Nitrate & Ammonia Reduction Project

[FishHobby99]

To consum nitrate plants need a lot micro nutrients. If you don't have enough micro nutrients the plants cannot grow and cannot consume any more nitrates. if your trimming the plants frequently you probably have enough micronutrients. If you rarely trim the plants or they don't look well then you probably need more micro nutrients.

What fertilizer do you recommend? I have Seachem’s Flourish. Is it ok?

 

[FishHobby99]

You should look at getting rid of the sand and installing an under-gravel filter, which will turn your substrate into a bio filter that will handle the problems you are having. Also, not all plants are equal, and your plant selection is not correct for what you are trying to achieve

I would never lose the sand. The cichlids/catfish like it.

What commonly available plants would you recommend?

i am indeed achieving what I set out to do. Best params ever, fewer water changes. Too involved with my axie cam & slate cave projects etc to post updates in the ammonia/nitrate uptake thread. Later on.

Could it have been done faster & better? More than likely. I will add any plants you suggest, providing they don’t bite & are avaliable.

 

[itiwhetu]

I would never lose the sand. The cichlids/catfish like it.

What commonly available plants would you recommend?

i am indeed achieving what I set out to do. Best params ever, fewer water changes. Too involved with my axie cam & slate cave projects etc to post updates in the ammonia/nitrate uptake thread. Later on.

Could it have been done faster & better? More than likely. I will add any plants you suggest, providing they don’t bite & are avaliable.

Any stemmed plants will be fine. The stemmed plants are fast growing and take nutrients from the water column.

 

[FishHobby99]

Any stemmed plants will be fine. The stemmed plants are fast growing and take nutrients from the water column.

I bought some tall Rotala when I made the last big Java order. I’ll toss them into the cichlid/catfish tank later.

 

[StevenF]

What fertilizer do you recommend? I have Seachem’s Flourish. Is it ok?

Flourish is actually not a very good fertilizer. It relies on you water having several nutrients and the iron gluconate doesn't last long. Also the sulfate salts in it will react with KH in the water and become unavailable to plants.

The best micro nutrient I know is this one.The only issue The iron in it is stable up to a PH of 7.5 and it may work up to a PH of8. But if your PH is under 7.5 Theron will stain the water a longtime. It has much higher Zinc and copper levels and it uses Chelated ingredient which are not affected by KH in the water. And it is safe for shrimp.

It doesn't have any calcium, magnesium, chloride, nitrogen, potassium, or phosphate. But I would be surprised if any of these are deficient. In my experience with nigh nitrates you likely are high in phosphate and potassium. Yourtap water probably already has sufficient Chloride and Calcium and Magnesium. You should monitor your Gh level and you might want to purchase a phosphate test kit.

As to floating plants I would recommend Red rout floater or Salvinia.

 

[FishHobby99]

Flourish is actually not a very good fertilizer. It relies on you water having several nutrients and the iron gluconate doesn't last long. Also the sulfate salts in it will react with KH in the water and become unavailable to plants.

The best micro nutrient I know is this one.The only issue The iron in it is stable up to a PH of 7.5 and it may work up to a PH of8. But if your PH is under 7.5 Theron will stain the water a longtime. It has much higher Zinc and copper levels and it uses Chelated ingredient which are not affected by KH in the water. And it is safe for shrimp.

It doesn't have any calcium, magnesium, chloride, nitrogen, potassium, or phosphate. But I would be surprised if any of these are deficient. In my experience with nigh nitrates you likely are high in phosphate and potassium. Yourtap water probably already has sufficient Chloride and Calcium and Magnesium. You should monitor your Gh level and you might want to purchase a phosphate test kit.

As to floating plants I would recommend Red rout floater or Salvinia.

Thanks, I will order some later today. I wouldn’t think CL or the other elements you mention come into play. Doesn’t conditioning tap water neutralize them?

Will check out the plants too, but have reservations about using floaters in my big tank. The fish eagerly congregate at the surface for floating food. I have ~20 fairly large ones in there, biggest 6”.

