Lowering Nitrite/nitrate

[PlatinumAngel]

Ok, so I'd been having some of my smaller fish die on me so I did a test in my 75 gallon.
My Nitrite came back purple at 1.0 and nitrate I'd say around 5.0.
Now my tank is still cycling, as it's about a month old.
How can I lower this? My ammonia was high too but I added ammo-lock and hopefully that will help that. Although my ph is low... go figure.
I'm tired of pulling dead fish from my tanks. Help!

 

[ox5477]

well if you have the opportunity to return your fish you have now... do it. it will make completeling a cycle 100% easier as you dont have to worry about doing wc's to protect the fish. here is the link to a thread that will explain Fishless Cycling to you. If you can't then heres what your gonna have to do.

Stop using the ammo-lock. This is soaking up the ammonia that your bacteria needs. This will only draw out the cycling process and cause your fish to go through more stress. The bacteria need a supply of food to grow and multiply so by using the ammo lock, your starving the ammonia eating bacteria... which are then not producing nitrite.... thereby starving the nitrite eating bacteria....

So, I would say start doing daily 30% wc's. This will help keep levels of the waste chemicals down... while still leaving some for the bacteria to feed on and reproduce. Keep doing the wc's every day and test the water everyday until you read 0 ammonia and 0 nitrite (do tests before wc). nitrate isnt as important but you dont want this to get over 60-70ppm depending on what species of fish you have. This will prob take a while too, but this is what needs to be done to try and protect your fish.

Ox

 

[PlatinumAngel]

well if you have the opportunity to return your fish you have now... do it. it will make completeling a cycle 100% easier as you dont have to worry about doing wc's to protect the fish. here is the link to a thread that will explain Fishless Cycling to you. If you can't then heres what your gonna have to do.

Stop using the ammo-lock. This is soaking up the ammonia that your bacteria needs. This will only draw out the cycling process and cause your fish to go through more stress. The bacteria need a supply of food to grow and multiply so by using the ammo lock, your starving the ammonia eating bacteria... which are then not producing nitrite.... thereby starving the nitrite eating bacteria....

So, I would say start doing daily 30% wc's. This will help keep levels of the waste chemicals down... while still leaving some for the bacteria to feed on and reproduce. Keep doing the wc's every day and test the water everyday until you read 0 ammonia and 0 nitrite (do tests before wc). nitrate isnt as important but you dont want this to get over 60-70ppm depending on what species of fish you have. This will prob take a while too, but this is what needs to be done to try and protect your fish.

Ox

Thanks.
Most of my fish are fish I moved from a 25 gallon I've only added a few neons and plattys. Well, I just added the ammo lock again before I read your post. Whoops. I'll do a wc tonight when I get home. Now on these water changes, am I to vacuum much gravel? I've heard at the beginning not to do that too much.
The fish I have are angels, bala sharks guppies, one platty, and other assorted tetras. So far in that tank I've just lost a few of the new neons, a new guppy and one of the plattys which was also new.
I only added the ammolock b/c the guy at my LFS suggested it for the higher ammonia levels in my 10 gallon which is cycling right now too, but just with dwarf frogs.

 

[ox5477]

well for future.... read the fishless cycling link I sent you and do that for a new tank. It doesnt put fish in the tank to be stressed and is much quicker and easier then doing wc's everyday and drawing out the cycling process to months rather than a few weeks.

Make sure you do wc's everyday on both tanks until the ammonia and nitrite read 0. I would also encourage you to write down the values you get everyday to keep a log to notice whether your values are going down or up and also can be used as a tool for the other members here on TFF trying to help you.

One thing too, I know your asking about issues with tank chemistry, but i should warn you now... bala sharks grow far too large for a 25G tank. individual balas can reach 12-14" as adults and need to be in shoals of 4-6 for security.... hence needing atleast a 125G tank for comfort and prob larger as they are very active and skiddish fish. Also, depending on how tall your tank is, the angel may be a little cramped as well. they require 18" of height as they are more of a vertical fish with their long flowing fins.

Ox

 

[Miss Wiggle]

just to say i agree with everything ox has said, in addition to the link he gave have a read of the link in my sig 'whats cycling' which will also help you to understand the process a little better.

have you still got the 25gal running?

