Nitrates Out Of The Tap...ugh. Seeking Help/assistance...

[jb1997mcd]

Background (sorry for the longer post, but believe it provides helpful info):
I recently purchased my mom’s house.  I had spent time there 6 years ago and had a 75 gallon tank.  The house has public water and nitrates out of the tap were always zero.
I moved to a house with well water and the nitrates were ~20-30ppm out of the well. 
 
In order to combat, I ro’d the water into a holding tank prior to water changes.  I grew to 4 tanks – 2 120’s, a 75, and 5 gallon.  I have been back in the hobby for about 7 years.
Fast forward to today.  I moved all the tanks to new house (not fun at all).  The TDS, KH, GH, and PH of the replenished RO water were very similar to the tap water at the new house.   
 
At the new house, I have two 100 gallon Rubbermaid tubs that I pre-treat the water, using API’s Stress Coat to remove the chlorine/chloramines as well as letting water sit for 24 hours with air house and heater.  The reason for two was I had aspirations of getting a centerpiece tank of say 200-250 gallons but sadly that has been put on hold.
 
After about two weeks I noticed some of the smaller fish in my tanks acting lethargic and then some not eating as consistently.  After running through normal tests – 0, 0, ~40 I could not believe my nitrates were that high.  I immediately went to the tap and found my answer.  The tap was producing 20+ nitrates.  I checked the water report on my township and sure enough – 2015 report - ~ range 1.7 – 4.7 NO3-N or 4.84 – 20.68 NO3 (possible 2016 could be higher).  Maybe rules have loosened on farm fertilization or something causing more ferts to enter water ways.
 
I did some larger water changes to get the nitrates down to an ~ 20-30 range.  BTW my nitrates at my old house with the well and RO water were always 5-10ppm.
It was a pretty demoralizing discovery about the nitrates.  I don’t want to RO water again due to cost (if I had to I may consider, but wife would not be happy). 
 
The idea I am exploring is growing pothos plants over my 100 gallon Rubbermaid tanks to try and remove some, if not all of the nitrates present in the tap water.  A couple of questions that I am trying to answer are:

1. Will this work, working for me would be removing at a minimum 50% of the nitrates?  I understand it may take 6 months or so to get the plants to where they can consume this much but at least I will feel like it is worth it if I can get 50% or more removal of nitrates?
2. What minerals if any would I need to put back in the water before adding to fish tanks that the plants would absorb?  I still have my seachem equilibrium that I could add back if I had to.
3. Will I have to add something like Seachem Flourish or will present nitrates be enough for plant growth?
4. What other challenges might I run into to?

I have already begun planning the process of setting up as this has consumed me for the past 72 hours.
Thanks for reading and feedback is greatly appreciated.  If anyone is open to chatting please hit me up.
Jason “jb”           
 
 

 

[BettaBettas]

alright just read first paragraph, well water is very hard to use in any fish tanks. the water conditions are very hard to perfect, I use well water and its super hardy so im personally looking rn for a water softener.  I definitely would add the plants, it wouldn't hurt anything and it would help period. I would still add (ex) flourish or some growth enhancer like so, I use CO2 booster for my 75g and my two 5g. Ill try to do more research on this "Very Interesting" topic. and if I have any answers ill post them here in comments, in the mean time someone else may have the answer to your problems!

Good luck
-Nate

 

[AbbeysDad]

I have really high (40-80ppm) nitrates in my well water! I explored RO, but really good systems are expensive and with my 30/50psi controller, I'd need an additional pump to force water through the membrane.
I opted for the now discontinued API Tap Water Filter yielding DI water. Unfortunately, for my well water, the cartridge was spent fairly quickly making the resulting cost only a little better than if I was to buy bottled water. I emptied a spent cartridge and filled it with API Nitra-Zorb to filter nitrates. Nitra-Zorb is only sold in pouches for aquarium filters - I bought several #6 pouches and emptied into the cartridge. It works great and I have recharged it several times with salt water. There are also many other nitrate filters on the market. Check out Crystal Quest Nitrate filter on Amazon.
Alternatively, Nitra-Zorb or equivalent pouches can be used in your filter to reduce nitrates (again some of these can be regenerated and reused with salt water).
 
