Hi I am new to the website and join really because of my tiger Oscar. I bought him from petsmart 2 weeks ago and he was doing perfectly fine it pasted ten days and the Oscar needed his water changed. I changed it and he started to lay on his side and started breathing heavily. I was curing him from ick. So the water was at 86 degrees. I put some airstones in and reduced the temperature of the aquarium and he began swimming up right but I noticed he didn't want to eat and would freak out and hit the bottom of the and just go crazy. I called petsmart and the fish care lady took my fish and said she would look after it for me to see what's wrong. I guess my nitrates rose with the water change. My question is how do I keep the nitrates low. I'm scared if I get my back fish and do another water change the nitrates will bounce back up.
Problem with nitrates
- Thread starter rickyg78
- Start date
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rotorhead22
Aquarium Advice Freak
If your tank has not been cycled, your Oscar can be suffering from ammonia or nitrite poisoning. How big is your tank?
40 gallon breeder tank. I used stability for the full 7 days and wait an extra couple of weeks. My ammonia reads zero and everything is fine except my nitrates are high. I did a 50 percent water change. The nitrates went down. Not completely but are going down. I'm just nervous that the
Hholly
Aquarium Advice Addict
Water changes actually lower nitrates as well as nitrites and ammonia. Chances are when you did your water change the nitrates were already high, as well as nitrite and ammonia. Please read these articles.
http://www.aquariumadvice.com/guide-to-starting-a-freshwater-aquarium/
http://www.aquariumadvice.com/fishin-cycling-step-dark-side/
http://www.aquariumadvice.com/guide-to-starting-a-freshwater-aquarium/
http://www.aquariumadvice.com/fishin-cycling-step-dark-side/
Hholly
Aquarium Advice Addict
Can you tell us specific numbers? What is "off the charts?" are you using test strips or a liquid test? I strongly recommend you read the articles.
Hholly
Aquarium Advice Addict
Test strips are notoriously inaccurate. You should look into a liquid test kit. API has a good one. Nitrates of 40ppm aren't great, but I wouldn't think it would cause a sudden illness like that. Did you pH change a lot when you changed the water? Large swings in pH can shock a fish.
Hholly
Aquarium Advice Addict
What kind of dechlorinator do you use?
Hholly
Aquarium Advice Addict
Hopefully someone else will see this thread and respond. If your water is safe to drink, it should be fine for your fish. I seriously don't think your fish's problem was the water change itself. I think something else was going on with it. Look up "old tank syndrome" and see if that could be it. And please read the articles I gave you links to. Good luck.
Hholly
Aquarium Advice Addict
Here's an article that may answer some questions.
http://freshaquarium.about.com/od/problemsolving/f/old_tank_syndrome.htm
http://freshaquarium.about.com/od/problemsolving/f/old_tank_syndrome.htm
rotorhead22
Aquarium Advice Freak
Unless you used seeded media in your filter/s I wouldn't expect your tank to be cycled without having a source of ammonia during those three weeks. What filtration are you using? I expect you had an ammonia or nitrite issue going on. If this is the case you would have to do large daily PWCs for a fish-in cycle.
rotorhead22
Aquarium Advice Freak
Except this tank is not an "old" tank but a new setup,
Hholly
Aquarium Advice Addict
rotorhead22 said:
But if that was the only water change you did in 3 weeks, there was massive waste buildup. Or did I misunderstand about how many water changes you did?
It's a 40 gallon. I have a 30-60 aqua tech and aquatech 10-20. I used the seachem stability. Which I heard was good. Maybe isn't wasn't good enough? Should I use the filter media from my 10 gallon aquarium that has ran good for months?it's been a week and a half since I changed the filter media in the 10 gallon. Will it help settle the nitrates? Will it help with more bacteria into my 40 gallon
jseiverd
Aquarium Advice Activist
Ive heard that some water has nitrates from the tap so check ur water dechlorinate it and test it
rotorhead22
Aquarium Advice Freak
If you read the articles that Hholly linked, you will notice that it takes weeks to months for the Nitrogen Cycle to establish itself in an aquarium. Those additives that claim to have active bacteria are supposed to help kick start cycling but a continuous source of ammonia is needed to feed the Ammonia oxidizing bacteria (Nitrosomonas), which generate Nitrites. The nitrites are then oxidized by another type of bacteria (Nitrobacter) into Nitrates. Quite a lengthy process but quite rewarding once it is over. As for seeded media, adding media from a cycled tank will definitely help speed up the cycle by providing colonies of BB.
FYI, never change out your filter media as this will cause a mini cycle to occur because the beneficial bacteria lives inside your filter media. You just need to rinse your filter media in tank water or conditioned water (never in tap water as the chlorine will kill your BB). This goes for your substrate as well. I recommend buying an API liquid test kit as these are much more accurate. Also, it is recommended that your filter be able to turn over your water volume from 6 - 10 times per hour so you good there (a 40 gal needs a flow rate of 240 - 400 gal/hr). Your AquaTech 30-60 and 10-20 have flow rates of 330 and 120 gal/hr, respectively.
For 1 Oscar in a 40gal, you need all the filtration possible since an Oscar creates a large bioload, i.e lots of ammonia.
Hope this helps.
FYI, never change out your filter media as this will cause a mini cycle to occur because the beneficial bacteria lives inside your filter media. You just need to rinse your filter media in tank water or conditioned water (never in tap water as the chlorine will kill your BB). This goes for your substrate as well. I recommend buying an API liquid test kit as these are much more accurate. Also, it is recommended that your filter be able to turn over your water volume from 6 - 10 times per hour so you good there (a 40 gal needs a flow rate of 240 - 400 gal/hr). Your AquaTech 30-60 and 10-20 have flow rates of 330 and 120 gal/hr, respectively.
For 1 Oscar in a 40gal, you need all the filtration possible since an Oscar creates a large bioload, i.e lots of ammonia.
Hope this helps.
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