Where are my Nitrates

[kenny69]

Okay team, my tank is five months old, well and truly cycled. It's a 100 gal 5 foot tank with a wet dry trickle (aqua grand 150 aquarium) I have 20 Malawi and 1 feather fin cat in there, all quite young (2-3 inches max, feather fin is about 6-7 inches)

I have no readings on anything, no ammo, no nitrites or Nitrates.

I am expecting nitrates however I don't get any readings (api test kits)

I have diatoms at the moment, new tank etc, could they be consuming the nitrates?

Any ideas??
I am doing 20-30% pwc every week religiously, but with no nitrates can I cut back on the pwc, maybe every second week?
Thanks guys!!
J

 

[carey]

Silly question, but, are oyu shaking the heck outta the bottle #2 for the test? and then shaking the test tube well?

I haven't heard of 0 trates often, unless you have some live plants.

 

[kenny69]

Silly question, but, are oyu shaking the heck outta the bottle #2 for the test? and then shaking the test tube well?

I haven't heard of 0 trates often, unless you have some live plants.

Hey Carey, sure am lol no such thing as a silly question

 

[carey]

Hmm I am baffled then. lol Thats' usually the quick answer to no nitrates. LOL

Are you really up on your water changes? I cant get my trates in fw down below 20 but in my sw tanks its 0. Go figure.

Wish I was more helpful.

 

[kenny69]

Hmm I am baffled then. lol Thats' usually the quick answer to no nitrates. LOL

Are you really up on your water changes? I cant get my trates in fw down below 20 but in my sw tanks its 0. Go figure.

Wish I was more helpful.

20-30% every week. My fish are in the best condition I have ever seen fish in, really just perfect ( touch wood ) next test I will shake the #2 bottle like mad and see if that makes a dif.

 

[carey]

When you can see little silver specks in the drops from bottle #2 you know its shaken enough.

 

[rich311k]

Get another kit or have a shop do the test for you. I would not really worry about it, if your fish look good and you are doing regular changes then you are fretting over nothing.

 

[BillD]

Have to agree with rich311k. One thing to consider is that as the fish grow, the bioload will increase and perhaps what was adequate in terms of water chnges will change so the size will have to be increased.

 

[kenny69]

Get another kit or have a shop do the test for you. I would not really worry about it, if your fish look good and you are doing regular changes then you are fretting over nothing.

Not a bad idea, might do a comparison test with my local store. Cheers.

 

[kenny69]

Silly question, but, are oyu shaking the heck outta the bottle #2 for the test? and then shaking the test tube well?

I haven't heard of 0 trates often, unless you have some live plants.

Carey you win lol I just shook the heck out of the #2 bottle for three full minutes and what do you know 5ppm nitrate reading!! Happy now I know the test kit is okay. Thanks for the help Carey!!! also happy that I am keeping trates down to 5ppm too!

 

[carey]

Nice Kenny. 5 is a good number. I hovered around 2.5 for weeks before it finally dropped to 0 in my tank. Youre really close though!

 

[kenny69]

Nice Kenny. 5 is a good number. I hovered around 2.5 for weeks before it finally dropped to 0 in my tank. Youre really close though!

I can't imagine it will ever get below 5ppm I plan on getting some more fish yet, and then they all have to grow to adults hehe. Just means more poop and more bio load. I would be very happy to keep nitrates down to around the 10-20 ppm, that would be acceptable, I think lol

 

[carey]

Oh wait, I totally forgot we're talking freshwater. LOL Yeah, 10-20 before a pwc is the common practice I think. I generally have almost 40 in my 125g of cichlids, I just can't seem to get that number down. I've been doing twice weekly pwcs too. 5ppm? I wish! LOL

For some reason my sw tanks run really low on the trates, not sure what thats all about though.

 

[kenny69]

Oh wait, I totally forgot we're talking freshwater. LOL Yeah, 10-20 before a pwc is the common practice I think. I generally have almost 40 in my 125g of cichlids, I just can't seem to get that number down. I've been doing twice weekly pwcs too. 5ppm? I wish! LOL

For some reason my sw tanks run really low on the trates, not sure what thats all about though.

Could it have something to do with the corals??

 

[carey]

I'm not quite sure. I figure the skimmer helps but I only have one skimmer and 4 tanks and they all run real low. i am also a horrible overfeeder so it's got me vexed. I had a thread awhile ago trying to figure out the how but it didn't go very far. Just wish I could replicate those results in my FW

 

[subliminalanarchy]

it's got to be the anaerobic bacteria in the LR... most saltwater tanks don't have as many fish also

 

[kenny69]

it's got to be the anaerobic bacteria in the LR... most saltwater tanks don't have as many fish also

That would make sense, not as many fish equals less trates from the start.

 

[carey]

Thanks guys, never thought of it that way. I only have like 8 fish or so. lol