LEROY Posted June 8, 2009 Share Posted June 8, 2009 Hey everyone, my tank has been cycling for almost 2 months now and it seems like I cannot get my nitrates under 20ppm. I have a 10 gallon FOWLR (without the fish as of yet). I've got a little over 10 pounds of cured live rock in there and I am running my AC 50 fuge mod with filter floss and chaeto. I change the floss like every 4-5 days and my CUC currently consists of 2 tiny blue leg hermits, 2 turbo snails and a scarlet hermit. I am doing 40-50% water changes every week and all my other parameters are in order and SG at 1.024. I'm not sure if this is a contributing factor to my high nitrate readings but when I started the tank I used a 15lb bag of aragonite sand in my 10 gallon, therefore the sand bed is about 2" deep. If this is a problem should I remove some sand and do another water change? I am just getting frustrated with the constant nitrate reading of 20ppm it never goes down!!! I don't have any corals but would it make a difference if I used ro/di water instead of just ro? Well any suggestions would be greatly appreciated, thanks in advance. -Steve. Link to comment
lakshwadeep Posted June 8, 2009 Share Posted June 8, 2009 Have you tested your source water? Link to comment
dweakl01 Posted June 8, 2009 Share Posted June 8, 2009 +1 for testing your source water. If your source water is not 0 TDS RO, then you should be getitng some. Also, 20 ppm NO3 is not that bad. I keep a very colorful 250 gallon SPS system with 20 ppm NO3. I think too many people in this hobby strive for 0 NO3, and get frustrated and try all kinds of stuff and end up screwing their tanks up more than anything. I have a friend who keeps beautiful reefs with N03 in the 100 - 120 range. Whatever you do, do it slowly. Link to comment
MGDMIRAGE Posted June 15, 2009 Share Posted June 15, 2009 Have you been feeding the CUC anything? flakes are pretty horrible for phosphate and trate. Link to comment
neal90 Posted June 15, 2009 Share Posted June 15, 2009 20 ppm isnt that bad what problems are you having with the tank Link to comment
MGDMIRAGE Posted June 15, 2009 Share Posted June 15, 2009 Yeah 20 ppm is nothing if you are doing fish only, but since you don't have any fish yet adding fish would only make it rise. Then maybe toss some purigen in the filter to scavenge for trates as well. Link to comment
addicted2reefer Posted June 15, 2009 Share Posted June 15, 2009 What test kit and how old is the kit, but i agree start with the source first, then maybe your test kit is inaccurate. Link to comment
lakshwadeep Posted June 15, 2009 Share Posted June 15, 2009 +1 for testing your source water. If your source water is not 0 TDS RO, then you should be getitng some. Also, 20 ppm NO3 is not that bad. I keep a very colorful 250 gallon SPS system with 20 ppm NO3. I think too many people in this hobby strive for 0 NO3, and get frustrated and try all kinds of stuff and end up screwing their tanks up more than anything. I have a friend who keeps beautiful reefs with N03 in the 100 - 120 range. Whatever you do, do it slowly. Do you have pics for these tanks? Most of your threads are in the classifieds section. Link to comment
LEROY Posted June 17, 2009 Author Share Posted June 17, 2009 I think I will test the source water. It comes from my grocery store and it seems that they are notorious for keeping up with maintenance of their filters. When I use the ro water from my folks' house during the cycle I had the same nitrate reading but I have since noticed some diatoms growing and I'm guessing it's the source water. Thanks for all of the advice everyone. Oh and I am using the API saltwater test kit. Link to comment
vangvace Posted June 18, 2009 Share Posted June 18, 2009 Pic of test tube next to card. (API can sometimes be difficult to distinguish 0-20 nitrates) Link to comment
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