Nitrates in my Tap Water

Togiran

Hey guys. I have a Nitrate reading of 20 in my tap water.
I use a liquid test kit.

What can I do besides buying expensive bottled water?

crazy4fish

i have the same problem. the advice that i have gotten is this: get either watersprites or water Wisteria. they for some reason bring your nitrates to 0 very quickly. i havent tried this yet but i will in the near future. there are also medicines that will lower nitrates but they can be costly. hope this helped!

herefishy

Elodea is another big nitrate hog. You can also use water hyacinth, Indian fern, Duckweed, giant Duckweed, as well.

Togiran

Can anyone link me to a post that's great for beginner tank planters?

Keep in mind that it's only a 10 gallon tank. Would that effect much? I'm very new to all this, so if you could help me in any way, then I'd really appreciate it. Thanks for the tips.

Flashygrrl

There's a couple, look for stickies. Elodea and Water Sprite are seriously the easiest things to care for, you don't even have to put them in the gravel if you don't want (but most people do with Water Sprite anyways) and if you naturally have nitrates in your water then you probably will have NO problem with them growing.

Togiran

Can you buy Elodea and/or Water Sprite from a Petco/Petsmart?

jeaninel

I think Elodea is also known as Anacharis. They carry it at my local Petsmart. You can either float it or plant it.

Togiran

Would planting it be the better option since all I have is a Betta?

Also, if I do plant it, do I need to buy that special soil and stuff? Or do I literately just stick it into the gravel (pea sized) like a regular fake plant?

jeaninel

You could just stick it into the gravel.

Flashygrrl

I got my Water Sprite at Petsmart, decided to get it after veeeery carefully checking their tank for snails. Ours doesn't house any fish anywhere near the plant tanks so fishie diseases weren't so much of a worry which is something that keeps me from buying anything live from Petco.