Safe Nitrate Levels?

[popsy121]

hello,

I have beeen running a fishless cycle for 6weeks no, both ammonia and nitrites are being processed in 12hrs.....I am using an api master test kit and checked the nitrate levels after i purchased 2 cherry barbs(stupid I know). The reading now is around 120ppm its a really deep red colour thats not shown on the test paper. What do I do now? from what i understand safe levels are 40ppm..... I don't want the fish to die, my kids will be heart broken through my stupidity.

thanks

 

[popsy121]

sorry forgot to mention i did carry out a 50% water change.

 

[JoshuaA]

hello,

I have beeen running a fishless cycle for 6weeks no, both ammonia and nitrites are being processed in 12hrs.....I am using an api master test kit and checked the nitrate levels after i purchased 2 cherry barbs(stupid I know). The reading now is around 120ppm its a really deep red colour thats not shown on the test paper. What do I do now? from what i understand safe levels are 40ppm..... I don't want the fish to die, my kids will be heart broken through my stupidity.

thanks

Important: Did you do a 95-100% water change after your fishless cycle was complete? Otherwise all that Ammonia/Nitrite has to go somewhere and you will have toxic levels of Nitrate in the water.

Check your Nitrites! Just incase, Nitrate is effected a stupid amount by Nitrite. The Nitrate liquid test from API is unreliable in my experience my girlfriend can do it and it will not change colour and stay yellow at 0ppm. I can do the test and get 80-160ppm or vice versa she will do it and get a result.

I think what the best course of action is really to check your Nitrite to make sure its not sky high which could be the cause, in fact even a small amount of nitrite can tamper with the API Nitrate test. Also you said

The reading now is around 120ppm its a really deep red colour thats not shown on the test paper

Does this mean your Nitrate test is not part of the API master test kit? The API master test kit goes from 80ppm to 160ppm on the readings. I think due to the fact the shadings change inconsistently its hard to make a judgement call on what it could possibly be when its on an inbetweener.

If your Ammonia/Nitrite is fine and even though you have done a fishless cycle sometimes it can spike! Then I would just say to do a big water change, and keep doing a regular water change every week. Also make sure you're not over feeding your fish as the fish food will break down into Nitrate eventually. Plants will help absorb Nitrate but CANNOT replace the need for water changes (unless of course you are heavily planted and have set your tank specifically for that option, the fact you have done a fish-less cycle implies not).

On the safe levels of Nitrate... I've seen many different aspects on this whilst fish less cycling my tank and I believe my aim will be to keep it below 40ppm and preferably not let it get above 20ppm. Our tap water on a good day has 0ppm Nitrate but on some days it comes through 5ppm of Nitrate.

Finally, I think you need some more cherry barbs, after a fishless cycle you could easily put more than that into your tank without problems.

 

[arobinson1984]

Hi,

it seems to me that you just didn't do a large enough water change at the end of your cycle. During the cycle as you know ammonia converts to nitrite which then converts to nitrate so you've basically got 6 weeks worth of nitrate built up by the end of the cycle hence the need for a 90-100% water change.

Just perform a large water change now, as much as you can, around 90% leaving just enough water in the tank to keep the fish wet, fill the tank back up with roughly temp matched water and don't forget to add dechlor and you should finds it's fine then.

It's very unlikely your fish will be harmed, its been proven that most fish are fine in nitrates well over 100ppm and some fine in even as high as 1000ppm! Except your obvious delicate fish such as discus, rams etc


Andy

 

[popsy121]

Hi, thanks for your reply.....

Did you do a 95-100% water change after your fishless cycle was complete? Otherwise all that Ammonia/Nitrite has to go somewhere and you will have toxic levels of Nitrate in the water.

At the end of my cycle I did a 50% water change and added dechclor.

Check your Nitrites! Just incase, Nitrate is effected a stupid amount by Nitrite. The Nitrate liquid test from API is unreliable in my experience my girlfriend can do it and it will not change colour and stay yellow at 0ppm. I can do the test and get 80-160ppm or vice versa she will do it and get a result.

Nitrites are deffo 0 i've checked them several times and are still showing 0.

I think what the best course of action is really to check your Nitrite to make sure its not sky high which could be the cause, in fact even a small amount of nitrite can tamper with the API Nitrate test. Also you said

The reading now is around 120ppm its a really deep red colour thats not shown on the test paper

Does this mean your Nitrate test is not part of the API master test kit? The API master test kit goes from 80ppm to 160ppm on the readings. I think due to the fact the shadings change inconsistently its hard to make a judgement call on what it could possibly be when its on an inbetweener.

Sorry I am using the API master test kit, I was referring to the colours on the chart...........The 120ppm reading I made was a guess, it's in between the last 2 readings, a really deep red colour.

Thanks

 

[popsy121]

Hi Andy, many tanks for your reply......

it seems to me that you just didn't do a large enough water change at the end of your cycle. During the cycle as you know ammonia converts to nitrite which then converts to nitrate so you've basically got 6 weeks worth of nitrate built up by the end of the cycle hence the need for a 90-100% water change.

Just perform a large water change now, as much as you can, around 90% leaving just enough water in the tank to keep the fish wet, fill the tank back up with roughly temp matched water and don't forget to add dechlor and you should finds it's fine then.

I done a 50% change at the end of the cycle, theres so much conflicting advice from so many sites and easy for us newbies to get very confused. So....... even tho I have removed 50% of my water and replaced it with 50% of dechlor water, I should do another water change of 90-100% is that correct??? would that not remove all the bacteria I have been building? Some sites recommend doing a 10% daily change..... sometimes too much knowledge is a bad thing.... this whole process is very confusing.


thankyou


Andy
[/quote]

 

[JoshuaA]

Basically like me and Andy have said is that when you do a fish-less cycle you are pumping a ton of Nitrogen into the tank, what you are aiming for is the end product to be Nitrate obviously. However because we haven't had fish in the tank and we've been doing this for 1-2 months we have a HUGE amount of Nitrate in the tank. We did 95% water change today when we introduced fish as our Nitrate was pretty much off the scale. With our water change even though it was 95% we got it down to around 10ppm!

50% just wasn't enough, another 50% probably won't be enough, ideally you should take it down as much as possible until the water level is about the height of the fish. Then fill it back up at the right temperature and dechlorinate it too (before adding). Keeping the filter media wet as well.

Edit: You won't lose the bacteria you've been building because the bacteria is nearly all in your filter and some on your gravel but not a substantial amount. From what I read somewhere about Brownian motion and the bacteria adhering to surfaces you will probably find about 0.01% of the population of bacteria free flowing in the water.

 

[arobinson1984]

As Joshua said, the beneficial bacteria isn't in your water, it's in your filter media with neglible amounts in your gravel and on tank glass.

Changing 95% wouldn't have any negative effects on ur cycle

Andy

 

[popsy121]

Appreciate your informative replies. I'll do the water change tomorrow when I get hold of some more dechlorinator... when you say fill it back up at the right temperature, is it best to add water from the tap that is the same temp... testing with me thermometer or add water and dechlorinator and let my heater do the work? what dechlorinator do you guys use?

thankyou

 

[popsy121]

is it best to take the fish out as it may stress them or leave them in?

 

[arobinson1984]

Hi popsy,


Leave the fish in, they will be fine. You will stress them more trying to catch them and moving them to another environment.

When i say temperature match the water, I mean just get the new water roughly the same temp as the water coming out. Using your hand to judge it will be fine, you dont need to use a thermometer or anything. Its best to roughly temp match the water because if you put in cold water then the temp in the tank will drop too low and you are likely to shock your fish.

Dont forget to use dechlor, I use pond dechlor but seachem prime is one of the best you can buy.


Andy

 

[JoshuaA]

I use those 15Litre buckets you can pick up for £1 from your local DIY store, I just use the standard glass thermometer you use in your aquarium to put in the bucket I put the water treatment(Prime) in first and use a mix of hot and cold from the tap. That way I feel the prime mixes better with the water. Get the match quite close if not exact it isn't hard after a while you know the perfect tap setting etc. Just be gentle with it and make sure your first few buckets are very close after about 50% you can be a bit less specific about how close you want it as to make the temperature shift is much harder.

One problem you might find though with filling an entire tank from empty is the fact you will get a lot of air bubbles which are from the trapped air in the water. The warmer the water the less bubbles.

I believe once the fish are more use to the environment you can be less precise with the temperatures but I think because they are new fish which are probably a bit stressed with the Nitrate levels then you may want to reduce the stress and give them an easy time.

Although as Andy says matching with your hand is usually good enough! Just depends how sensitive you are. If you're like me and you can drink tea just from the boil or submerge your hand in cold water indefinitely then a thermometer in a bucket might be the best option!

Edit:

You may also find it useful to siphon the water back in up to about 50% as well from a bucket if you have that option. If you can place the bucket above the water level start a siphon going and it will prevent a stir up when the fish are swimming at such a low level. I also do it so I can get on with the next bucket of water whilst it's slowly filling the tank. A python system would seem an overkill for our 60 and 40l tanks.

 

[popsy121]

Something strange has happened.......On the way back home stopped at my lfs purchased some API Stresscoat as this was the only brand that they stocked. I got the buckets out, put my t-shirt on, even got the other half on standby and then thought might aswell do another Nitrate test so I know know the amount i've started with.... results came back as 10-20ppm, done the check again and same results. I'm a bit confused as previous tests results were sky high.

Other results

Tap water between 0-5ppm
Ammonia 0.25
NitrIte 0

thankyou

 

[OldMan47]

Ammonia that is above a detectable level is not a good sign Popsy. I try to always be optimistic about these things, it gets me in trouble with WD sometimes. Nitrate levels are almost never dangerous in our tanks.
Nitrates have been shown to be safe in ridiculously high levels, well over 1000 ppm, for some fish. Experimental evidence is not available for other fish. That does not mean you should ignore your nitrate levels. Nitrates tell us something that is hard to judge otherwise. It tells us how much higher thew concentrations of poisons in our tanks may have become compared to the levels in tap water. OK so who cares? Who cares is me and you. There are poisons in our tank's water that build up over time and we have no way to measure. What we do instead is measure nitrates and whenever the levels are 20 ppm or more above tap water levels, we do a water change. That means that we remove the unmeasured poisons often enough to remove the poisons that we cannot measure. Experience has taught us that a rise of 20 ppm above tap water is a level we can use to define when those unmeasured poisons may need to be removed. By doing the water change at that time, we make our tanks safe for all of our fish.