High Nitrates from my source water. Do I need to get an RO?

[Filip]

Its not reverse osmosis, it uses a nitrate-removing resin that has to be replaced or regenerated when it gets exhausted. It works like a water softener but with a different type of resin. I never tried it because it looks like it would be more expensive than RO if you use a lot of water.

Dan , can you share some viable suggestions for a water softener unit ?
Do they work with rechargeable resins too ?
Do they strip KH along with GH from tap water?

[DJW]

Dan , can you share some viable suggestions for a water softener unit ?
Do they work with rechargeable resins too ?
Do they strip KH along with GH from tap water?

A water softener would be good for your house, but not so good for the fish. It replaces the calcium (and magnesium) ions with sodium ions. If your water is GH 16 and KH 16 the softener would make it GH 1 and KH 16. GH goes way down because sodium doesn't contribute to general hardness and calcium does. House water softeners have no effect on KH.

"Softened" water has the same or a slightly higher TDS than the source water.

The hard water coming to my house goes in two directions - one pipe to the water softener and on to the house, and another pipe that goes to the fishoffice. The softener is recharged with salt. Every two months or so I dump about 100 pounds of salt into it.