*How do you control nitrate in your aquarium, and what range of nitrate do you feel comfortable with?* And if you want more info on nitrate as part of the nitrogen cycle, don't forget to check out my video here: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-D2rxFNM8sDA.html
I think the most challenging things for beginner and intermediate fishkeepers to understand about nitrates (or any potentially dangerous nutrient) is that 1. we are taking static measurements of a dynamic system and 2. we often use nitrate as a proxy for all macro and micronutrients. If you read 0 ppm nitrates that means they are being consumed as fast as they are produced. If you read any amount over 0, then your tank is producing nitrogenous wastes faster than it is consuming them and water changes will be necessary. This dynamic changes as more plants grow (more consumption) or as fish population or feeding increases (more production). You need to re-revaluate your fertilizer dosing periodically. Also, when we are using nitrates as a proxy for all plant nutrients, we might misdiagnose poor plant health as low nitrates when in fact it could be low light, potassium, phosphorus or a micronutrient. Adding nitrate heavy fertilizer might improve plant health at the expense of fish or invertebrate health. There’s just no safe “lazy” way to dose fertilizer.
If you watch older video's or read older article's they would tell you at 20 ppm you better do at least a 50% water change right then before everything is dead.
old answer: i don't worry about it. i find plants that work with my water and keep them. i'm a pretty lazy aquarist, so path of least resistance is good for me. new answer: i've learned a lot the last couple of years, and am getting to move my 55 to a 75 and set up all that i have learned in the last couple of years. this was good info, and even with many decades of fish keeping experience, i learned something for this video. looking forward to your next.
I’ve given up completely on submerged plants and gone with plants grown out of the water with their roots in the water (pothos, philodendron, monstera). I don’t need to add co2 and can keep the light off most of the time on the aquarium itself, so no algae problems. They handle nitrates better than submerged plants ever did for me.
It's even more complicated for plants as they need a ratio of macro nutrients Nitrate, Phosphorous and Potassium/Sulphur (Potash) which Aquarium Ferts typically provide. Out of ratio plants suffer and algae increases, tank sourced Nitrates from fish poop throw the ratio off. Then there's the micro nutrients / minerals. Glad you're preparing another video about it. (Easy Green has macro and micro nutrients).
Awesome video as always! I love how you make sure to address things in a way that doesn't assume every viewer is familiar with fish keeping. Can't wait for the next video! I just started keeping plants so looking forward to it!
Irene I love your videos and the style that you explain things. A lot of people don’t understand nitrates and live plants. I still feel that I have a lot to learn.
I LOVE ACO's test strips and Easy Green, as well as the occasional dose of Easy Iron where applicable. No longer need any other brand fertilizers. I even use EG on my houseplants!
Note that the mg/L (ppm) values quoted in scientific literature are generally done with a NO3-N ("nitrate nitrogen") test (like the Hach test). The test in the standard API kit is straight NO3 (nitrate alone, not NO3-N). The equivalence is about 1 (NO3-N) : 4.4 (NO3). Thus, if a research paper gives a value of 100ppm, then the equivalent value on the API test is about 440ppm. Unfortunately, above 40 on the API test it gets very difficult to tell what the value really is. That is just to say that most people stress WAY too much over this number.
We use potted plants underwater for easier substrate cleaning. Then plants on top by replacing the lid with chickenwire. Use the stainless wire, usually coated with green plastic. Cut neatly to fit with all sides folded over an inch or two. I also block my top light at a 40 degree angle towards the plants..
