin rasbora
7 pristella teras
4 serpae tetras
1 farlowella catfish
1 bn pleco

assorted snails and a few red cherry shrimp

also has 2 small swords and 1 water wisteria. the plants are relatively new(3 weeks) the stock list has been the same for a while and never tested over 40 ish during a pwc. nothing has died other than snails because my assassins are eating them. i run a 2x 6700 48" t5ho fixture

 

[Zimmanski]

Do something like this picture. I took an old filter from my 20 gallon that I wasn't using since I replaced it. Take all the media and everything else out of the filter, fill it with rocks and then plant Pothos in it. I'm not using Pothos but I hear they use up nitrates like crazy, I think it would take any plant a little while to use that much nitrate though. You could try getting water from your LFS to for a while

 

[tim_s]

Well!

If you have 50 gallons tank sitting at 80 Nitrates and you did a 50% water change the math is quite simple on this one.

(80 + 40) / 2 = 60 PPM

The plants will help but it is not the solution.

80 PPM is not great but you can immediately reduce the problem with water changes and I would double check your water has not returned to a more desirable nitrate level.

 

[Coel]

i am going to let the tank settle and test again in an hr i just did an almost 70% pwc... and changed carbon/peat

 

[BBradbury]

Question of Nitrates

so it seems my water company may have changed something my tap is testing for 20-30 nitrates using API. can anyone recommend a plant that will sponge them up fast?


thanks

Hello Coel...

Nitrates in the 30 ppm range aren't going to hurt your fish. If you follow a good water change routine by removing and replacing half the tank water every week to 10 days, your water chemistry will be safe for your fish.

Aquarium fish are very good at adapting to the majority of public water supplies. They've been doing this for a long time.

If you want to add some plants, go with stem plants. I like to float Anacharis and Pennywort in my tanks. These two are good natural water filters.

B

 

[Rivercats]

It's best to try to keep nitrates under 20 and in a planted tank between 10 and 20ppm. It sucks when your tap water spikes but adding more plants can greatly help, not cure, but help. If you want to use Potho's you can take cutting from a house plant and loosely tie them together, remove the leaves on the part of the cuttings that will be in the water, and then just hang them over the corner edge of the tank. Mine are large enough now they sit like a house plant would but w/o soil and a pot perfectly between my light fixture and the tank corner. When the roots get too long they can just be snipped to a shorter length. Don't use Potho's in a HOB filter conversion as their roots grow super long and really fast and will clog up your impellor. Here are a couple links to look at about HOB planted filters that do use up an incredible amount of nutrients.

Planted HOB thread.

Anyone ever grow emersed plants out of the filter of a Fluval Spec?

Also as stated above adding more fast growing stem plants and either more wisteria or water sprite will increase nitrate absorbsion.

 

[tim_s]

It's best to try to keep nitrates under 20 and in a planted tank between 10 and 20ppm. It sucks when your tap water spikes but adding more plants can greatly help, not cure, but help. If you want to use Potho's you can take cutting from a house plant and loosely tie them together, remove the leaves on the part of the cuttings that will be in the water, and then just hang them over the corner edge of the tank. Mine are large enough now they sit like a house plant would but w/o soil and a pot perfectly between my light fixture and the tank corner. When the roots get too long they can just be snipped to a shorter length. Don't use Potho's in a HOB filter conversion as their roots grow super long and really fast and will clog up your impellor. Here are a couple links to look at about HOB planted filters that do use up an incredible amount of nutrients.

Planted HOB thread.

Anyone ever grow emersed plants out of the filter of a Fluval Spec?

Also as stated above adding more fast growing stem plants and either more wisteria or water sprite will increase nitrate absorbsion.

I am curious why you mention that within a fish only tank 20 PPM and as soon as you add plants you mention a range 10 PPM - 20 PPM.

As this whole post is about - is taking advantage that the plants need nitrogen. Fertilizers carry many bound Nitrates - example potassium nitrates.

I would of thought - it would be 20 PPM for either.

 

[Rivercats]

IMO in a non planted tank the lower the nitrates the better and should always be "under" 20ppm. Lower is better as fish only tanks don't need any nitrates and 20ppm should be the high cap. But my understanding, while some people with planted tanks keep thier planted tank nitrates as high as 40ppm I've always read and been told 10-20ppms is best. Plus it's always worked for me.

I actually thought the thread was how to lower nitrates due to a high tap water spike in them.

My main tank is a 220g, heavily planted that I dose PPS-Pro daily to keep nutrients in the water and I try to keep my nitrates closer to 10ppm because I have alot of Rotala macrandra that does better with lower nitrates and slightly higher phosphates. When I kept fish only tanks even back in the 80's I always tried to keep my nitrates as close to zero as possible but my fancy goldfish tanks were always around 20ppm which I felt was too high even with WC's.

 

[Coel]

Yeah my tap water spiking is part of the problem usually it tested about 10ppm. I've been slowly easing into the planted but looks like I may go to petco and get some wisteria if any is left