# Please guys urgent help neede!!!!!



## chicotah (May 5, 2009)

i got a new fish tank for my birthday two weeks ago... it was a fully working well established tank off ebay.... big woops i know but i fell in love wen i saw it... its a 240 ltr bow front seabray custom build.... so i bought it home filled it and had to put the fish in once full yet another bad i know......... but like i said its a 240 ltr tank with 2 inches of sand substrate running a fluval 305 external pumping 1000 ltrs an hour i have rock, slate and bog wood o and a plastic cave for my plec and fish to hide in. i have on average of about 50 live plants running a buld of what strenght i dont know... fish in the tank are 5 fire mouth chichlids (about 2 inches) 3 salvini chichlids (about 2 inches) 2 convict chichlids(breeding pair at the size of 2 inches) two blood parrot fish (5 inches) 2 congo tetra 4 cat fish and 2 plecs.... one of witch has a new home next week..... but i have a very hi nitrate reading ive tryed everything water changes nitrate minus and now nitrex by jbl..... but still very high reading is there any other way any one can think of that will help me reduce this level now......... i did a water change today and like i said no difference in nitrate change....... i have no nitrite or amonia in there just nitrate or no3' please guys any ideas are gladly welcomed:thumbup:


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## deb53 (Jun 4, 2009)

Fresh water hun?? Or did you bring home water from the seller in containers??

Have you cleaned out the filter? If so did you use the old water that hopefully you bought home or clean water?

xx


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## chicotah (May 5, 2009)

i bought home enough water to clean the tank and to half fill it yes tropical.....


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## Guest (May 1, 2010)

The reason as to why your nitrate (NO3) reading is high is because the tank is slightly overstocked, or at least, it soon will be. However you have a bigger problem than that...

I wouldn't really suggest keeping such a high number of American cichlids in a 240 litre tank, as I can easily imagine war breaking out between the convicts, salvinis and firemouths as they reach sexual maturity (which won't be long off!). 

You should try to separate the cichlids now into separate tanks. All of the cichlids in the tank can reach 13-15cm/5-6" in length and all can be described as 'moderately aggressive'. In an ideal world, the firemouths should have the entire tank to themselves, but even that's pushing it. The convicts should have a 75 litre tank as a general minimum and the same applies for the salvinis. 

Another problem is territoriality between the same species. You have three salvinis and five firemouths. If you have two male salvinis, both will fight to compete for the female once they reach sexual maturity. If you have two female salvinis and a male, one pair will form and the extra female may be bullied or killed in the process. With the firemouths, you could end up with similar problems, with either two pairs forming and the spare fish being bullied or killed or individuals of the same sex fighting with eachother. It's a bit of a sticky situation to be honest and it depends on the sexes.

Remember that nitrate is one of the end products of the nitrogen cycle. The other end products are phosphate and nitrogen gas, which simply dissipates from the aquarium water or is used up by live plants. During biological filtration, ammonia (NH3) is broken down into nitrite (NO2) and then into nitrate. However the nitrate isn't broken down, it just keeps on accumulating until it is removed by water changes or used up by live plants.

Just to be sure, I would suggest testing your tapwater for nitrate. If your tapwater has a high reading, then carrying out water changes would be pointless as you would only be adding more nitrate to the system.


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## chicotah (May 5, 2009)

cool will try to rehome some of the fish.... i know i can move my convicts into another tank no problem so that will nail that down and ill test the water now. kow it has small amounts of water.... i have been advised to change the water with water from tesco as in the 15p still water to make it totaly soft but as with my live plants this is not what i need lol salvinis seem happy with there situation and the firemouths have formed two pairs and the spare sal an fire have teamed up as friends but war hasnt broken out yet but when it does ill be selling some!!!!


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## chicotah (May 5, 2009)

ok just tested the tap water and you guessed it lol 20pmm of nitrate in the tap...... so now what


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## Guest (May 1, 2010)

chicotah said:


> ok just tested the tap water and you guessed it lol 20pmm of nitrate in the tap...... so now what


OK, I think that's accountable for a large part of the problem. You have three ways of dealing with this...

1) Buy a nitragon unit. This is simply fitted to the faucet on your tap or inline with the cold-water feed pipe (usually under one of your sinks). This unit filters out nitrates. It costs peanuts to run however the main drawback is that it needs flushing frequently with dishwasher salt. Nitragon units are also hard to come by nowadays, with most people using reverse osmosis units, which I will mention below.

2) Buy a Reverse osmosis or RO unit, these are fitted in the same way as nitragon units. The process of reverse osmosis removes 99.9% of virtually _everything_ from plain tapwater, including hardness, pH, nutrients (including nitrate) and dissolved minerals; making it 99.9% pure. Water in such a pure state can't be used in an aquarium without prior treatment to restore the pH, dissolved minerals and oxygen content. Using pure reverse osmosis water without treatment will send the fish into osmotic shock, which is usually lethal. Special chemicals can be purchased from aquatic stores to re-mineralize the water and restore the hardness and pH.