It's a good series. And you're doing a fantastic job of hitting the primary points at an approachable level of detail. You are correct, research is conducted (in this regard) in either recirculated aquaculture or in the study of natural systems (limnology). Very, very, very few studies actually focus on an aquarium; and the few that do are often focused on coral due to how threated coral has become. Due to this, it's hard to find specific's on something like a toxicity level of a nutrient on an aquarium fish. You did a good job of trying to run that down. There are also related fields that have an even better understanding of specific areas; such as nutrient management being another agricultural field which is entirely dedicated to understanding nutrient cycling, feralization, inputs and outputs/uptake. Or pedology's (soil science) understanding of both natural soils and sediments, and artificial substrates. And they often usually have a well developed understanding of the microbial communities which inhabit them. Two areas of research you may want to draw off of for other future video's. Then of course theirs's horticulture and botany for anything plant related. Those are most of the applied sciences most related to this hobby. Also, while easy green is a fantastic product. And I know you're linked to aquarium co-op, which is a good company and a great educational source for new hobbyists. Hobbyist's should not really start with an all-in-one fertilizer, until they have enough plant bio mass which requires it. Cory should have gotten his act together years ago and had a second product line which lacks both N & P in the formulation. Why? If you expand that nitrogen cycle even further, macro molecules in fish feed are chalk full of nitrogenous compounds and a fairly high phosphorus load. They are in forms such as protein and nucleic acids (which get broken down and become available through different bio-process's in the aquarium). In that early phase of the hobby, where even you admittedly struggled to reign in Nitrate: the last thing you want to do is dump in more Nitrate. It's pouring gas on a fire. N, P, & K are the often dubbed the "primary macro nutrients" because plants (and most life) needs them in large quantiles; alongside C, O, & H which are either found in carbon dioxide or water. If you don't yet have a large plant load but do have too many fish, you'll get all the N & P you need from the conversion of fish food to waste. In this earlier stage, something like Brightwell's FlorinMulti is a better option. I really don't care about a specific brand, they just happen to have a product which fits the discussion topic. Once you hit the point you're at now, where the plant uptake exceeds the available N & P from feeding: now is when an all-in-one is advisable. (also, Plants will use ammonia as often as they will use nitrate. don't dos ammonia, but understand that point, as you won't catch it if your only testing for nitrate) That's why so many call it a "balance", you're balancing input against uptake. And it's is a moving target, which can swing the other way as well. For instance, if you don't provide the plants enough nutrients to allow them to grow, they will die off and you will go back to having to many nitrates again. Or if you have a large fish loss, you may start out with a algae bloom from to much nitrate, but over time you may starve out the plants if you don't increase the fertilizations or replace the fish load. Hence, a balancing act. It's almost impossible to perfectly match input to uptake in a system, as everything is growing and changing. But it's certainly a fun challenge try try. And for that reason, I'm happy to see you and the Co-op push testing. Strips take only a few second, and we a hobbyist's have no way of knowing (with any detail) unless we test. It's a great "best practice" to raise hobbyist's success rates. It's a good series.
With every tank I try to achieve a balance and keep it very simple. I stopped chasing plants that require too much work and embrace the ones that thrive but every tank is different. I have easy green and potassium but I don’t even dose those on a schedule. I’m not lazy necessarily but I hate over working to the point I don’t enjoy my hobby. So I do take the “lazy” approach but I’ve just never been extra. I prefer simplicity and in nature things balance themselves out. I feel balance is always the best starting point.
I have a 5 gallon(betta, mystery snail, cherry shrimp) and a 16 gallon tank(betta, 3 kuhli loaches, mystery snail, amano shrimp). Right now I just check for nitrites and ammonia.
I control my nitrates by using a slow moving plenum or anoxic filtration. these systems keep nitrates low because the bacteria that grows actually feeds off it, it also keeps your phosphates low which is the main cause of algae. Nitrates are not just a bi product from fish, its anything that is rotting in the aquarium that is causing ammonia. eg rotting plant matter, or sludge on the bottom of the tank. dirty filters will also contribute to nitrates. Plants are a great way to keep nitrates down, however you will need to use fast growing stem plants. Slow low light plants will not consume nitrate the way fast stem plants do which means that if your not using anoxic filtration than water changes will need to be done frequently.
