o glad I asked about the Seachem products, they don't tell you all that stuff on their blurb! I think for the level of plants I am wanting to keep that I don't want to risk my fish by using such harmful products and risking, as a newbie, getting it wrong.
Many of us forget, or perhaps don't initially realise, that every substance added to the aquarium water gets inside the fish. Fish don't "drink" because they are continually taking in water via osmosis through every cell of their body, plus in the gills during respiration. Not everything going in the water is necessarily going to harm or kill the fish, but it does get inside them and this means they have to deal with substances internally in the bloodstream and organs that they would not ever encounter in their habitat. So keeping that in mind, when fish are present in an aquarium, the fewer substances we add the better, always.
This past year in dealing with a problem in one of my eight tanks I came to the realisation that much of the plant fertilisers I have been adding were frankly unnecessary. And they contributed to high organics which caused other issues, and problem algae. Less is always wiser. Work up from nothing to use what is needed, rather than overloading and then having to deal with issues. This is also safer as it allows the natural biological processes to stabilise and remain relative so; adding any substance usually impacts these processes somehow, and finding how is not always easy when things go wrong.
Will using 50:50 RO/tap stop the increasing nitrate calculation sufficiently? Would you rather use this mixture to halve the issues of using all tap (with high nitrates, hardness, and pH), or all RO (With it's lack of minerals and requiring replenishing)
A second thought - maybe the fact that I have 2 filters running at the moment, and producing more nitrates than my 2 guppies are excreting, is causing a large amount of nitrates?
I am basically leaving the nitrate resolution for the other members in this thread who have dealt with this problem (nitrates in the source water I mean), something fortunately I do not have. I will however comment on your question I cited here. First, nitrates occurring in the source water is a distinct problem and needs resolving before the nitrates get into the aquarium, more or less.
Nitrates occurring within the aquarium is a very different issue, and should be easy to resolve: not overcrowding, not overfeeding, not over-fertilising plants, regular partial water changes, keeping the substrate and filter cleaned, live plants, etc. Each of these factors impacts nitrates. The number of filters should not, because nitrate is the end product of the nitrification cycle, in which ammonia produced by the fish and bacteria and organic processes is changed into nitrite by one set of
Nitrosomonas bacteria, then the nitrite is changed into nitrate by a second set of
Nitrospira bacteria. So technically the nitrate level is only going to be the result of the ammonia to nitrite to nitrate process, which begins with the amount of ammonia entering the system. It doesn't matter if there is no filter, one filter, or two filters; this is not going to impact the amount of ammonia/nitrite/nitrate. This is a simplistic explanation but should suffice to deal with the filter question.
The nitrification cycle is only the first part of the process. The nitrates resulting from the nitrification are then dealt with by plants (this is minimal), different bacteria (primarily in the substrate), and partial water changes removing some. The bacteria aspect is de-nitrification, during which various bacteria use the nitrates; some use them to produce oxygen, others result in the nitrate changing back into the original nitrogen as nitrogen gas which is released into the air. Again, I am being simplistic, but I think you will see the point.
I have a lot of aeration maybe this is affecting pH. I will definitely do a test in a morning for hopefully a different take on my pH levels.
As I explained previously, this is not too likely, or more correctly, not going to have much impact. The surface disturbance caused by aeration and filters may increase the gas exchange that naturally occurs at the surface, whereby oxygen enters the water and CO2 is driven off. CO2 can enter the water too, depending upon levels to begin with. But generally speaking, the pH will be determined by the initial pH of the source water, the level of minerals and carbonates, organics from the fish load/foods, and bacterial processes. Again, partial water changes and maintaining a clean filter and substrate (relatively speaking, you don't want to over-do this for other reasons) all help to stabilize the pH. And each aquarium can be different, even with identical source water. I have varying pH levels in my 8 tanks, yet my source water is the same, all tanks are planted, fish load are relatively similar, etc.
Remember that because of the diurnal variation in pH, you should always test pH at roughly the same time each day if you want a better idea of what it may be doing. Generally, testing it in the early morning, shortly after the tank lighting comes on, works best, as it will be at its lowest and you will get a good idea of what is occurring day to day.
Byron.
I personally think it would change to more neutral (PH)
