Yet Another Tank Journal By Ch4Rlie!

[Ch4rlie]

Test bottle still in date Charlie?

 
Yup, ok until 2018.
 
Always good to hear of folks asking this as it's soemthing easily missed.
 
I have another test kit,  amaster kit from Nutrafin, rarely used but may use this just to see if any comparision between API and Nutrafin.
 
 

could something be leeching from the wood? 

 
It's POSSIBLE but unlikely, dead wood is dead wood and usually the only thing to leach is tannins.
 
These two bits of bogwoods in that tank were brand new from LFS either last year or previous year, soaked in a bucket with undechlored water with a small powerhead for a while as usually do, also pour hot boiling water before and after the soak in the bucket just to be sure.
 
Not sure how to test wood for anything untowards to be entirely honest

 

[Akasha72]

my memory is being jogged of a post from last year I think .... someone who'd got some wood from the lfs that sent the pH skyrocketing to well above 8 .... it took us a while to figure it out if I remember right but I think we eventually suspected the wood had been in a tank previously that had possibly been marine ??? Oh I hate it when my memory lets me down ...
 
I'm just wondering if there's a clue there, that was why I mentioned the wood. I guess there would be an easy way to tell ... you could remove it, put it in a bucket of water again and test the nitrate over a few days and see if you get a high reading.
 
Other than that I can't think of anything that would cause nitrate to rise that high ... are you adding any ferts that contain nitrate?

 

[eaglesaquarium]

 

Test bottle still in date Charlie?

 
Yup, ok until 2018.
 
Always good to hear of folks asking this as it's soemthing easily missed.
 
I have another test kit,  amaster kit from Nutrafin, rarely used but may use this just to see if any comparision between API and Nutrafin.
 
 

could something be leeching from the wood? 

 
It's POSSIBLE but unlikely, dead wood is dead wood and usually the only thing to leach is tannins.
 
These two bits of bogwoods in that tank were brand new from LFS either last year or previous year, soaked in a bucket with undechlored water with a small powerhead for a while as usually do, also pour hot boiling water before and after the soak in the bucket just to be sure.
 
Not sure how to test wood for anything untowards to be entirely honest

 

 
How's the gravel test going?

 

[Ch4rlie]

How's the gravel test going?

 
Have put about 5ml of gravel topped up with tap water in a 10ml vial.
 
Going to leave it capped for a few days and see what comes from this.