I suspect the difference in "how much is too much" recommendations is largely because of OTHER water parameters affecting how toxic nitrate is as well as some species of freshwater inhabitants being more sensitive than others (and some bloodlines are hardier than others, too!) . For example, I've seen some platies and guppies tolerate up to 200 ppm and still reproduce and grow like crazy. But then I've also seen other platies and guppies only thrive if nitrate stays below 100 ppm. At the same time, I've seen in my own tanks that my shrimp suffer if I let nitrates top 50 ppm. They seem to be the most sensitive occupants on my current tanks, so that's my own cutoff point.
I'm new to aqariums. My daughter was given a 30g and 10g tank from her uncle when he moved with all of his fish. I wanted just artificial but after all this research I've added some live plants. We lost 5 fish in the move but the one tank has stabilized. The 10g has high nitrates but I did all 1ml of fertizer for the Java fern.
The 10g I plan on replacing with a 50-75g for the common pleco. Hes alone in that tank until I have money in the next month or two for the bigger tank. He's about 7" long.
HELP! STUMPED. I have a three month old planted tank. Ammonia 0, Nitrites 0, Nitrates 160+. It has no fish. Occasionally, I will see a wilted leaf and remove it, but most of the plants are growing. My floaters have multiplied so much that they would cover the entire surface it I didn’t corral them. The lights are on 15 hours a day. There is not a spec of algae in the tank. The substrate is gravel. There is no organic material in the tank except the plants. Tap water has minimal nitrates. I do not fertilize the tank, except I broke one root tab in half and buried in under two rooted plants. I can’t figure out where all the nitrates are coming from. Advice? I love your videos 😊
From my experience ammonia binding dechlorinators, and bottled bacteria, along with a fair amount of plants and a hang on back filter, along with three do it yourself filters in a moderately overstocked 10 gallon tank(12 fish including an 8 inch growing common pleco) has kept my fish healthy and happy for the last almost 6 months, even though most fish Karens on the internet say I should keep them in a no less than a THOUSAND GALLON tank for 12 fish, or I’m a fish racist! I don’t do the tests anymore until I start losing fish again. Btw I’m using Excel by seachem for the plants…is that recommended?
Is the 200 ppm figure talked about actually NO3 ppm as we measure it with (for example) an API test, or nitrate-N ppm? Did you check for that? Because the latter needs to be multiplied by 4.4 for a conversion to NO3.
It’s in NO3-N. But the authors of the paper concluded that US Federal NO3-N safe level should be reduced from 10 ppm to 2 ppm (or from 44 ppm nitrate to 8.8 ppm nitrate).
@@GirlTalksFish well, it’s complicated. One piece of information in that study included in the review was that the lethal dose of nitrates as measured by an aquarium test kit for guppy fry is about 875 ppm. However, the overall conclusions of the review of lots of toxicology studies is that the safe level of nitrates as measured by aquarium test kits for freshwater systems is 8.8 ppm.
@@Dylan-ok6ft That 8.8 ppm nitrate number doesn't seem to reflect my personal experiences at all it comes to common aquarium fish and aquarium water test kits. 🤔 Do you mind linking the studies you're referring to?
I've done some reading and as far as I understand, in unpolluted waters in the nature nitrate levels rarely exceed even 10 ppm. Yet plants have no trouble growing. I think people overestimate how much nitrate plants need and even can use. An abudance may not only harm the plants but the aquatic animals as well.
Part 3 can't come fast enough! I've been struggling to keep enough nutrients, and eliminating deficiencies, for months on my new tank setup! I know I have something out of whack because I continue to have algae growing rampant
Hi need your advise I just setup my new tank 1 week ago and cycling the tank Do a water change 40% After few days my nitrites are 5mg at max toxic level My ph is 7.6 and ammonia is zero Any advice how to lower the nitrites
Hi, I absolutely love your videos! I was hoping you could answer a question I have. I have a 10 gallon planted tank with red cherry shrimp and one large zebra Nerite snail. I had a bloom of detritus worms--the kind that live in the substrate and the kind that live on the glass. There are way too many for my taste, despite having cut back on food and doing thorough cleanings. What fish would you recommend I put in the tank to help eat the worm population?