 

[xxBarneyxx]

Doesn’t conditioning tap water neutralize them?

Short answer, nope

A cheaper alternative for getting your trace elements is to buy Chelated trace elements dry salts and make them up yourself. Something like the bag below will keep you going for months, not sure of suppliers outside of the UK though.

Chelated Trace Elements - Dry Salts - Dry Chemicals - Fertilisers

Aquariumplantfood.co.uk,trace elements, chelated trace,Aquarium Hydroponics, Horticulture Chemicals, Nutrients, fertiliser, EI dosing, Easylife, aquatic plants, shop, online shopping

www.aquariumplantfood.co.uk

Agree with the high nitrates you naturally have in your tank you probably don't have to worry about a lack of Macro nutrients.

 

[FishHobby99]

I’m too lazy too research all these details & my fish are doing well with API Tap Water Conditioner. If it ain’t broken, don’t fix it as my my Pops always said.

Big tank nitrate levels down low, thanks to submerged pothos & ”bamboo” roots.

 

[StevenF]

Thanks, I will order some later today. I wouldn’t think CL or the other elements you mention come into play. Doesn’t conditioning tap water neutralize them?

water conditioners don't reomove CL2. They simply convert the toxic forms into a safe chloride salt. Tap water typically has severalPPM of chloride salts which is much more than you need. TypicallyI at tank will only need about 0.05ppm of CL. In myRO water tank I have to add it.

 

[StevenF]

Chelated Trace Elements - Dry Salts - Dry Chemicals - Fertilisers

Aquariumplantfood.co.uk,trace elements, chelated trace,Aquarium Hydroponics, Horticulture Chemicals, Nutrients, fertiliser, EI dosing, Easylife, aquatic plants, shop, online shopping

www.aquariumplantfood.co.uk

Many places sell this procuduct and it likely wouldn't work. the iron in it (FeEDTA) oxidizes at at a PH 6.5 or higher and is unusable by plants. It also doesn't have enough zinc. The one I recommended uses FeDTPA and is good up to a PH of 7.5 and has significantly higher levels of zinc.

 

[FishHobby99]

Thanks for all your insight. You are light years ahead of me on multiple levels.

 

[TwoTankAmin]

I will add a few quick thoughts. Plants in the tank to help remove bad things is a great solution. However, it does not mean no water changes, in fact it may mean more in some planted tanks (high light CO2 added ones for example).

While you may have introduce the plants to help with nitrate, they use more than just this. The more nitrate they consume, the more of the other things are are also consuming. Not doing weekly water changes can mean two things can happen. The first is that the plants use up all of some iof the things they need. The second is the things that they do not need, especially of nothing else in the tank is using them, will accumulate. These need to be removed.

For most of us, a lot of what plants and other things need in a tank comes in with our water (the same is true for what builds up that is not wanted). Usually the best solution to keep things in balance is regular water changes. But there are situations where we need to correct imbalances. So we may add fertilizers and we may add plants or other things to keep the water supplied with things it lacks.

Bear in mind that a lot of what goes in and out of a tank during a water change we do not even have a test kit to measure.


FYI- Measuring nitrate is extremely difficult. The solution, as noted in an above post, isfirst to turn it into nitrite and then to measures that. This is why testing for nitrate when nitrite is present will be inaccurate to some extent. However, nitrite is an issue for fish at pretty low levels and will stall a cycle it if reads 5 ppm or above when tested using the nitrogen scale (favored by science) or about 16.4 ppm on the total ion scale (used in most hobby test kits). The very popular API kits uses the total ion scale. Nitrate readings during cycling can get very high (80 - 100 ppm and above) and the small amount of nitrite that might be present wont matter much in such cases.

 

[FishHobby99]

What do you think about the use of submerged roots of terrestrial plants such as pothos & Lucky Bamboo to remove nitrates?

 

[TwoTankAmin]

They work great if you have the space and the they work with the tank inhabitants. But for unplanted tanks I am partial to Hamburg Mattenfilters and similar massive foam media formats.