Nitrates at 140 - 160 ! Help!

JediAnt

Hello all,
Sorry if I'm bringing up an old topic but I'm new here as of 10 minutes ago.
I've been needing help and couldn't find it anywhere else.
I have a 55 Gallon community.
Since cycling a few months ago when i first set this tank up my nitrates have kept going up on a steady basis.
Ammonia is 0, Nitrites are 0, and PH is 7.0.
But my Nitrates are between 140 and 160!
I've lost several Mollies and now My Clown Loach is acting very weird.
I don't know if it's normal behavior for Clown Loaches but I have one that hides all day and I only rarely see at night in the dark. And the other is out during the day but sometimes I see him laying on his side at the bottom and even sometimes on his back. But as soon as I get close to inspect him he starts swimming around.
I have a Dragon Goby who I see yawning often. And My danios have gone from a Blueish color to a now silvery color.

I change about a third of the water at least once a week.
About a month ago I added White Diamond into the filter.
I went through 2 bottles of Amquel Plus.
I went to feeding them less.
And after none of that worked I just went out yesterday and got Nitra-Zorb media to add to the filter.

Any other suggestions???
I'm really concerned for my Clown Loaches.

...KEP...

Hi JediAnt
A few bits of info would help to narrow down possible causes...How many months has your tank been set up? Have you tested your tap water (or the source of the water going into your tank) for Ammonia, Nitrites etc? Sometimes it can be the culprit... Are you using liquid testers or the strips? (strips are less accurate sometimes) I am wondering also, when you do a water change, are you gravel vac-ing as well? I'm wondering if it is from excess 'junk' in your gravel...I really am just throwing ideas out there..anyone know if this tank is too new to be experiencing 'old tank syndrome'? I found an interesting article on it, if you are interested in case that is the problem.
http://www.bestfish.com/oldtank.html I'm sure others will chime in with some suggestions as well...I'm pretty new to all of this as well.
Karen

JediAnt

Thanks for the reply Kep.
No I haven't tested my tap water yet. I'll go do that in a bit.
sadly I just found one of my Clowns dead.
I use liquid testers, not strips. I test about twice a week.
I've had this tank set up since August.
I hope this helps. I need to get this fixed ASAP before I lose anymore fish.

...KEP...

I'm very sorry to hear about your fish. I've been doing some digging and found this: http://aquarium-answers.blogspot.com...-nitrates.html that may be helpful. I am doubting 'old tank syndrome' with a tank this new, and I'm thinking it has to be something else. Are you on a well or city water? The above article talks about well water potentially being high in nitrates...now it is just bugging me. Let me know what you find out with your water testing. If it were me, I'd be bumping up the water changing and only lightly feeding every third day or so...how heavily is your tank stocked? Numbers and types of fish may help...
Karen

fernival brainard

Hi there Jedi,
clown loaches lying on their backs or sides is normal, freaked me out when i first got my loaches but then I found out that is what they do....they don't even care much if they are being layed on or lying on another fish....they are also shy and can be a bit reclusive at times...and can be somewhat sensitive fish (for lack of a better word) they don't really do well in newer tanks (so I've been told\read).

Those nitrAte readings are just plain scary....I would recomend testing the tap water for nitrates before you add it to the tank....that could be part or all of the problem...IMO it is strange to see nitrAtes that high without a nitrIte spike too - this is what makes me wonder about the 'trate numbers for your water straight from the tap.

good luck
fern

JediAnt

Ok so I retested my water just now:
pH 6.8 Ammonia 0 Nitrite 0 Nitrate 160

I also tested my Tap Water:
pH 7.3 Ammonia 0 Nitrite 0 Nitrate 20

I got about 30 fish in there. Most are small community fish, neons, mollies, danios, a pair of cory's, one reclusive clown loach, a dragon goby, 4 x-rays and 1 betta. No one is bigger than 2".

I know i'm not overfeeding them. And i keep the tank very clean.

I'm thinking of doing bigger water changes, like maybe 50%

...KEP...