I'm a newcomer and bought a 200L tank and put lots of plants in a 3 to 4 inch deep soil capped with sand substrate. Then dosed it with ammonium chloride drops. I used those dip strips and it registered zero ammonia. So the next day I put more ammonia in, still those strips registered nothing. After repeating this for several days I bought the API test tube kit and the ammonia was high off the scale, but the dip strips now only registered one grade up from zero. It took three 50% water changes just to get the ammonia within measurable range and it killed several plants. I will not be using those strips again - and yes, they are in date etc. Fortunately no fish in the tank yet.
The nitrate problem can be can be further complicated by your tap water if you're using decorated tap water for your water changes. It's always worth testing your tapwater nitrate levels: mine are 20ppm (the UK and EU legal limit that water companies should not exceed is 50ppm!) Nitrate removal is far harder than ammonia and nitrite removal - there are no quick, simple, cheap methods to get rid of it. Balance is the best solution. Plants need nitrate to grow. Aquarium inhabitants produce nitrate as the end result of the nitrogen cycle. Balance the amount of plants with a sensible stocking level effective lighting and good water filtration/circulation. I have an aquarium with this balance established. It has barely recordable nitrate levels; good plant growth and minimal algae. The nitrate only enters the aquarium via the water top ups (20ppm going in - but the plants remove it quickly... hence the barely recordable nitrate level)
I caved into peer pressure from my coworkers and removed the algae to please their aesthetic needs. I fullt regret removing the algae. The nitrates and nitrites were stable and under control until I removed the algae. Now, I gotta do a 20% water change every other day. Yes the tank is over stocked, slightly, and yes I am working on cycling a new tank to remove some of the fish, but everything was A-OK until I removed the algae to please some amateurs 🙄 NEVER AGAIN.
How do you judge it the other way around? A planted tank with bigger fish that always sits around 40ppm nitrate? Would you say that’s too much as the plants don’t seem to consume enough?
Ill get my first aquarium in a week or two. It will be 105L tank. I will have this fish 1 betta,6 danios,1 dwarf puffferfish and 4 kulli loaches. I will get plants. I rlly wanted to know if plants help and I saw it in video, tysm. Ill get filter,heater and air pump. Is this good tank, let me know I dont want fish to suffer or die. I have one more problem I need to get fish and aquarium on same day. I thought about when i get home to let aquarium cycle for 4h before fish get in. Btw how long can they be in bags? Will they be ok? 🥺
I just started using the co-op test strips. Could you tell me why my Hardness/GH is testing pink? There is no pink on the chart. I noticed in the video yours was too.
Okay, so my plants are growing great! But I noticed something the other day. The leaves of my plants are growing, like, roots? on the leaves. I pick them off, but I have NO idea what this is. Could it be a parasite? They are really embedded in the leaves. I pulled all my plants out (they can float and still grow. But I have no idea what this is. I can’t find anything on it! Who I take them out and start over. They are only a month off. I noticed it yesterday! Help!!
My nitrate, nitrate and chlorine are all good and my red eye tetras look good except one but hes hanging in there, and my chinese algae eater is doing great and not bothering my fish. I give him algae wafers and shrimp pellets so he doesnt try to get protein from my babies...im worried he will bother the panda corys when they get here, and if he does hes gotta go...ill put him in our community pond
My problem with all in one fertilizers is the phosphate. My nitrate is always low, so I manually add it weekly, but my phosphate is always high, 2 ppm or higher. Have you any idea why it's always so high? I never add it myself. Thanks for the video 🙂🌷.
Hmm I usually have low phosphate, but my current theory is that I usually feed a lot of low phosphate foods, like frozen and live foods (versus flake foods). I also keep a ton of plants, which probably helps.
