How much have plants reduced your nitrates?
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Nils
Aquarium Advice Addict
You could probably do a small shrimp tank with only real plants and could get away without a filter, I'll tell you that my tank relies a lot on the addition of plants to help keep down all the poisonous things in the water.
Nils
Nils
Rpeinhardt
Aquarium Advice Activist
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Quite a bit. I have to dose nitrates because my plants eat them up and then algae moves in.
hennaartist
Aquarium Advice Freak
A lot! I have two planted tanks, and one that is not planted. All my tanks are on the same water change/ cleaning schedule, and Ll have been established for over a year or longer. My 30 gallon didn't have any plants because my blue crawfish just kept destroying them. Just before my scheduled weekly water change, the nitrates in this tank were always considerably higher than my other tanks. I finally threw in some floating plants (brazillian Pennywart) and my crawfish has left them alone for the most part (since they're out of reach).
Since I've added the floating plants, the nitrates have been lowered by about a third.
Since I've added the floating plants, the nitrates have been lowered by about a third.
trennamw
Aquarium Advice Addict
In my little betta tank with a big ozelot sword and a lot of floating pennywort, it did stop recurring cyano but didn't help with nitrates.
Then the filter died. Then I did see a huge drop in nitrates. After a few weeks with no water changes it was zero across the board.
Makes me want to start fresh with a new tank, pack it with plants first, then start a fishless cycle ... The idea being that the plants suck up ammonia and it never becomes nitrite or nitrate ... And the beneficial bacteria only establish enough to get the ammonia the plants can't handle.
I could be completely misunderstanding the whole thing but it was interesting to me that plants helped most after the filter quit, and the tank is healthier without the filter.
Sent from my iPhone with three hands tied behind my back.
Then the filter died. Then I did see a huge drop in nitrates. After a few weeks with no water changes it was zero across the board.
Makes me want to start fresh with a new tank, pack it with plants first, then start a fishless cycle ... The idea being that the plants suck up ammonia and it never becomes nitrite or nitrate ... And the beneficial bacteria only establish enough to get the ammonia the plants can't handle.
I could be completely misunderstanding the whole thing but it was interesting to me that plants helped most after the filter quit, and the tank is healthier without the filter.
Sent from my iPhone with three hands tied behind my back.
ArtistGardener
Aquarium Advice Freak
A huge difference. I have a heavily planted 55 that registers almost 0 nitrates (and very healthy plants). I do a 25% water change every week to ten days anyway. My lightly planted tanks generally have nitrate readings at 20 ppm with a 50% water change weekly.
uncgirl1
Aquarium Advice Activist
I think plants help a lot! When I first started I always had highish nitrates by water change time. The more I planted, the less nitrates I had. This go around, I planted and did a fishless cycle. After cycle, I had 40 or so nitrates. I did a large water change before adding fish and now my nitrates are never above 5.
Sent from my iPhone using Aquarium Advice
Sent from my iPhone using Aquarium Advice
BBradbury
Aquarium Advice Addict
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Nitrates
Hello john...
Land plants will do a better job removing all forms of nitrogen from tank water than aquatic plants. They're much larger and have larger root systems. Emerse the roots of the Chinese evergreen and you can reduce your water changes significantly. If you don't want that much foliage in your planted tank, then follow an aggressive water change routine. The more you change and the more often you change it, the better.
B
Hello john...
Land plants will do a better job removing all forms of nitrogen from tank water than aquatic plants. They're much larger and have larger root systems. Emerse the roots of the Chinese evergreen and you can reduce your water changes significantly. If you don't want that much foliage in your planted tank, then follow an aggressive water change routine. The more you change and the more often you change it, the better.
B
Mattyfelts
Aquarium Advice Addict
not enough to reduce water changes. you need a monster amount of plants to make that much of a difference
mrvincent
Aquarium Advice Addict
I have a 29g hightech tank with CO2 injection... I must add nitrates to the water or the plants starve... I can change 50% of the water each two months. Chill?
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