help with plants...

nice pirhana

ok, quick update.

thank you guys & gals so much for your help & suggestions. im gonna read about the lighting next. i got the tank used so i know the bulb is at least 7 months old.

i re-tested the tank water & re-read the instructions to make sure i did everything right including shaking the bottles. to my dismay the nitrate still read over 80 pp this after the 30+ % water change last night. so i just finished 50-60% water change now. im giving things time to settle before testing it again.

the previous water change i used the new tetra aqua safe plus to treat the water. on the 50% change i went back to seachem prime. i used this when setting up the tank & when adding water that evaporated.

btw-i did test my tap water, both hot & cold side & it was 0 ppm.

this brings me to another question...could my orig prob being with the plants dying/decaying be the cause of the nitrate levels being so high? dont understand why its so high & my nitrite & ammonia are both 0 ppm.

iits beginning to look like im writing a book so i'll post all the spec on my tank, fish & products in another post.

GwenInNM

I do not think having a couple plants dying would contribute to that high of nitrates. You are likely over feeding. It was good you did another 50% water change. Feed only once a day, and just a small pinch. You fish should eat what you put in the tank in a short time (say 30 seconds). Also if you are not syphoning your gravel as you do water changes you are not getting out the decaying material (left over food, poop) that is in the gravel. In your case, just taking out water and replacing with clean water, won't be enough. I took over a tank from a friend, and her nitrates were at 80. When I tore the tank down, there was so much gunk in the gravel. That's probably why many don't like gravel and prefer sand.

Gwen

Geomancer

There is 'beneficial' bacteria that grows in fish tanks. One kind breaks down Ammonia into Nitrite (with an i) and another breaks down Nitrite into Nitrate (with an a). There is nothing that breaks the Nitrate down into something safe for the fish, so the only way to remove it is with partial water changes.

In addition, the plants use Ammonia as a nutrient to grow, in a fully cycled tank it is normal to see both Ammonia and Nitrite be 0 ppm, so that's a good thing and shows your tank is cycled.

These water changes should be done once a week, do at least 25% but going up to 50% is fine. The chemical you use to declorinate the water isn't of vast importance as long as it is removing the chlorine (I believe both of what you have do that). While your nitrates are so high, you should do daily water changes until they get under control. It's impossible to get them to 0 ppm, try for around 20 ppm.

Vacuuming the gravel is a good idea, just avoid the areas around the plants. In a fully planted aquarium, this does not need to be done, the waste and excess food the breaks down provides nutrients to the plants. But if you only have a few plants, best to clean out the areas where there are no plants.

For lighting, you want to get those on a timer (they are cheap, less than $10) and set them to be on no more than 12 hours (start with say 10 hours).

You'll want to also get a fertilizer for the plants, you add it once a week, it will provide whatever is missing unless you have very soft water (they assume you'll have some nutrients like calcium in your tap water).

Byron

We have to be careful not to jump too fast here. There is still critical data we don't have (I asked for this in my last post) so I prefer waiting for that before suggesting remedies. Otherwise we are making assumptions without data.

arcdtch

I put some amazon swards in my tank about 10 months ago, origonaly i had a T8 single bulb light on the tank and it wasnt giving out enough light. I upgraded to a GLO light dual T5 High Out and am using dual 6700k lights in them. This last week i went to move 1 plant and ened up having to redo my whole tank due to the root structure under the gravel. For your nitrate issue i would try to not only do 50% water changes every other day but also stir up the gravel and free up the debres under it, you could have a lot of waste trapped in it that is causing levels to spike. I have a 30 gallon tank and im using 3 power filters on it, AquaClear 30, AquaClear 70 and the one that came with it from walmart. All 3 combine turn about 600 gallons an hour and keep my tank levels very clean. Also remember your CO2 level will effect plant groth. Durring the day they make oxign but when the light is off they are making CO2. I have 2 6" bubble bars on both sides of my tank that are constantly moving air through the tank that the power filters do not. They also like warmer water (68F minimum to 82.4F) or (20C-29C) i keep my tank near 77, also PH levels they like 6.0 to 7.6, i use tap water and ours is near 7.2. Hopefully this will help them grow better.