NITRATE PROBLEM

[kell73k]

I had a high nitrate problem in my previous tank.  Never did find the source so assumed it was the inert gravel. I have since moved the shrimp to a new tank.....cycled over a month, ada substrate medium planted (bylxxa, pella, fissidens, riccia, replens, and some trident fern. also have floating water lettuce.  The measurements are ph 6.4 ammonia 0, nitrites 0, nitrates 40.  GH 5, KH 1 and tds 170. Before I added the shrimp nitrates were at 5 now within a few weeks they skyrocketed. I am only feeding snowflake and ridx. I am using only r/0 mineralized with ssgh+. I also add mosura sea mud. I cant figure out what is causing the very high nitrates can anyone see something I have missed that would be causing this?  Thank You for reading and any help

[rostick555]

How often are you feeding? Depending on how large your colony is you should be only feeding every other day or every two days for anything under 100 shrimp and in very small quantities. Also if that is not the issue how old is the test kit and some test kits use different scales of measure depending in how you look at the test vile?

[kell73k]

I only feed every 2 or 3 days and feed in a glass dish. I have about 30 shrimp in the tank. I am using api test kit and its fairly new (double checked it with older set I still have). It is very hard to tell which shade of red it falls in, But any red is bad anyway  I am thinking its the plants. I have been finding little pieces of pella and riccia around the tank wondering if they are causing the nitrate spike. They don't appear to be rotting though. tonight I took out the riccia and did a 30% water change with water that was same temp,tds, and ph. I hate to change that much water when the shrimp are pretty new in tank but the nitrates were very high and I lost a shrimp.

[Mamashack]

30 shrimp should be able to manage on what they can scavenge around the tank - maybe only add additional food once every 2 weeks and remove it after a few hours. The exception to this is snowflake food altho a little bit goes a very long way and it can be left in the tank without polluting it as long as there isn't too much of it to start with.

I doubt it was the substrate if it's an inert one. 

Try doing 10% W/C daily until the nitrate is under 20 ppm. 

[OMG Aquatics]

Pretty sure red = 80+?

orange 5-80?

I always overfeed but nitrates are under control. Barely do water change. I have water wisteria, hydroctyle japan, taiwan moss and a small patch of riccia on SS mesh.

hydroctyle japan and water wisteria does most of the nitrate absorbing. I was at 80-160 ppm nitrates at one point but once the plants settle which took me about 3 weeks, nitrites are always 5-20 ppm now. Adding plants does not start absorbing nitrates fast until settled.

[countryboy12484]

Its not bad to feed frequently as long as its a small amount and you remove it after a few hours.. I feed something every day and have had no problems

[randy]

How are the shrimps doing? If they do fine, don't do anything drastic, it will just do more harm than good.

 

This tank had nitrate at 60ppm... so I did 10% WC  2-3 times in one month, so far so good, and I haven't tested the nitrate since, and they are still breeding.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1dmAr0yjq2Q

 

I'm not saying nitrate is okay for shrimps, I'm just trying to emphasis that drastic changes may cause more harm in a stable (even if in a bad way) tank than good. I personally would never do large amount (>30%) water change even if half of the population gets wiped out in one day, but that's just me.

 

So what would I do in your situation? I would siphon the substrate (only a small 3"x3" area, and do it SUPER slowly and carefully), and smell the water from down in the substrate. If the water smell anything suspicious, that's probably the cause. Then I would siphon a small area once every week until the water is fresh.

 

Floaters really work for nitrate, not instantly, you need the floaters to start growing like crazy and that's when it absorbs nitrate more efficiently. Many people expect throwing in tons of floaters would solve the nitrate issue overnight, that never happened to me.

 

It could also be the old tank syndrome but you seem to indicate that it's a relatively new tank so let's rule that out.

[Mamashack]

If it's API nitrate test then 40 and 80 are so similar in colour that you can't tell the difference except by doing a dilution test with RO water - same with the orange for 10 and 20 - anyway imo if it's red it's not good.

Other fast growing plants such as elodea could help too in fact any of the stem aquatic plants would probably help.

[kell73k]

Thank you for all the input and advice

[kell73k]

I had already done the water change and had water dripping back in overnight. This morning all the shrimp looked ok. All shrimp still ok this afternoon and nitrates are in the orange which is an improvement. I will retest in a few days and see if things stay there or I need to do more small water changes. Thank you to everyone for the input 

[wicca32]

water changes are the only true way to remove nitrates that high. plants will use them but probably not fast enough to keep the shrimp happy. what kind of filter are useing?

[kell73k]

It is a 30 gallon tank and has a 200 marineland biowheel  HOB,  largest size sponge filter, and a smaller generic canister filter also. I do not use carbon in my filters but thought about putting some purigen into the canister if you think that would help.