Need Advice About Nitrate

[LuSciOuS_GirL]

HI I am not sure if this is the right subforum to post in. but if it isn't it can be moved.

Anyways my problem is this. For the last week or so I've noticed my tank is going through really high Nitrate spike.
Tank contains BGK, 1 Angel fish, 1 Pink skirt, 2 guppies.

For the last 4 days in a row i check my tank and my stats are for everything Amonia, Nitirte @ 0.0
and when i check my Nitrate its as high as 110-120. I do about 70-80% water change and test again. it shows between 0 and 5. The next day i check and its again at 110-120. How can it spike so high over night Is there something i am doing wrong I am not overfeeding them. b/c for last week i went to 1 feeding a day.

Please help. I've noticed my BGK acts really stressed out when Nitrates are high. he's been in my care for almost a year now. His size is 9" he is very healthy and beautiful fish. I don't want anything to hapen to him.

Please if there anything i can do to stop the spike let me know.

Thank you.

 

[Mr._Fishy]

The test kit could be faulty. What brand is it? I can't see how you would get readings like that just overnight without any nitrite or ammonia readings. I am not sure if the bgk would even survive in those kind of conditions. How big is the tank? How are the other fish acting? You could try to get a different test kit and see what the reading is on that. Check for any rotting material in the tank as this would cause a spike in the pollutant levels.

Hope all goes well,

Ryan

 

[LuSciOuS_GirL]

Tank size is 33g

I use Nutrafin Master test kit. Same kit we use to test our 75g tank with 8' Oscar.
And it works just fine for the 75g. and it has to work, b/c it shows different reading after water change.
When Nitrate is that high my BGK sleeps constantly and i know he doesn't sleep that much in normal conditions, and when he is awake he comes out of his hiding spot and swims up and down really fast. my other fish seems to be not moving as much as they usually do.

I thought may be I made a mistake somehow when testing. so I got my hasband test it today and it showed same reading. 110ppm before and 0-5 after water change.
He is stunned too. we can't figure it out.

i checked everything for rotting material. Last fish I had to remove was sword tail about 2 weeks ago. And that was b/c my angel fish pecked his eyes out. and i know he was alive when i had to put him down. so there is no dead or missing fish.

i will do another test at midnight and one toworrow. if same problem persists i am thinking of taking out all of my gravel and cleaning it off when i do water change tomorrow. I will just use water I take out of the tank to wash out what ever is left after gravel cleaning.

Any other advice would be apreciated.

Thank you

 

[Mr._Fishy]

Once when I didn't do a water change for a few weeks (vacation then sick for a week), my nitrates were 60 and my bgk just swam forward and backwards in the same spot for a while and was a lot more skittish. The other fish just seemed to be half conscious and were sluggish. That was just 60. I think for you part of it is the test kit. Theoretically, the nitrates shouldn't go from 120 all the way down to 5 with a 70-80% change. They also shouldn't sky rocket that much overnight without a major ammonia and nitrite spike. Is the tank hooked up to a sump with another tank? If so, could it be something in the other tank(s)? Have you added any fish. Try thoroughly vacuuming the substrate and don't feed the fish.

You do realize that a 33g is far too small for a bgk. Given the proper care, they can grow to 20"+. I would recommend 4.5x2 (do they make 4.5' tanks?)as a minimum tank size. It will also probably eat those guppies soon.

Ryan

 

[LuSciOuS_GirL]

Once when I didn't do a water change for a few weeks (vacation then sick for a week), my nitrates were 60 and my bgk just swam forward and backwards in the same spot for a while and was a lot more skittish. The other fish just seemed to be half conscious and were sluggish. That was just 60. I think for you part of it is the test kit. Theoretically, the nitrates shouldn't go from 120 all the way down to 5 with a 70-80% change. They also shouldn't sky rocket that much overnight without a major ammonia and nitrite spike. Is the tank hooked up to a sump with another tank? If so, could it be something in the other tank(s)? Have you added any fish. Try thoroughly vacuuming the substrate and don't feed the fish.

