Bad nitrate test kit?

[sleonard]

For a very long time my parameters were stable at 0,0,0. So much so that I rarely even check them anymore. I have a drip system and drip ~150 gal/day into my 80 gal tank. Recently I had a small outbreak of gill disease which I treated last week and that spurred me to check my water just in case.

Ammonia was 0, Nitrite was 0, but Nitrate was off the scale. I checked it again to be sure I didn't count the drops wrong but got the same result so I checked the water straight from the tap. It also measured off the scale. "Gosh darn, golly gee, that's not good." I thought to myself as panic started to rear it's ugly head.

I have come up with 3 possibilities. Either my test kit chemicals have gone bad even though they are only 4-6 mos. old (Best case), the recent storms here have flushed a bunch of Nitrates into the water system (If it doesn't last long, my fish will survive), or for some reason there is now permanently high nitrates in the water system (end of fishkeeping in the entire city.)

I'm hoping its just that my test kit has gone bad but I put a high dose of Prime in the tank just in case and I'm going to call the LFS and see if they have noticed any high nitrate readings lately.

Scott

[pcsb23]

Hey Scott, first thing I would do is call the water people and ask them if there is a temporary problem. From what I remmeber there is a statutory limit to the amount of nitrates that are allowed in the municipal water supply so if it is high it can only be temporary.

I would also probably get a new test kit too :)

[Alight]

You can calibrate your test kit with some NO3 solution. If you have KNO3 that you use for ferts, you can use the fertilator or Chuch Gadds calculator to create the test solution.

To get a ball park idea if your kit is really rotten, you can use any fertilizer you might have around, as long as the nitrate % is listed on the package.

You can look up various conversion tables to find out how many teaspoons you need to make a 1/1000 dilution, then dilute that to make it 10 parts /1000000, or whatever level you want to test.

I advise anyone who really wants to know their nitrate levels to make an accurate NO3 calibration solution, no matter what kind of test kit you have as I have found all aquarist test kits to vary from kit to kit, and from the time you open it til the time you use it up.

[Dissident]

Take some water to your LFS and have them test it for you to see if your kit is off. If your kit is bad buy a new one while you are there.

[sleonard]

I just got back from the LFS and their test also showed very high nitrates in the tap water. (although only 3 miles away, their tap water is fine.) I am now waiting on a call back from the Tempe water dept.

Scott

[sleonard]

I just got off the phone with a Tempe water quality specialist. Whew, she refused to believe my nitrates were that high. She would not accept the results of an aquarium test kit and wanted me to find and pay a lab to do a spectrometer test. She said it was "impossible" for me to have that high of nitrates coming in to the house.

I explained that I also took the water to the LFS where they tested it and got the same results I did while not get the high reading on their own water. Two different test kits both giving 0 ppm readings on known good water and 20-40 ppm readings on my tap water.

She then tried to blame it on the pipes in my house but I went outside and tested it at the meter and got the same results again.

It took half an hour of convincing but finally she got approval from the manager to come out and do their own testing. Don't know how long that will take.

Scott

[Dissident]

Thats pretty crazy. At least you are moveing along with getting it figured out.

[Alight]

For sure, don't drink the water until they figure it out. Sounds like you have some major ground water infiltration from a polluted source, like a sewer or septic system.

[sleonard]

The water company sent someone out this morning to take samples. As soon as she saw the water color she became a believer. She ended up taking about 5 samples from various locations in the neighborhood.

She said that it will take about 10 days for test results to come back but warned me not to drink any water at all. I'll be at the store buying a lot of bottled water after work tonight.

All my tanks get water that is either RO or RO waste that went thru the prefilters (10u sediment/5u carbon/1u carbon). The RO in my breeder tanks will be safe but the RO waste will still have some nasties such as the nitrates that started this as well as bacteria and virii.

2 weeks for test results and then getting the underground delivery pipes replaced. Looks like my fish are up the proverbial creek for a long time to come. I don't think I can hand carry that much bottled water for the next several weeks.

Scott