 

[PlatinumAngel]

just to say i agree with everything ox has said, in addition to the link he gave have a read of the link in my sig 'whats cycling' which will also help you to understand the process a little better.

have you still got the 25gal running?

Ox, they're in a 75 gallon now. And it's def deep enough for the angels.
I actually didn't have the time or space to cycle the new tank before taking down the 25 gallon. So no, the 25 gallon is down too or I would have cycled fishlessly. Our living room just couldn't handle both tanks.
I will start writing down the levels everyday. So glad I bought the python instead of using buckets... that would have killed me doing this many water changes.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

what did you do with the filter from the 25 gal..... if you'd hooked the old filter up on the new tank then you wouldn't have had to cycle at all

how long ago did you do the change over? what's happened to the old filter?

 

[ox5477]

Glad to hear you have upgraded to the 75G. How many balas do you have? I would recommend a shoal of atleast 3 or 4. They will prob still outgrow the tank eventually, but you can have a good year of them in there growing. Make sure you have a tight fitting, heavy lid, as they are known as jumpers as well, from being so skiddish.

I agree, it would take me all afternoon to do a wc on my 125G using 6 gallon buckets. The python is a godsend

Ox

 

[PlatinumAngel]

Glad to hear you have upgraded to the 75G. How many balas do you have? I would recommend a shoal of atleast 3 or 4. They will prob still outgrow the tank eventually, but you can have a good year of them in there growing. Make sure you have a tight fitting, heavy lid, as they are known as jumpers as well, from being so skiddish.

I agree, it would take me all afternoon to do a wc on my 125G using 6 gallon buckets. The python is a godsend

Ox

We have glass lids the only holes are small ones next to the filter, and we have two balas. Might consdier getting one more once the tank stabalizes.

Miss Wiggle,
We had an undergravel filter. We did put a stocking with some of the gravel in the filter to help speed up the cycling. I wouldn't have thought we should have had so many problems. The old filter wouldn't have worked at all on this tank.

 

[Corleone]

Ammo lock won't soak up all the ammonia - it converts it to ammonium, which is less toxic and your bacteria can still utilize it. However, it'll throw your test results far out of whack for some reason (I used it during an ammonia spike when I was a newbie and ended up testing 8ppm ammonia when I'd only had 0.5 before using it) and makes it difficult to pin down what you need to do. At this point, your best route is water changes. It'll take a lot of them, but you'll have to keep ammonia and nitrite under .25 until they go away entirely. Thank god you have a python - I spent the last week hauling buckets every day with my 55, and just about broke my back.

With an undergravel filter, moving some gravel will help, but the only way to have bypassed a cycle entire would have been to cram ALL the gravel into your new filter, so you move your whole biofilter. Probably not an option, obviously. But just about any amount of it will help introduce bacteria, so it wasn't a waste.

 

[PlatinumAngel]

Ammo lock won't soak up all the ammonia - it converts it to ammonium, which is less toxic and your bacteria can still utilize it. However, it'll throw your test results far out of whack for some reason (I used it during an ammonia spike when I was a newbie and ended up testing 8ppm ammonia when I'd only had 0.5 before using it) and makes it difficult to pin down what you need to do. At this point, your best route is water changes. It'll take a lot of them, but you'll have to keep ammonia and nitrite under .25 until they go away entirely. Thank god you have a python - I spent the last week hauling buckets every day with my 55, and just about broke my back.

With an undergravel filter, moving some gravel will help, but the only way to have bypassed a cycle entire would have been to cram ALL the gravel into your new filter, so you move your whole biofilter. Probably not an option, obviously. But just about any amount of it will help introduce bacteria, so it wasn't a waste.

Glad it wasn't a waste.
I took the test before I added the ammo lock this morning.
Well we had a 25 foot one, was a different brand, but we put the new tank further from the sink, so we had to buy the 50 footer.
That sucks. Buckets are brutal for anything bigger than a 10g.
I'll start with the water changes and hopefully they'll help. I hate feeling like I can't add any fish or worrying about the ones I have already.