My tap water is not very fish friendly. I don't know if it's because of the crazy amounts of fertilizing done around here or what...but the amount of nitrate and nitrite in the water is quite high. Using a test strip, these are the values I get straight out of the faucet:
Nitrite: between 1.0 and 3.0 ppm
Nitrate: between 40 and 80 ppm
These test strips don't have ammonia on them.
Chlorine: 0
I was concerned about putting in water with these levels into my new tank. So, I used a combo of rain water, distilled water, and tap water and got levels pretty close to 0 before putting in my betta. After putting the betta in the new tank tonight, I've started hearing about cycling the tank with no fish for weeks. I didn't do that so there are no helpful bacteria in it yet. If to cycle the tank with my fish in it I have to do partial water changes every day or every other day like I've read...then what water can I use to put it the tank? With these many water changes, it just wouldn't be financially sane to keep buying that betta-specific water pet stores sell (is that even any good). The girl at the pet store said distilled water, so I looked this up and apparently that's no good...so I'm at a loss :-|.
Any ideas would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks
Nitrite: between 1.0 and 3.0 ppm
Nitrate: between 40 and 80 ppm
These test strips don't have ammonia on them.
Chlorine: 0
I was concerned about putting in water with these levels into my new tank. So, I used a combo of rain water, distilled water, and tap water and got levels pretty close to 0 before putting in my betta. After putting the betta in the new tank tonight, I've started hearing about cycling the tank with no fish for weeks. I didn't do that so there are no helpful bacteria in it yet. If to cycle the tank with my fish in it I have to do partial water changes every day or every other day like I've read...then what water can I use to put it the tank? With these many water changes, it just wouldn't be financially sane to keep buying that betta-specific water pet stores sell (is that even any good). The girl at the pet store said distilled water, so I looked this up and apparently that's no good...so I'm at a loss :-|.
Any ideas would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks