Use Of Salt

[eaglesaquarium]

Well, if you want to draw an arbitrary "line in the sand" so to speak, shouldn't the number be based on their natural habitat or other more substantial research? Many folks have nitrates in their tap water higher than 20ppm. Do all these folks need to get a RO machine just to keep guppies?


Seeing that you are a discus keeper and that they are much more sensitive to dissolved solids and nitrates, it makes sense that you err on the extreme side of caution, not to mention the cost of your fish. The OP however, is keeping rams, guppies, tetras and loaches. These fish are less sensitive to nitrates, and probably don't need the same parameters as discus. Many fish prefer much different conditions that discus, especially livebearers who prefer/need a much harder water to be healthy.

 

[fishguy2727]

IME rams can be just as sensitive, loaches not far behind. I don't err as far as most discus keepers do (who strive to keep nitrate at 0-5ppm).

In the situations where the tap itself is higher than 20ppm then it is okay to allow it to be higher, but it should still be as low as possible. One big reason it can go higher is that you know your starting poing is over 20ppm and as stated before it is not just nitrate that lowers water quality. The other things will still build up but if you already know you are starting at 20ppm, you know that nitrate being 30ppm means only an increase of 10ppm, still low and most likely the other things that lower water quality will be low as well.

I would not go by nature. In nature almost all fish die, water quality being one of the reasons. In nature 'success' is replacing both breeding adults with offspring that eventually become breeding adults. So if a pair of oscars produces 2,000 offspring every year for the five breeding years they are alive (they won't live as long in the wild as they can in captivity) that is 10,000 offspring. If 2 of those make it to become breeding adults that pair was successful. We should be reaching to be more successful with our aquarium fish than 1 in 5,000. Granted not all of those 9,998 who didn't make it died from water quality, but the point is that nature is not ideal and should not be the only thing to determine our captive care.

Not to mention that in nature there is a constant water change system in effect most of the year keeping the water quality very high.

But again, if you are not measuring water quality with nitrate, what are you measuring it with?

 

[eaglesaquarium]

But again, if you are not measuring water quality with nitrate, what are you measuring it with?

Well, to be honest, with my experience and lack of success with the API nitrate test, I'm not sure if I am measuring water quality with nitrate either. Also, my nitrate test kit jumps up from 20ppm and 40ppm then up to 80ppm.


I think a lot of the "ways of determining water quality" have more to do with fish behavior and activity than just the tests. Tests can be wrong, they can expire, they can be improperly run. The fish also have to pass the "eye" test. A nitrate test isn't going to find a parasite, nor any other disease.

 

[fishguy2727]

True, but visibly healthy doesn't mean healthy long term. That only means that they are not so unhealthy that they are immediately harmed.

IME the best thing to prevent any health problems is high quality food and water. I only feed and recommend New Life Spectrum (specifically the Thera+A formula because of the extra garlic, enough to kill some parasites). For water quality you have to keep it as high as possible. I do massive water changes on my personal tanks (80-90% weekly), but I do not recommend anyone jump into this type of water change schedule. Yes, the API kit is more complicated than most aquarists would enjoy doing, but if done properly it is accurate. Just read and follow the directions and it should be pretty accurate. The fact that the intervals on the test card are closer at the low end (0-20ppm) shows that this is the more important part of the range.

That said I do believe that looking at the fish is vital, something many people overlook. IME watching the fish can be more important than what the tests tell you. Whether the test kits say it or not healthy fish are doing relatively well, and stressed fish need a water change. However, water quality, nitrate, and long term success are more subtle than can be determined by simply looking at the fish. Fish being in perfect visible health doesn't mean the water quality is enough to prevent that oscar from developing HLLE and dying before it is 15-20 years old.