Plants, plants, and more plants can dramatically help keep tank nitrates low. In theory, they may be able to use and lower the nitrates from your unfiltered well water. I watched a Youtube video recently that seemed very credible. The fellow claimed he had high nitrates in his well water, does a 50% water change in his heavily planted tank and by the next day, his nitrates are zero (He believes the plants and anaerobic bacteria in his substrate are quickly processing the nitrates). Who knows!
 
The last thing in keeping tank nitrates low is good housekeeping. If you have gravel, you may need to clean or switch to sand where detritus doesn't turn the substrate into a nitrate factory (less important if you have a lot of rooted plants). Keep the filter(s) clean. Filters merely remove detritus out of sight, but it decomposes in the filter and creates nitrogenous compounds. In some regards, this creates organic fertilizer for the plants, but depending on bio-load, can be excessive.
Don't over feed and don't over stock.
 
In any case, high nitrates in the source water is just a blip and can be overcome.
I hope this post helps some. Good luck and Tank On.
 
-Michael

 

[jb1997mcd]

Thanks Michael.

​I ran RO on my well with an average 30-50PSI and my membrane was still working after 4 years.  I initially bought a pump to push the PSI up but it was such a pain.  I stopped using the pump and the RO system still worked fine.  I had a DI portion also but that would only work for about two weeks before I had to swap out so I stopped using.  My TDS was contstant at 8-10 for the past 3 years.  You do waste a lot of water when you RO.  The RO system was $250 but to plumb and set everything up was quite a bit more than that.
 
Now that I am on public water I want to try the plant option as I would have to pay for all the water.  I don't want to go he chemical opiton and have read about the nitrate filters for some time with not a lot of success. 
 
Interesting link on the Crystal Quest.  I have not seen that one before or if I did I wrote it off due to cost.  I guess a follow up question here is does anyone know anyone that can comment on the Crystal Quest whole house nitrate remover?
 
Hoping someone can come along and answer the 4 questions above. 
Regards,
​Jason

 

[StevenF]

Most plant fertilizers on the market provide NPK in 1/1/1 ration.  Meaning for for each gram of nitrogen there is 1 gram of phosphate and 1 gram of potassium.  So for 30 ppm of nitrate you would need 30 grams of phosphate and 30 of potassium per liter of water.  Add to that trace elements you would also need you are probably talking about another 30 grams per liter for all the trace elements needed  That's about 60 grams of fertilizer per liter of water.  You would be better off buying dry fertilizers instead of flourish.  For flourish you would probably need 20 to 30 times  the recommended dose.  
 
You would need an air pump running all the time to keep CO2 levels up or go to a CO2 injection system.  You might even need to use brighter lights.  Now all of the above numbers are my guesses.  Someone with better chemistry skills might recommend a higher or lower dose.  The only other way is to filter the nitrate out.  If you buy RO water from a suppler  that is a significant expense.  However if you install a RO system it shouldn't  be that expensive since most of the maintenance expense is in replacement filters. 
 
Yes plants will help but you are going to need a lot of fertilizer to do it.  The plants in my small aquarium keep the nitrate levels near zero (I use RO from my own RO filter). Most of ROs expense is in purchasing the unit and the occasional filter change.   
 
Yes plants will help but you are going to need a lot of fertilizer to do it.  The plants in my small aquarium keep the nitrate levels near zero (I use RO from my own RO filter). Most of ROs expense is in purchasing the unit and the occasional filter change.
 
Could you post a link to your utility water quality report.  I am wondering what the tap  levels of potassium and phosphate are.

 

[jb1997mcd]

Thanks Steven, 
 
Yes I RO'd water at my old house on the well and it worked well.  Now that we are on public water my cost for water per month would go up substantially.  Here is the report for our water back from 2015, most current report.
 
Had trouble pasting the link, but if you enter into google search it is the first report.  Unfortunately it seems to only list potential hazardous items.
 
aquaamerica.com/waterqualityreports/2015/pa/pa1460073.pdf
 
My 3 options seem to be plant route, RO (which probably will be too expensive) or large nitrate removal system like the one from Crystal Quest, but nothing comes up when I google Cyrstal quest and aquariums which is concerning.  I have to believe someone would have tried this and if it worked others would have followed.
 
Looking at water bill, maybe RO is not that expensive, but hope that the plant option would be something that folks give a thumbs up to.
 
