Nitrate In My Tap Water!

[verdamper]

Hi everybody

My 15 gallon tank has now been cycling for a month and yesterday was showing 0 nitrite and 0 ammonia. Which was dropping from 5ppm ammonia in a 12 hour period. The nitrate level was high as normal when finishing cycling So yesterday i did a 90% water change and reduced the tempreture of my tank to about 76 ( it was mid eighties for cycling). I was planning on getting some of my fish today but tested the water this morning and the ammonia was 0 the nitrite was 0 but the nitrate was a round 10-20!! So the fish went on hold!! the nitrate should be lower due to the 90% water change but is not!!

So i serched on the net and found information that tap water can contain nitrate, so i tested my tap water and the level of nitrate was around 10 -20!!! I have two questions

1, is the water safe to drink?

2, how do i remove the nitrate before adding to my tank?

i treated the water with tap water conditioner to remove clorine by the way

please help

 

[dwarfgourami]

A nitrates reading of 10-20 ppm in your tap water is nothing unusual and nothing you need to worry about, either for yourself or the fish. Mine varies between 5 and 40 ppm- it's farmland around here, all those cows crapping. Haven't done me any harm that I know of.

Most fish are fine with nitrates up to 40 ppm, and often even more. If you intend to keep extremely sensitive fish (many people would say discus, and some oddballs too), you would need to buy an RO unit to treat the water, but most community fish are not fussy about nitrates.

 

[sankyj]

Hi everybody

My 15 gallon tank has now been cycling for a month and yesterday was showing 0 nitrite and 0 ammonia. Which was dropping from 5ppm ammonia in a 12 hour period. The nitrate level was high as normal when finishing cycling So yesterday i did a 90% water change and reduced the tempreture of my tank to about 76 ( it was mid eighties for cycling). I was planning on getting some of my fish today but tested the water this morning and the ammonia was 0 the nitrite was 0 but the nitrate was a round 10-20!! So the fish went on hold!! the nitrate should be lower due to the 90% water change but is not!!

So i serched on the net and found information that tap water can contain nitrate, so i tested my tap water and the level of nitrate was around 10 -20!!! I have two questions

1, is the water safe to drink?

2, how do i remove the nitrate before adding to my tank?

i treated the water with tap water conditioner to remove clorine by the way

please help

You should be ok with that reading, adding plants is a good way of bringing Nitrates down

 

[verdamper]

Thanks for the help guys, i only plan on keeping community fish so i should be fine. MY tank is also well planted so this should help. I just thought that nitrate was dangerous bgut if low levels are ok then i am cool!! I will get my fish tomorrow then!! Thanks agin for the help this forum is so usefull i would be lost without it!!

 

[KeeperOfFishyPeace]

Nitrates aren't too dangerous but nitrites and ammonia are, keep up the water changes and testing, and you're good to go (with you fish too, of course)!

 

[Kiwigirl]

the level of nitrate was around 10 -20!!!

This level of nitrates is ok, your plants will love it.

How heavily is you tank planted???

 

[Creature Seeker]

Wouldn't a Nitrate sponge in the internal filter also help?

...

 

[andywg]

That level of nitrates is perfectly fine, as mentioned above.

The only research paper I have heard of on nitrates showed that no ill effects (long or short term) were reported at nitrate levels under 100 ppm. So long as you don't go over 100, you should be fine.

 

[MHunt]

I must admit, my tap water has a very low nitrate, only 10 - 20 ppm. My bigger concern is my pH which comes out of the tap at about a 9! Even so, my tank pH has settled at about 6.5 to 7.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

That level of nitrates is perfectly fine, as mentioned above.

The only research paper I have heard of on nitrates showed that no ill effects (long or short term) were reported at nitrate levels under 100 ppm. So long as you don't go over 100, you should be fine.

even our marine's and coral's are still surviving in 70/80ppm of nitrates (read the thread in my sig before you flame me) and they're much more sensitive to them than tropicals.

yeah if you can keep them under about 40ppm, but it's nothing to be massivley concerned about.

 

[MHunt]

1, is the water safe to drink?

This was mentioned in the "you know you're a fishkeeper when" thread!