Nitrates

[lisa23]

I went in our local pets at home to have a look at the fish, and asked the women who worked there about a couple of fish. She said, that I mustn't have fish if the nitrates in the tank are above 0. I was sure from what I read here low Nitrate levels are ok and normal. The sales assistant said no and even if its in my tap water if I don't change the water for 2 months it should disapear. She said all of their tanks tested at 0 Nitrates

So was she right, and Ive been getting mixed up with my reading, or is she talking crap?

Thanks
Lisa x

 

[st24rsap]

nitrates are the produce of the nitrogen cycle where the ammonia (fish waste and food) is broke down into nitrite, the nitrite is then broke down into nitrate by the good bacteria in a fully cycled fish tank and filter.

Ammonia and Nitrite levels are not good, anything above 0.25ppm is bad for the fish.
Nitrate will generally be between 5 & 50ppm in a healthy tank

 

[lisa23]

Thanks thats what I thought, so how are their tanks kept at 0 nitrates

 

[st24rsap]

i really dont know the answer to that as have no idea how the filtration systems at fish stors work.

 

[Colin_T]

Nitrites should be 0
Nitrates come after the nitrites

Fish food and waste break down in the water producing ammonia.
Beneficial filter bacteria eat the ammonia and convert it to nitrite.
More beneficial bacteria eat the nitrite and convert it to nitrate.
You get rid of nitrates by doing partial water changes.

Ammonia & Nitrite should always be 0 in a well filtered tank.

Nitrates can go up pretty high without doing any real damage to the fish but it is best to keep the nitrates as low as possible.

I would guess and say the shop assist got the A & I mixed up. NitrAte & NitrIte

 

[st24rsap]

Nitrites should be 0
Nitrates come after the nitrites

Fish food and waste break down in the water producing ammonia.
Beneficial filter bacteria eat the ammonia and convert it to nitrite.
More beneficial bacteria eat the nitrite and convert it to nitrate.
You get rid of nitrates by doing partial water changes.

Ammonia & Nitrite should always be 0 in a well filtered tank.

Nitrates can go up pretty high without doing any real damage to the fish but it is best to keep the nitrates as low as possible.

I would guess and say the shop assist got the A & I mixed up. NitrAte & NitrIte

 

[lisa23]

No they wern't mixed up because I questioned it and she showed me the charts they kept.

Thanks for your help, I suppose they have a better filtration system or something.

 

[littlest]

hmm... it could be that she uses stuff that removes ammonia (zeolite possibly) in her tank. So she is relying on chemical removal rather than cycling, so she never gets nitrates, as there is no cycle taking place.
Could be that she has a really heavily planted tank and the plants are taking up the nitrate.
Could be that she is talking out of her a$$.

 

[lisa23]

the tanks arn't really planted, I did wonder if they use the chemicals, or if they make up the results. tbh I am new to all this but have read all I can. Been in two different fish shops today and both have given me information which is completely different to what I've been reading and both of them had plecs marked up wrong.

It's all a bit confusing when you want to ask the 'professionals' things

Thank you all though, its good to have people here I can check things with

 

[aaronnorth]

if I don't change the water for 2 months it should disapear.

Thanks
Lisa x

Where the hell she got that from i dont know!

 

[Colin_T]

hmm... it could be that she uses stuff that removes ammonia (zeolite possibly) in her tank. So she is relying on chemical removal rather than cycling, so she never gets nitrates, as there is no cycle taking place.
Could be that she has a really heavily planted tank and the plants are taking up the nitrate.
Could be that she is talking out of her a$$.

I think the last one on the list

I worked in petshops for a while and even I could never keep the water with 0 nitrates. And I had the shop tanks running sweet. I don't know of any shop that keeps their nitrates on 0. Most shops don't even test for it in their own tanks. They make sure there is no ammonia or nitrite and the PH is fine but don't really bother about the rest. They do massive water changes each week and hope it keeps the nitrates low enough until they sell the fish.
Likewise I don't know of any shop that uses chemicals to remove ammonia either. It would be too expensive to buy it all and then it has to be recharged all the time. It doesn't make financial sense to do that. You also have to monitor the ammonia levels very closely so you know when to change the ammogon/ zeolite. If you don't change it in time you get ammonia spikes and everything dies.
Nope, she was talking out of her bottom.

 

[mr oscar]

she does not know what she is talking about, some nitrate is not a problem, if you have plants they will sort it out dont worry about what she has said

 

[monkey_biz]

sound bollox to me BUT...............
15 years ago i built my own marine system that had zero nitrates. how?? i had a large wet dry sump with a planted mangrove/algae section and a denitrification chamber all DIY.
the denitrator has anerobic bacteria and a VERY VERY slow flow. the bacteria turn nitrate to nitrite then to nitrogen gas but i had 2 fish, some corals and a handfull of inverts about 10% stocked/water volume so they could have a denitrification plant but for a fish shop the plant would need to be the size of tesco's