Water problems

[ArtistGardener]

Your nitrates are fine; just keep up with normal water changes to keep it around that level. Your ammonia does appear elevated, but not to .25. Do you have a dead fish hiding somewhere in there? Use Prime with your water changes and keep watching this.

 

[Stacey W.]

I completely agree with ArtistGardner. Also you don't need to add RO water your ph is what it is and you can fight it but why? Adding RO water makes everything more complicated. Just as AG said unless you want soft water fish then you can try to mess with the ph. Otherwise, if your worried about your nitrates then get lots of plants.

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[Blahblahblah]

That's great to hear! Just looked have no dead fish. My ammonia just went up since yesterday. I don't know why? I have found that the only surviving Gold Panda Molly Is bullying my 4 black skirt tetra's. So I put some stress coat in the tank hoping it might help heal or distress. Could that have cause it to rise ? I've been doing water changes about ever 4 day's and using about 4 to 5 treatment of Prime to the water before adding to the tank. I would love to replace all the fish I've lost, but not until you guy's say its safe too. Can I get some snail's to help with the brown algae that doesn't seem to what to go away (3 months). It look absolutely disgusting!! Can I add a plant ?

 

[jarrod0987]

Hi, I am very new to the Aquarium world and am having problems with my water. I have a 29 gallon tank and my level's are off bad and I've tried all kinds of chemical. I used tap water with Tetra Aquasafe. We had a bad problem with brown algae so we took out 10 gallons and scraped the glass clean. Now our levels are out of wak. My NItrites are 10.0 My Hardness is 150, Alkalinity 300 and my PH is 8.4. I keep adding the AquaSafe conditioner and was told to get some PH reducer. I've put it in 4 times now and have had no changes. Now my Corydoras Melini's are hiding in what we now call the death rock. Can anyone help or give me some advice Please?!

I have good news for you.
Brown Algae is normal for a new aquarium and it goes away on it's own after a month or so. Or add otocinclus catfish for 2 dollars. Give him a week and see how much is gone. Please don't keep adding aquasafe WHEN you have no more ammonia.. Also don't worry so much about pH. If the fish look fine and happy they are. Adding pH down may kill them. They like pH stability much more then they like a certain pH number.

Sounds like you have hard water. Not uncommon. Not a problem at all as long as your fish seem happy. It is an issue for certain live plants but some like it as well. If you really needed to get hardness,kh, and ph down then the right way would be to mix your tap water with distilled water until you got the target levels you wanted but doing that all at once kills fish. I would advise against it unless you are having trouble keeping tropical fish alive in your tank. You could, alternatively, switch to a fish that likes hard water.

Nitrates of 10 is just fine. If you google around you will find that is a highly recommended number for planted tanks. Anything 12 or less if just beautiful IMO.

 

[gilpi]

Information overload!
The most important thing you need to know is the cycling process.
Many will disagree with my simplistic approach but here it goes anyway...
Stop putting chemicals (as you say) in the water with the exception of a good de-chloramine stuff when doing water changes, Prime is good.
You don't need carbon in your filter and there is no need to clean the filter very often, a common mistake newcomers make. The filter is where the "good" bacteria thrives that will get rid of ammonia and nitrites, so just rinse and keep the same filter floss or sponge.
Keep up with water changes.
Fish don't need to eat that much, over feeding can become one of your biggest problems in a tank.
Don't obsess with testing the water, sometimes taking a step back and letting the tank take its course can be the best thing to do, often newcomers try doing "too much too soon" which can lead to failures.
I hope my advice helps you some as there are others here with very good advice as well.


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[bazook]

Ok. If Stacy or no one else helps you I will try. I cycle the old fashion way I guess. A lot of people on these sites use tetra Safe Start but I have never used it. Plants are nice but that's a whole other subject and not the time. Right now you are trying to save your fish.

You need to measure your ammonia, nitrites and pH and make a little chart to write these down with dates. This is so you cabn see the trends over time. Any time you see ammonia or nitrites, do a 30-40 percent water change. Use tap water and be sure it is the same temperature as best you can. Be sure to put the appropriate dose of Prime in the tank for the water you are replacing BEFORE you put in the new water. If the tank is not cycled at all, you will be doing this daily for a month to 6,weeks. Once you see nitrites, the tank is starting to cycle, once they go down and you start seeing nitrate, and little to no ammonia and nitrites, then the tank is cycled. As I said, do not add any more fish until the tank is cycled. Do not listen to advice from people at the fish store.

I said do water change any time you have ammonia, I'd say any time it is above .25.

Oh, one thing you could do to speed things up is to find someone else's filter to take a piece and put it in with yours to get the good bacteria to grow faster. You might get some from a fish store, only thing is you have to be pretty sure they don't have any disease going on.

Good luck keep us posted.


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Won't the chlorinated water swishing through everything kill the bacteria (if you dose before adding)? I keep my water in a bucket for 30min-1hr before adding.

 

[nirbhao]

Won't the chlorinated water swishing through everything kill the bacteria (if you dose before adding)? I keep my water in a bucket for 30min-1hr before adding.

Dose for the full volume of the tank.

 

[Autumnsky]

That previous post meant to ONLY use dechorinator like Prime and not all the other bottles of stuff.

Yes plain untreated tap water will kill beneficial bacteria.

 

[nirbhao]

Good catch, Autumnsky. Thank you.