Hi JediAnt
I wonder how many people went and tested their tap water after reading this thread...I did. Mine is sitting at around 2.5ppm. When I read that yours is 20ppm, I have to say, I was a little surprised but then I also don't really have any other points of reference as to what is typical. I also have a freshwater 55 gallon community tank that was set up at about the same time as yours was with about 1/2 the 'inches of fish' as you have ( I'm working on stocking it...) and my nitrates are at 0ppm ( the most I've seen in this tank was a 5ppm when it was cycling) I'm just trying to give you a point of reference, and yes, you can 'smack' me if you like . I'm thinking your answer may lie in the nitrates in your tapwater, but I cannot say for sure. I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around the fact that my nitrates are lower in my tank than in my tap water...maybe they're gassing off?? Who knows. That's for another thread...Another thing that keeps popping up in what I've been reading about nitrates it is that undergravel filters can sometimes contribute to high nitrate levels because 'junk' gets trapped deep inside them and it's hard to clean it out...but then, some people refer to cannister filters as nitrate factories- something I haven't experienced. Not sure what kind you are using... I am wondering about trying an alternate water source for water changes to see if it helps...of course, you would need to do it slowly so as not to shock your fish. I'm SERIOUSLY not the expert on that, so hopefully, others will chime in.
Here's hoping for finding a solution.
Karen

Jay

Let's see if we can get some of the mystery out of this and look for a course of action or multiple courses.

The Mystery of the Rising Nitrates.

Let's keep it simple for illustration purposes. Our measure for NO3 is one (1) unit. Your tap water contains 20 units. Your aquarium naturally produces (20) units in a week. With me?

Week One
20 units from the tap
20 units from nitrogen cycle

40 units total
50% water change leaves 20 units
add back in 20 units from the tap (refill the 50%)

Week Two
Starts with 40 units
Tank generates 20 units from the nitrogen cycle
60 units total
50% water change leaves 30 units
add back in 20 units from the tap

Week Three
Starts with 50 units

You can see the trend. You cannot stop it without changing out 100% of the water every week and that would still leave you higher than you want to be based on your tap water.

I think you need a multi front attack.

Scavenger resins will only reduce a small portion of the NO3
Large water changes using another water source with much smaller amounts of NO3 will clearly help.
Plants will eat up nitrates.
Filter changes weekly.
Through and deep vacuuming of the gravel weekly.
There is equipment out there that will extract NO3 but is very expensive.

Hope this helps,

Regards,
Jay

JediAnt

Thanks again for the imput Karen and Jay.
We're getting closer to a solution.
As for my filter I'm running a Marineland Emperor 400 with White Diamond and Nitra-Zorb. I think my next step is to add some plants. I've never had much luck with aquarium plants. I've tried them once or twice but they've either just got eaten up by the fish or come uprooted and just float around the surface until they fall apart and get sucked into the filter.
But I've been reading that they remove some Nitrates so it's worth a try.
What about the Filter Media. I mean the carbon cartridges. I don't change those with every water change because they don't always look so dirty. Should I be replacing those more often? They are kinda pricey for that Emperor 400. Should I do 50% water changes maybe twice a week? Will the bigger water changes affect my fish? Everytime I change my water I do add some aquarium salt. Could this affect it?

Jay

IMO the alternative water source is going to help in a big way. You could go with RO filtration or buy RO water from the grocery store.

Salt (NaCl table salt) is no help what so ever unless you are treating short term for Ich etc.

"Some" plants is not going to do it A large plant mass will contribute to lessening the NO3 somewhat. I keep my heavily planted tank at 30 ppm NO3 and the plants take a small percent of that.

IMO it is not necessary to run activated carbon continuously in an aquarium. In fact, I do not use it at all unless I want to remove a discoloration or medication from the water, which is rare. Once it is used up (perhaps a week) It becomes one more media for bacteria colonization and production or nitrate. In your case, I would use the nitrate scavenging resins.

Again IMO and IME you need to do four things for immediate help...

Find a new water source for water changes.
Use larger water changes
Vacuum very well every week
Change out your filter media every week

Jay