water changes no good.

[moik]

Hello, as some people know that I have an angel tank with certain issues.( all my tanks problably have the same issues) I have been doing Form/MG treatments with no improvement. As I get more frustrated with this problem I am starting to suspect my water. The tank is a 40gal. breeder with 3 Hydro-sponge 5 in it. My PH-7.0-7.2 Ammonia-0ppm Nitrite-0ppm Nitrate- 35-40ppm. These numbers are from the tank water itself. My main concern is my aged water change water has a Nitrate-25ppm value. How am I supposed to get the Nitrate lower if I am putting it back in? I have tested 3 times and had a second opinion on the numbers. All my filters are well seeded and I know about Formalin knocking back the bacteria count a little bit,but no nitrites and ammonia at all. So it appears some bacteria are there. Could the high Nitrate numbers be the cause of some of my problems? Please I need some advice on this.

[GrillMaster]

You might want to check yer N03 test kit... Sounds like it is not giving a correct reading which is not uncommon at all.

You could also have something in the barrel giving you high N03. When was the last time you cleaned it out?

Why so many hydro sponges in a 40G? Is this the only filtration you have?

Sorry for all the questions...

tc
Mark

[dandestroy]

IS your tap water with nitrate or is your aging barel contaminated with something? Test your tap directly for nitrate.

If you do have that much nitrate in your tap you will need an RO system to clean all that nasty stuff... and I would not drink that water as a mater of fact with 25ppm nitrate in it.

You can help a bit the fish using some salt and adding some prime.

[moik]

Hello, I have just set these two barrels up not a month ago. Upon me moving everything down the basement. You look in the barrels and there is nothing ,not even a film on them. The test kit is brand new today. I threw away some test kits today also out of frustration (they were problably good) I have done the test out of the storage barrels (3times) and just done it of the tap a minute ago and it reads 25ppm. As for three sponges in this tank is only because I was planning on expanding in the very near future ,so I decide to put another sponge in now. So I would have a well seeded sponge for another tank. This is the only filtration in my tanks. I do a real tight water change schedule. Need help badly and the fish are showing stress for a while. Hopefully I have weeded it down to this.

[GrillMaster]

Have you tested the N03 right out of the tap? I would call your water co. an ask them what the N03 level is.

Mark

[moik]

Hello, thank you for your help. As of about 5 minutes ago I have tested it . Straight out of the tap and it reads Nitrates 25ppm. What now?

[GrillMaster]

Moik, all I can say is call your water company an ask them whats up...That is just insane having water out of the tap with 25 ppm N03.

What to do right now is tough! You cant change the water from the tap. You cant change the water from the aging tank, although 25ppm of N03 shouldn't kill the fish, it will stress them.

I dont know bud, I just cant see that much N03 coming from the tap. It doesn't make sense to me...I am stumped!! Sorry!

tc
Mark

[moik]

Well,I thank you for your help and hopefully someone else can have an idea. Do you think something like Amquel would do any good?..As far as the water co. is concerned, I will be calling them tomorrow. Guarenteed. Thanks again

[FishLover888]

Put something in the storage tank that will take out the nitrates. Don't remember the exact name (Nitra-Zorb?) but you should be able to find it from most on line fish supply stores.

Another option is to buy some water from your local supper market or some RO water from your LFS. Since you have a 46g tank and if you do 15% of water changes, you need about 6 g of fresh water. You can use 1/2 of your tap water and 1/2 of water from the store, that will lower the number to 12.5. Still kind of high but much better than 25. Or you can use all 6g from the store.

Where are you located? I heard some people in Australia is having exactly the same problem with their source water.

[moik]

hello, thanks for the ideas. I just do not have a 40 gal tank. I have 4-40 gal. and 4-30gal. and 3 20gal- and a 120 in my living room. I wish it was just one tank. I am thinking about using Amquel but at 25ppm ,it is goig to take 25 drops per gallon to make it 0ppm. Amquel only take out 1ppm per dose. I really did not want to play with an RO unit. but hopefully someone has some advice. Thanks again

[korbi_doc]

Hi Moik, sounds like you need an R/O unit...in NJ, my source well water was pretty nasty & I used 100% R/O, reconstituted, & the fish did much better...the only problem I see with R/O is the waste water, but it was a well, so I was ok then, now in Tn, the water is better, soft out of tap, just chlorine, but municipal, with a high ph....may need to R/O to reduce the ph for my wild Heckels, but I hate to waste water when I'm paying $$ for it, lol, never had to do that before...may try to save it for other tanks, would like to have other cichlids, JMO, Dottie ;)

[moik]

I have been trying to stay away from an RO unit. In the recent past everything was fine, all of a sudden my water goes bad. Municiple water line breaks and then little things start to happen. I have read about RO units and need to talk to someone about the in/out of these filters. I just wanted to keeep things simple, but god has other plans. I have to do something soon. Please need info on RO units. Whats the best ones for function and price. How/what/whatever about them also. This is new for me. Thanks again

[mench]

Send a note to Randle,he is the R/O water guru..he also can hook ya up with a super R/O unit.

Mench

[sleonard]

Call your water company. 25ppm Nitrates is not only way past any legal limit but is very unlikely to be the case. I'll bet that when they send a sample to the lab for photospectrometry that the results show far less than 25ppm.

The same thing happened to me. My tap water was testing between 25 and 40 ppm with brand new test kits from 3 different manufacturers. When a sample was tested with photospectrometry it only showed 3.5 ppm. The hobby test kits are unreliable and to this day continue to show much more nitrate than is really present in my water.

Scott

[moik]

At this point in time I am not going to waste my time on the water co. They will just say Ok and go away.I am just going have to resolve this on my own. I can not keep on "bobbing and weaving" everytime the water co. decides to change something. From what I know and heard a million times is we have to keep conditions stable and consistant for discus. I Guess I have to try to keep things as a routine, consistant on my end, and not worry about the water co. Please if anyone has any good/cost effective way to resolove this ,please let me know.

[sleonard]

For about $25-30 you can have a sample of your tap water analyzed for nitrate content by a lab. You need to find out whether or not you actually have that much nitrate or not. If there is that much than you should contact the water company so that the situation can be rectified since there is almost nothing you can do on your own to remove that much nitrate cheaply or easily (If you have a bona fide analysis they will pay attention) and if there is not that much than you need to know so that you can look elsewhere for the problem. Do not assume that the test kit results are accurate.

Scott

[moik]

Thanks for the info. Where would you suggest I have a water sample tested? any ideas on the east coast