I’ve always had nitrate problems in this tank since I set it up. Maybe I just didn’t cycle it well? I know this is wrong, but I was using test strips because I didn’t think they were THAT off. The strips were always coming up to about 10 to 50 ppm for nitrates. I’ve been trying to bring them down, but I’m not sure what’s causing them. I tested with a real kit for the first time today, and the nitrates are off the chart I don’t know what to do. There is no waste on the ground after I finish changing. I change all 11 of my tanks every week. I know not to change the filter. (The test results are after a 10%-30% change) help is greatly appreciated. Thank you.
Posted by Goummy_1
5 Comments
Have you tested your water source?
Nitrates are the end product of your cycle, you want to be producing nitrates. A cycle crash would be high ammonia or nitrite.
Are you dosing liquid fertilizer? The nitrogen in fertilizer will typically show up in nitrate tests.
Are you overstocked or overfeeding? These are the usual culprits of high nitrates.
Water replacement or plants remove nitrates. Might want to do a larger water change than the usual.
First, don’t panic. Nitrates truly just aren’t that toxic so this really isn’t an active emergency or anything. Second, change more water. I know that probably sounds facetious, but really think about the math of it- if nitrate is 100ppm and you change 10% of the water then you will only drop nitrate to 90ppm, which would barely even show up as a different color on the test, you know? As long as your source of replacement water doesn’t contain ammonia, nitrite or nitrate, then just changing more water more frequently will drop the nitrates. Of course test your tap water, make sure there’s nothing actively decaying in the tank, make sure it’s not overstocked, make sure it’s not overfed, make sure it’s not over fertilized, lightly clean your mechanical filtration if there’s any excess organic waste trapped in it, etc. But if everything is fine then a few 50% water changes over the next week should resolve the problem and drop it to a manageable level.
Is it planted?