Regards,
​Jason

 

[AbbeysDad]

Crystal Quest is a countertop (not whole house) nitrate filter and is not unlike countless inline nitrate filters being used for refrigerators, ice makers, etc. The resins used in trapping the nitrates are technically chemical, but do not add chemicals to the water!
Oh and when I google Crystal Quest, it pops right up.
 
I'll maintain that a heavily planted low tech tank with an appropriate bio-load does not need excessive chemical ferts....here is my 60g as an example.

 

[jb1997mcd]

Thanks Michael,
 
​I took a look at their website and it looks like they offer a whole house nitrate removing system.  Not that I would go this way.  The more I think about it I would probably go back to RO before I went with that option.
 
Hoping Pothos plants in a hydroponics setup in my 100 gallon Rubbermaid can work.  Steve suggested a number of ferts.  I was hoping to get some good nitrate removal from the pothos by consuming existing nitrates out of tap and providing a good grow light.  I am a novice when it comes to plants so hoping for additional feedback.
 
Thanks again,
​Jason

 

[StevenF]

 
 
Now that we are on public water my cost for water per month would go up substantially.

IN the typical home the largest consumers of water are landscaping irrigation, leaks, showers, laundry, toilets, and the   dishwasher.  Drinking water and food preparation typically only amounts to a couple of gallons per day per person. https/www3.epa.gov/watersense/pubs/indoor.html.  So an RO system sized to produce drinking water and water for the aquarium would probably only make a small impact on your water bill.  Also the brine discharge from a RO system can be used to water plants in the yard, flush the toilets, and wash the car.  But typically it is not collected.  Lear how to read your water meter and find out where the master supply water valve is.  With that you could check for leaks in the ground between the meter and house or find other hidden leaks.  One neat trick is to put food coloring in the toilet tank.  if the water in the bowl also changes color your toilet is leaking.  Many toilet leaks go unnoticed.  
 
Unfortunately your water quality report only took me to a page that required a zip code to pull up the correct report.  I don't know that.  The key thing to remember on plants is that if your are short on any one nutrient your plants will stop growing until that shortage is corrected.  So it your nitrates are high in the tap but phosphates and potassium are low your plants will use up nitrates until they run out of P and K.  IT may only take a couple of days for that to happen.  Leaving most of the week with little to now plant growth and no nitrate removal.  The shortage problem is also not limited to P and K.  A shortage in any one of the micro nutrients such as iron, calcium, and copper will also cause plant growth to stop.  Currently my aquarium is running nitrogen and maybe potassium deficient deficient and I have started to see my phosphates rise.  So with RO water it is important to fertilize with every macro and micro element the plants need.  If you miss just one you could easily get an algae bloom.  The good news is that with RO water, you know exactly what is in your water.  For my small tank I use SeaChem Flourish complete because it is the only one I know of that I am sure has everything in it.  Many fertilizers are not complete.  Unfortunately for your high nitrates flourish would probably not be practical due to the amounts you would need. to remove all the nitrate with plants.

 

[AbbeysDad]

I dunno, Crystal Quests rechargeable countertop nitrate filter model looks like a pretty good deal at $79.00USD and you don't have to mess with mineral replacement and pH adjustment...and there are many other inline nitrate filters much easier and simpler than any RO solution. But I'm not on commission and I have my home grown nitrate filter solution.
Good luck.

 

[jb1997mcd]

[SIZE=10.5pt]Thanks Steven/Michael,[/SIZE]
 
[SIZE=10.5pt]Steven, the more feedback I get the plant method to reducing nitrate in a holding tank seems like it could be pretty laborious,  The more I think to myself, the more I am leaning towards going back to RO.  I calculated that I need about 100 gallons a week for water changes which would mean about 400 to 500 gallons total for the RO process.  At 1 cent per gallon we are talking about 5 bucks a week, not too bad.[/SIZE]
 
[SIZE=10.5pt]Michael, that definitely seems interesting.  I wish I could find some other aquarium folks that have went down this path.  If everyone with nitrate issues from the tap with public/well water could solve this issue in this manner I would think it would be a pretty common method.  I will continue to research.[/SIZE]
 
[SIZE=10.5pt]Regards,
​Jason[/SIZE]