Question about nitrates

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When I had my motoros, they were growing well and breeding with a nitrate level that hovered around 80 ppm (mg/l).
 
devder1;3719724; said:
so you guys are saying nitrates arent bad, but i thought fish could get stunted by permanently high nitrate levels
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Nitrates at levels up to 200ppm aren't necessarily bad, even long term. Above that they can (and do) become more toxic as the levels increase. You don't want to completely ignore nitrates, but as long as you can keep it under 100ppm or so, your fish ought to be fine.

Again, if your fish are healthy, active, and feeding normally, and the nitrates are at a reasonable level, there's no reason to fret about whether they're at 20, 40, 80, or 100ppm. There is probably little difference to the fish at any level. The biggest issue from nitrates will be algae growth.
 
I don't really worry about nitrate levels at all. I've kept and bred rays in the same water systems as adult crocs in the past... imagine those nitrate levels!

As posted, the biggest downside to nitrate is algae growth. Think about most lawn fertilizer...two main parts used to get plants are nitrate and phosphate. Not a real reach to figure out why those work against you in a tank.
 
Well this makes me a little less worried about 40ppm's now.

I do have some algae growth in my tank, but the tank gets a few hours of sunlight in the afternoon. I've now installed some solar screens over those windows that supposedly block 90% of the UV rays, so hopefully that'll fix some of the algae issues. I think I may try some Purigen if things don't clear up soon though.
 
a question, is do fish need to adapt to those high nitrates or can they simply be thrown in a tank with nitrates 100 ppm higher then its previous environment
 
I see people freaking-out about 10ppm,50ppm,100ppm...RELAX!! The first two parts of the cycle is what does the damage.

The people who have kept rays on this site "Successfully" will tell you-cycle your tank properly,add bio-load with common sense, & do 25%~50% waterchange weekly.

The KISS method i believe....gotta Love it!
 
COOL MBU;3722528; said:
I see people freaking-out about 10ppm,50ppm,100ppm...RELAX!! The first two parts of the cycle is what does the damage.

The people who have kept rays on this site "Successfully" will tell you-cycle your tank properly,add bio-load with common sense, & do 25%~50% waterchange weekly.

The KISS method i believe....gotta Love it!
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x2, KISS is all you need.
 
SpeshulEd;3721931; said:
Well this makes me a little less worried about 40ppm's now.

I do have some algae growth in my tank, but the tank gets a few hours of sunlight in the afternoon. I've now installed some solar screens over those windows that supposedly block 90% of the UV rays, so hopefully that'll fix some of the algae issues. I think I may try some Purigen if things don't clear up soon though.
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Purigen is a godsend for me. Helps me keep my nitrates under 40 ppm when they come out of the tap at 20-30. I am a bit OCD so you might have guessed the tap nitrates piss me off to no end :nilly:

Sorry didn't realize how old this thread was... Post still stands :)
 
devder1;3719422; said:
thats very interesting, i think of 40ppm as high :eek:
also if you are having issues with nitrates, i would look into a fluidized bed filter, since i got mine my algae growth has almost ceased and the only thing i can think of is the lack of nitrates
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please explain to me how a fluidized bed filter would lower nitrates?? im curious to see what you come up with. thanks
 
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