Water Values for Dummies ..

[Bedge]

As we are starting up a community tank, we are tracking the water values daily.

We follow the directions and all, but it just doesn't make sense in my little mind!

We added a couple of peacocks yesterday, to cycle the tank further:

Yesterday (no fish):

Ph: 7.4 (added 50ml PhPlus). Amonia: 0. Nitrite: 0. Nitrate: 7.5.

Today (24 hours after adding four small peacocks)

Ph: 7.8 (added 50ml PhPlus). Amonia: 0. Nitrite: 0. Nitrate: 10.

So I know that Nitrate is ok as long as it is under 40, but just for pure interest sake: with the addition of the new fish, what has created the Nitrate rise?

What may we expect to see happen with the tank in the next few days?

Thanks.

[Colfish]

you add fish, fish add waste, nitrate is the end product of waste.

keep adding the fish you want slowly, keep a watch on the cycle.

dont push the ph any further, malawi's dont need it any higher.

"what will happen in the next few days"

not much, if you go slow. you should see a slight rise in nitrate values, but you know the limit.

go slow and all will be good

[Bedge]

Hey, thanks ...

so do nitrates keep rising if you dont keep the tank semi clean? Or do they drop off naturally?

They are up to 15 tonight, so i did a little water change ...

The aim is to keep them as low as possible, right?

[chorrylan]

so do nitrates keep rising if you dont keep the tank semi clean? Or do they drop off naturally?

The aim is to keep them as low as possible, right?

they will keep rising until you do a water change.

As long as you have fish producing urea you are accumulating nitrate (and hopefully spending as little time as possible transitioning through ammonia and nitrite on the way to nitrate if your filters are up to speed).

Plants will use (a small amount of) nitrate and under some conditions anaerobic bateria will consume (an even smaller amount of) nitrate but for all practical purposes every biut of fishfood you add to your tank is goign to be converted into nitrate and the only thing removing the nitrate will be your water changes.

So:

1. don't waste food... more food means more nitrate (and potentially even worse if the filters don't cope...)

2. don't increase the fish population (and food) at a faster rate than the filter bacteria can handle. If the bacteria can't keep up it won't be able to convert ammonia through nitrite into nitrate quickly enough and you will be able to measure ammonia and nitrite with your test kit but will probably get very high readings on the deadfish-ometer first.

mind you 15ppm is pretty good as far as I'm concerned. For a malawi tank I would be scheduling my waterchange frequencies to maintain nitrate levels between 40 and 80ppm.

As a tank is starting up it's a bit counterproductive to be doing waterchanges too frequently (unless you are getting water from another tank) as you are taking a percentage of the "good" bacteria out of the system at the same time.

[Bedge]

Its a bit strange what is going on with my tank, I haven't figured it out yet. My Veija Fene died on NYE (he had no tank mates), we took him out and left the tank exactly is for 4 days. The filter (ahiem) kept running, heater on etc.

We did a complete water change and substrate change on Saturday and then added four small peacocks on Sunday ... to cycle it a bit more.

The ammonia and nitrite's are sitting pretty, but the nitrate is going up slowly each day. So not sure if its cycled, semi cycled, some where in-between etc. Peacocks seem quite happy, so guess it all cant be to bad!