Is my aquarium overstocked?

[Lcc86]

Thanks for the info will remove them. Lesson learned to do even more research. Good thing nothing has died so I will remove everything that has been advised to me.

Just out of interest, were you sold all the fish etc as being compatible originally?

 

[Essjay]

I'd be a little concerned with your nitrate reading. A mature tank, especially a heavily stocked one as in your case, should always have a positive nitrate reading, NEVER 0ppm.

Plants can help reduce nitrate, and you have plants, but I'd be very very surprised, given your stocking levels, if the plants alone were sucking every bit of nitrate from your water.

And a huge water change, pretty much 100% will also reduce your nitrate to 0ppm, for a short while. But you don't do huge water changes!

I'd recheck it if I was you.

In theory it is possible to have zero nitrate.

If tap water nitrate is virtually zero and the tank is heavily planted, the plants can remove all the ammonia made by even an overstocked tank resulting in no nitrate being made in the tank.
My tap nitrate is between 0 and 5 ppm with the API tester and my water quality report gives it as 3 ppm. My tank nitrate is zero.

Where tap nitrate is almost at the legal limit, water changes will not reduce tank nitrate to zero, and in this scenario tank nitrate is unlikely to ever be zero.


However, we do see members with inaccurate nitrate readings due to the test not being carried out correctly. @M Zaman Can you confirm that you shake bottle #2 before adding drops to the test tube, and that you shake the test tube after adding bottle #2 drops as per the instructions? And that the bottles are not past their use by date?

 

[M Zaman]

In theory it is possible to have zero nitrate.

If tap water nitrate is virtually zero and the tank is heavily planted, the plants can remove all the ammonia made by even an overstocked tank resulting in no nitrate being made in the tank.
My tap nitrate is between 0 and 5 ppm with the API tester and my water quality report gives it as 3 ppm. My tank nitrate is zero.

Where tap nitrate is almost at the legal limit, water changes will not reduce tank nitrate to zero, and in this scenario tank nitrate is unlikely to ever be zero.


However, we do see members with inaccurate nitrate readings due to the test not being carried out correctly. @M Zaman Can you confirm that you shake bottle #2 before adding drops to the test tube, and that you shake the test tube after adding bottle #2 drops as per the instructions? And that the bottles are not past their use by date?

I can confirm I done the test properly as I have read it again now and I done everything that was said like shaking the second bottle and waiting 5 min. Tbh I was confused why my nitrates were always zero aswell. Is that harmful?

 

[M Zaman]

Just out of interest, were you sold all the fish etc as being compatible originally?

Yes I was

 

[Essjay]

I can confirm I done the test properly as I have read it again now and I done everything that was said like shaking the second bottle and waiting 5 min. Tbh I was confused why my nitrates were always zero aswell. Is that harmful?

Zero nitrate is the level we all aspire to. The lower the nitrate the better for the fish.

 

[Sanityassassin]

I can confirm I done the test properly as I have read it again now and I done everything that was said like shaking the second bottle and waiting 5 min. Tbh I was confused why my nitrates were always zero aswell. Is that harmful?

Not harmful at all, lol. Zero nitrates are most hobbyists holy grail.

I've accomplished it in smaller, lightly stocked planted tanks, in fact it's pretty easy to achieve. But once your stocking levels get to a certain point, and I'd put yours in that category, then the plants struggle to keep up with the ammonia, and so nitrate is formed.

 

[M Zaman]

Yeah iv tested nitrates 8/9times since setting up my tank And they've always read zero. I know I'm not seeing things because iv tested twice sometimes in different tubes while following instructions exactly.

 

[Byron]

It would benefit having a photo of the entire tank so we can see the plant species and numbers. Zero nitrate is not at all off the mark, even for the fish mentioned here, but that depends upon the plant species/numbers.

I'll just pick up on the blue ram, this species must have warmth, in the 27-30C/80-86F range, and preferably middle of this range, certainly not below this. That can impact you tank mates, as most of our tropicals cannot manage with this long-term.