The main drawback with RO units is that they are hardly cheap to run, with a large amount of water being fed into the unit going to waste. Water wastage generally depends on the temperature and pressure of the feed water. In some areas, the water pressure in the taps is simply too low for the unit to run effectively; and so a booster pump must be fitted. The carbon and sediment filters and membrane need to be replaced every so often; and this will set you back at around £50 a go.

3) If you are physically fit, you can buy reverse osmosis water from specialist aquatic stores in 10, 15 and 25 litre containers. The water will need treatment of course, as the water is sold straight from the RO unit. Buying reverse osmosis water is usually quite cheap, with 25 litre containers of the stuff selling for about £2-3. The main drawback is that the purity of the water isn't always 100%, as the water has to be produced in large capacity units to satisfy demand. Larger reverse osmosis units are less efficient and therefore produce water of a lower purity than smaller capacity units.


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## chicotah (May 5, 2009)

so could i do partial water changes with RO water straight without adding the stuff like ph n so on... as mine are possibly all ready rocketing out of controll.... i have been advised to do water changes with water like volvic of evian but i dont know if this is safe to do so or not..... i know it will be expensive to use water like this but will it help...... i live in the middle of nowhere and struggle to get any where

but i will probly have to find somewhere that sells RO water and get the advise on how to get it to the ph n so level i need but obviously needing 240 ltr of the stuff is a big demand lol i will have to get on the phone tomorrow and get looking....:thumbup: fingers crossed i will have this peoblem sorted soon im really worried about my little guys.... i do love them will have to put some pics upwen its all sorted n not being gay!!!!


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## chicotah (May 5, 2009)

ok been looking at a nitrate reactor butit says hang on the side.... what does this mean... can i fit it to mu filter or does it need its own


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## Guest (May 1, 2010)

chicotah said:


> ok been looking at a nitrate reactor butit says hang on the side.... what does this mean... can i fit it to mu filter or does it need its own


A nitrate reactor wouldn't be a long-term solution, as you are still pumping in nitrate-laden water from the tap. A nitrate reactor is designed to fit inline either with your filter piping (if the flow rate is suitable) or connected to its own pump or overflow from the main tank. Due to the nitrate-laden tapwater, the media would need to be replaced regularly to keep the nitrate level under control, incurring more expense and hassle.


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## Guest (May 1, 2010)

chicotah said:


> so could i do partial water changes with RO water straight without adding the stuff like ph n so on... as mine are possibly all ready rocketing out of controll.... i have been advised to do water changes with water like volvic of evian but i dont know if this is safe to do so or not..... i know it will be expensive to use water like this but will it help...... i live in the middle of nowhere and struggle to get any where


You could mix the RO and tapwater at a ratio of 80:20 and then leave it for a couple of hours with an air-pump to re-oxygenate the water. You could carry out water changes with mineral water, as it is chemically safe. But, mineral water contains silicates which can cause algae problems. It would probably cost you around £5-10 to carry out a single 25% water change.


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## Maiisiku (Feb 20, 2009)

You'd get RO water by installing an RO unit in your main tap system. I don't think you can buy it. I woudn't want to do water changes with bottled water it would be a nightmare! Especially with a tank that big doing it every week!


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## hawksport (Dec 27, 2009)

Maiisiku said:


> You'd get RO water by installing an RO unit in your main tap system. I don't think you can buy it. I woudn't want to do water changes with bottled water it would be a nightmare! Especially with a tank that big doing it every week!


You can buy it. If you are on a water meter runing an ro unit gets expensive as most of the water goes straight down the drain.


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## Maiisiku (Feb 20, 2009)

I didn't know that! I'm quite lucky where I am really as my tap water only has 5 nitrate in it so I genrally have a pretty easy time. I guess buying RO and then adding some mineral water would seem like the best option in this situation. If you don't mind the algea. You can always get a bristlenose plec and some algea eaters. My cory eat a lot of the stuff off the back of my tank.


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## Guest (May 2, 2010)

Maiisiku said:


> I didn't know that! I'm quite lucky where I am really as my tap water only has 5 nitrate in it so I genrally have a pretty easy time. I guess buying RO and then adding some mineral water would seem like the best option in this situation. If you don't mind the algea. You can always get a bristlenose plec and some algea eaters. My cory eat a lot of the stuff off the back of my tank.


The problem with adding more fish is that you are in effect adding more nutrients to the tank. High levels of nitrate and phosphate actually aren't a problem in tanks containing a high plant biomass, as any fast-growing stem species will effectively out-compete algae for food and starve it to death.


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## chicotah (May 5, 2009)

ok guys im now down to 2 plecs 2 catfish 2 parrot fish 2 salvinis and 3 firemounth..... they all seem very happy.... since moving out my convicts they have spawned and i have a small tank of about 150 big black eyes looking at me at night now.... they really are interesting to watch and are firccly guarding them.... tank seems to have settled slightly..... nitrate is coming down quite slowly but is coming down non the less..... seems to be getting better


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