Hey Irene (or any other aquarium keeper seeing this), have you ever considered making your own fertilizer with powder sources of nitrogen, potassium, magnesium, etc.? I've been considering it since Green Leaf Aquarium has an available kit for sale and it's more cost effective and customizable for each tank. I'm open to any advice so feel free to give me any of your opinions/experiences/advice.
Hi Irene :) thanks for the great info. Question for you: when I dose my planted tanks with Easy Green my nitrates spike significantly in the following days. This leads to more frequent or larger water changes. Any recomnendations on how to balance this?
Nitrate is one of the primary ingredients of Easy Green (and most fertilizers). The nitrate “spike” you detect is your fertilizer. If you do a water change after fertilizing, you are pouring money down the drain! Do a water change before adding fertilizer. Also, if adding fertilizer is increasing your nitrates beyond safe limits, then don’t add fertilizer. If your plants are healthy, you might not need fertilizer. Or maybe you need a micronutrient fertilizer or a nitrogen-free fertilizer (0-5-5).
I had a quick question, I've been going back and forth on heaters for a 5 gallon Betta tank I'm going to be getting, and every review of every heater I've looked at has had overwhelming amounts of people reporting heater failures. I was wondering what heater you would recommend for a 5 gallon? Thank you:)
This is way late but if you haven't figured it out some fish can live in cold water without a heater. The temperature you keep your house will be the temperature your aquarium is. Study cold water tropical fish and you should find many. Hope this helps.
Ever since I started owning pet fish (3 years) I have always had problems with nitrates. All other parameters were basically at 0 but nitrates was always a issues for me. Even right after a water change the API nitrate test tube will turn red. Wth? And yes I am doing the rest right. So after a while I got busy and had very little time for my tank. All I can do was add water to replace evaporated water. Well guess what? I would go months without Changing water or cleaning my tank and my water was crystal clean and fish never got sick or died. With all that said no trait test tube was still dark red. What's up with that? Should I be concerned? I mean these fish have been in this water for 4 months without a water change and they look as happy as a clam.
So I’m currently creating a tank for a betta with silk plants and some moss balls. I am hoping to add in live plants later on but for a while it will just be the moss balls and the betta as the live things in the tank. Any suggestions on what ppm I should keep the nitrates at?
If it's just moss balls, as in marimos, then probably keeping it fairly low will be fine. Marimos are actually an algae, not a moss, so they're pretty good at taking in everything they need. The worst that could happen with low nitrates is they just don't grow as fast, as far as I know. The beta should easily produce enough waste to keep a few healthy. Just keep it above zero and worry more about how the betta likes things :)
My fish tank water levels for no2 and no3 are very high, I’ve done many water changes and the levels stay the same, I’ve put in a live plant but still isn’t doing anything, all my fish seem fine but, no signs of stress, what do I do? I have a 76L fish tank with 7 fish, everything was good when I got the fish until I started feeding bloodworms and the water went all weird and start getting brown algae on the glass, tested the water level and no2 and no3 are very high, I am really concerned
To keep things simple. In planted tanks I use 50ppm Nitrate as my gauge for intervention. For a tank with no plants, I would keep the tank 20ppm or lower.
@@SequoiaElisabeth looks like I am doing it wrong here then in my planted tank. Normally adding towards 20 every week as my plants bring it down a bit during the week. They grow these days but slower then first months. Will add more in steps and see the change. How high should phosphate be? Thanks in advance 😀
@@TheRiager Phosphate in a planted tank is not usually an issue. No one I know even tests for it. Now in Saltwater tanks it can be a big issue. Some say it causes algae growth, though with regular water changes it's a non issue. Frankly I don't test my water unless I see an issue coming on. Weekly water changes and all is well.
Here's what I got from this video. Nitrates are not bad. Companies try to make you believe they are so they can make money. So, buy some plants and some fertilizer (which can get expensive when you have several tanks!!) to avoid doing water changes (which are free).
