Do NitrItes Cause Cloudiness?

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Twoapennything

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I'm wondering if nitrItes cause water cloudiness, even just a little bit. I've been struggling with cloudy water for a couple of weeks, but have been getting normal readings with the API. Well, this morning I got the following readings: .25 ammonia, 1.0 nitrItes, 10 nitrates, 7.2 pH. So I have a nitrItes spike . . . is this a mini cycle? I'm afraid I've caused it myself by rinsing out my filters in chlorinated water and probably killing off the beneficial bacteria (Big Jim has already told me how to avoid this in the future -- please don't yell at me! ;) ).

I've dosed the tank with AmQuel and the fish are all perked up, where before they were pretty listless.

I know that nitrItes can be as poisonous as ammonia. As soon as my DH is awake, I'll start PWCs.

I knew something was up -- I've lost six fish in the past two weeks.
 
yep, sounds like it. new tank syndrome, just do frequent PWCs and hope for the best for your fish
 
pcw??? does that mean water changes??.lol

Yeah, PWC means partial water change, so you don't change out all the water in the tank, but just a percentage of it. In this case, I'm going to try a 30% PWC and see how that affects the nitrIte levels (well, all the levels -- ammonia, nitrAtes, and pH too).
 
yep, sounds like it. new tank syndrome, just do frequent PWCs and hope for the best for your fish

I could just kick myself for rinsing those filters in chlorinated water. The tank was well established before -- I've had this particular tank stable since July. So the tank isn't new per se, but it may as well be, right?

Think I'll be okay with PWCs every other day?
 
when you say chlorinated water,, you mean regular tap water.....im just curious becasue i just bought my fluval 405 filter for my 55 gallon....and the instructions told me to rinse the bio and carbon before placing in the canister..........
 
when you say chlorinated water,, you mean regular tap water.....im just curious becasue i just bought my fluval 405 filter for my 55 gallon....and the instructions told me to rinse the bio and carbon before placing in the canister..........

Yes, that's what I meant by that -- regular tap water. Do the instructions tell you to use a dechlorinator in the tank in general? I would imagine -- and someone will correct me if I'm wrong -- that if you're doing an initial rinse of filter components, and you shake as much of the tap water off as possible, once you put the filter to use with the dechlorinated water, it will dechlorinate the filter as well. Or if there's a way to soak the filter in a little dechlorinator or declorinated water, you might want to do that to ensure your filter components are chlorine free. This is just my guess.
 
For rinsing the filter:
-INITIALLY: I rinse with regular old tap water. Then put in tank, fill up, and dechlorinate the whole thing once I'm sure I'm ready to start cycling.
-In an CYCLED tank: rinse in a bucket with water taken from the cycled tank. It has to be rinsed with cycled water or the bacteria in the filter is lost.

(that's not yelling, i guess it's just general to both the initial post and the question about new filters.)
 
The cloudiness is most likely caused by another bacteria that often appears during the cycling process. It will not harm your fish, but the amonia and nitrite do.

It will probably go away on its own once the tank cycles.

Is there any chance you can seed the filter with filter medium (even plain substrate helps) from a cycled tank? This will cut down dramaticly on cycling time and help keep your fish healthy.
 
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