Ammonia, Nitrites, and Nitrates, OH MY!!!!

[Nameless]

Ok. I started cycling my tank 12 days ago.

It's a 75 gallon. I put in 2 big bags of CC and 63 lbs of live rock. I have since added another 12 lbs of rock.

My ammonia and nitrates are at zero.

My nitrates, however, are at about 15ppm.

At a future time, I plan to install a dsb with macro algae in my sump, but haven't had the time yet.

Will nitrates that high affect any of the organisms that came in on my live rock? Should I do water changed now to try to bring nitrates down? Should I take other steps to decrease nitrates?

So far I've had only a diatom bloom and three small patches of hair algae, but no really bad algae issues....

 

[stilmas]

Are you using a tap water purifier? It sounds like your tapwater has alot of silicates and nitrates in it for your nitrates to be that high in that short of a time and getting diatom algae. What animals are in your tank if any? And no, nitrates won't bother your rock at that level. Live rock will slowly consume the nitrates but not that fast!

[ November 14, 2001: Message edited by: stilmas ]</p>

 

[Nameless]

No animals yet. Just cycling with rock.

I filled initially with tap water, assured by my LFS that doing so was OK because the chlorine would be evaporated out in plenty of time.

 

[stilmas]

AHHHH! They seemed to have left out that there are many other toxic chemicals in tapwater. You should ATLEAST get an Aquarium Pharm. Tap Water Purifier. Tapwater is usually loaded with silicates, nitrates, and phosphates, along with other heavy metals. If I were you, I'd do a 50% change with purified water, then again in a few days, before adding any corals. Fish would be probably ok. This sounds like alot of work, but it will be worth it in the long run. Test your tap water and see what you get.

[ November 14, 2001: Message edited by: stilmas ]

[ November 14, 2001: Message edited by: stilmas ]</p>

 

[Nameless]

Well, I've gotten an RO unit now. I'm using it for top offs.

Maybe I'll just start aggressively changing water to take some of that crap out.

 

[stilmas]

DI water is better than RO, if in the future you can add some DI chambers to that RO unit you will be better off. IMO, AP Tap Water Purifier is better than just plain RO.

 

[SteveP]

15ppm is a little high, but nothing to worry about at this point. Just keep an eye it - you're still cycling. Was the rock pre-cured? Nitrates and phosphates can be absorbed by macroalgae so get some if you can. Silicates will cause diatoms so get a cleanup crew and make sure it has critters that eat diatoms (abalones, conchs, turbos, ceriths, nerites, etc.) As stilmas said a tap water purifier or RO/DI unit will decrease the amount of this stuff entering your system.

Steve
8{I

 

[slimy]

15ppm is hardly worth worrying about. After a mere 12 days of cycling, it's actually pretty low. Now, if it's still that high after being set up a month, THEN you might consider getting worried. But no, it shouldn't harm anything on the rocks. Anything that as strong enough to survive hitchhiking on live rock is not going to be be adversely effected by a nitrate level of 15ppm, which is (in all likelyhood) steadilly dropping. During cycling, my nitrates topped out at 60ppm. 3 weeks later, it was undetectable.

A diatom bloom is normal durring the latter part of a cycle. It should go away.

As for the tap water, if you keep using your RO unit to do water changes, anything really harmful should eventually get pulled out. Just stick to the RO water from now on.

 

[AnotherGoldenTeapot]

Is the nitrite really zero?

If it's not then your nitrate will read high. This happens because most nitrate tests work by first converting some of the nitrate to nitrite and then measuring the nitrite. These tests are calibrated assuming you have no nitrite to start of with.

 

[AnotherGoldenTeapot]

Slimy - per my last post - you probably never had much nitrate at all.

All of the pink/red tests work as I've said. They are not reliable if there is any nitrite present to start of with.