You do realize that a 33g is far too small for a bgk. Given the proper care, they can grow to 20"+. I would recommend 4.5x2 (do they make 4.5' tanks?)as a minimum tank size. It will also probably eat those guppies soon.

Ryan

about test kits. i think it works fine b/c it shows normal readings for our 75g.
And I didn't add any new fish for about a month or so. And even then they were killed withing few days by my Angel. And i did remove their remains out of the tank. so i know there is no rotting flesh or anything else.

i figure i have to much gravel. about 2-3 inches.

I will remove some of the gravel. and see if that helps.

right now i have 75g with single oscar. and running 55g for about a month. when its ready BGK goes there by himself. and 33g will stay community. BGK is not the problem. he doesn't touch my guppies. My angel fish is a different story. he is agressive, and i keep loosing my fish to him, rather then known preditor. at first i thought it was BGK till i caught my Angel eating my baby guppies. who were about 3 month old when released into community tank. then he pecked the eyes out on my swordtails. so yeah i have to get BGK into his new home.

Thanks for the advice. I will put my fish on a day or two of diet. and clean out gravel.

 

[Mr._Fishy]

Did you actually see the angelfish pecking out the eyes of the sword tail? Because my bgk plucked the eyes out of an angelfish and a couple others. Also, angelfish will eat smaller fish given the chance, as neons and other small fish are part of their diet in the wild.

Too much gravel can be a problem. You can develop pockets of nasty stuff if you don't vacuum the substrate and/or your substrate layer is too thick. Maybe you disturbed a pocket while cleaning?

Good luck

 

[andywg]

Sounds to me like the test kit is going wrong. If you have nitrates of 110ppm, and you get them down to 5ppm in one water change, you would have to have changed over 95% of the water and replaced it with water at 0ppm nitrates.

 

[Mr._Fishy]

Sounds to me like the test kit is going wrong. If you have nitrates of 110ppm, and you get them down to 5ppm in one water change, you would have to have changed over 95% of the water and replaced it with water at 0ppm nitrates.

That's what I said. I also don't think it is possible to go from 5 ppm to 110ppm nitrates just over night without any nitrites or ammonia. Do you know if it would be?

 

[LuSciOuS_GirL]

Sounds to me like the test kit is going wrong. If you have nitrates of 110ppm, and you get them down to 5ppm in one water change, you would have to have changed over 95% of the water and replaced it with water at 0ppm nitrates.

That's what I said. I also don't think it is possible to go from 5 ppm to 110ppm nitrates just over night without any nitrites or ammonia. Do you know if it would be?

as I say again it is not test kit. we tested it on 2 other tanks and it worked fine.

I did have close to 3 inches of gravel. I took some out 2 days ago. now i have about 1 1/2 of gravel and for the last 2 days reading was fine. I can't believe that too much gravel can cause problem like this. May be there was a pocket of waste that I disturbed when i was gravel cleaning.

Mr._Fishy- yeah i was watching as my Angel was "sucking" the eye out. thats when i've noticed sword tails second eye was already gone. i tried to get angel away from him, but he kept attacking fish and the net.

I wanted to have big peacfull community tank. But with angel now I don't know what fish i can put in there. considering my guppy is pregnant and ready to drop her fry. So she will be separated into 20g till she is done.

 

[andywg]

as I say again it is not test kit. we tested it on 2 other tanks and it worked fine.

How then do you explain that the test kit is reading so high and then so low. Something in the testing process is going wrong. Considering how inaccurate the vast majority of nitrate test kits that we can afford are, I think the most likely problem is with the test kit. Have you tried another couple of test kits from other companies to compare the results?

How do you know that the other two tanks are not just giving inaccurate results in another way?

It is impossible for the nitrates to drop from 110ppm to 5ppm without changing over 95% of the water.