Did you really shadow ban me for posting scientific facts? It's not my fault you didn't do enough research. I guess when you're wrong on almost every point in the video it's easier to ban scientific criticism than to post a correction.
HONESTY - YOU ROCK GIRL. I'M LAZY, (ME TOO) , I PUSH THE PRODUCT BECAUSE I WORK FOR THEM & I GET A DISCOUNT. HAHAHAHA YOU'RE A PISSER GIRL. THANKS FOR THE INFO.
I decided to keep plants in my first fish tank and was able to succeed thanks to mostly Irene, along with some other RU-vidrs. The battle against algae was a bit tough, but nothing floating plants and a cleanup crew couldn’t fix! Thanks for sharing your stories, including your failures. In fact, I think those were the most helpful!
This is such a weird topic in the aquarium world...watch 100 different videos about nitrates and you will get 100 different answers. In my opinion, not an expert - but have been an enthusiast since the 80s - it would be REALLY hard to reach a nitrate level that will hurt your fish. I have had tanks will over 100ppm for years with no ill effects for the fish. The downside being high nitrate tanks are really high maintenance as far as algae growth.
Had this same problem, I hadn’t tested my 25g pea puffer tank in a few months after I had all my plants explode/ kept doing my regular cleaning (I would do a weekly 10% and be typically 20-30ppm) but suddenly I tested and my nitrates were 0! I decided to see how long it could go and I think without even doing water changes, it would never go up. I started using some liquid C02 and feeding a little bit heavier, which is doing great! I want to get into a whole c02 set up, although until I have the money it has been great!
My tap water is hard and has at least 40ppm nitrate (hard to tell exactly with the test kit), my fish have never had any issues with it and I do a 25% water change weekly regardless. All the forums online saying you should water change to remove all the nitrate surprise me, I really don't think it matters if your fish are used to it.
most fishes are actually hardy... my tap water is around 80-160 ppm, and i've been fishkeeping for 25 years already... the only way to get rid of nitrate from tap is thru distillation and reverse osmosis
My experience has been somewhat different from yours, Irene. I have a 29 gallon community tank, which is moderately planted. I have never gotten a nitrate reading exceeding 5 ppm. My aquarium bioload is lower than the maximum recommended using AqAdvisor. The only macronutrient fertilizer I have ever used is root tabs, and I haven't used them for a year. My gravel is inert. I change 10-20% of water, vacuum the substrate, and clean the glass weekly. My plants are all fairly easy to grow, and they have never done poorly, despite the low nitrate concentration. I did have a blackbeard algae problem in the past, but I have largely solved it by cutting down on the number of hours of light (now 6-7 hours per day). I assume that I have somehow lucked into a nitrogen-balanced aquarium where the nitrate produced in my system is close to the amount of nitrate taken up by the plants.
You have been a huge help to make my first planted tank enjoyable. After shutting my 7 year old Cicilid tank down I started watching your videos because I wanted to change to planted tank with nano fish. THANK YOU for sharing your experiences!!!
Hello my aquarium has a mix of 14 fish and 25 or so cherry shrimp,mostly planted with low to medium light plants with full spectrum led lighting which mimics sunrise to sunset all in 8 hours, plants are growing and algae has not been as rampant since thankfully. Enjoy your videos thanks for your advice.
I have an non stop nitrate problem for years even tho I do a WC weekly religiously along with my planted 75 with a big canister filter has like 15 big plants and no matter what I do I just can’t get rid of the nitrate. Starting to think the API nitrate test is wrong. Even tho I have multiple nitrate test kits
I like the logic. The discussions on the salt water/ reef side of the aquarium hobby has also spurred a ideal of near zero nitrate & phosphate. Going to try your method, Jim PS: Ever noticed that parents are better at and more relaxed at “poop” discussions? 🤔
@@GirlTalksFish Yup,a definite sign of parenthood & fish guardianship. When one realizes that map directions are given in youth landmarks, “Turn left at the playground, right at the school, right at the town pool, ……,” you’re a seasoned parent. 🤓
