ray keepers please read....and answer..

[keepinfish]

Ok in this thread here
we have been talking about nitrate levels... Some folks seem to have an easier time keeping nitrates down that others. WHY?? is it location, differences in filteration, Amouth of food fed..or other reasons..

Please take the time to post your readings...accurate up to date readings..

1. What type of test kit are you using and age?

2. Where is your location?

3. Size of tank?

4. Stocklist?

5. How much do you feed and how often?

6. What type of filteration..details

7. How often to you change the water, and amounts changed?

8. What are your nitrates before and after water change?


Maybe it could have to do with too much media in sump and it collects more "sludge" and this raises nitrates? Just open thoughts...

 

[keepinfish]

Ok in this thread here
we have been talking about nitrate levels... Some folks seem to have an easier time keeping nitrates down that others. WHY?? is it location, differences in filteration, Amouth of food fed..or other reasons..

Please take the time to post your readings...accurate up to date readings..

1. What type of test kit are you using and age?

api (few months old)

2. Where is your location?

South Kansas

3. Size of tank?

210

4. Stocklist?

2 10-3 10" rays
1-19" tig
1-28"+ fire eel
2-14-16" gar
1 15" blk aro
1-6" dat
1-11" bass

5. How much do you feed and how often?

daily.. 2 handfulls of pellets, and 1 handful of smelt daily.. shrimp every other day

6. What type of filteration..details

home made sump, pot scrubbers, lots of turn over 15-20X

7. How often to you change the water, and amounts changed?

80%+ weekly

8. What are your nitrates before and after water change?

40ppm. before water change
10ppm after




Maybe it could have to do with too much media in sump and it collects more "sludge" and this raises nitrates? Just open thoughts...

my details

 

[skynoch]

Ok in this thread here
we have been talking about nitrate levels... Some folks seem to have an easier time keeping nitrates down that others. WHY?? is it location, differences in filteration, Amouth of food fed..or other reasons..

Please take the time to post your readings...accurate up to date readings..

Here's an interesting one. This is my best tank for crystal clear water and water parameters.

1. What type of test kit are you using and age?
nutrafin
2. Where is your location?
Drayton Valley Alberta Canada
3. Size of tank?
280
4. Stocklist?
2 24" tigerrays
5. How much do you feed and how often?
3 large shrimp 2x a day
6. What type of filteration..details
from the overflows into a 100 micron filter sock in a sludge bucket to a 90 gallon wet/dry sump with filterfloss over 5 gallons of bioballs and a maybe 2 pounds of submerged biomedia. Here's the kicker I've been running the tank 2.5 years and changed the filter floss once, cleaned the sock once, and never cleaned the sludge bucket. Also have a flyriver turtle that lives in the sump, 4 small discus, and 6 blue tetras.
7. How often to you change the water, and amounts changed?
usually every 3 days about 30-40%
8. What are your nitrates before and after water change?
No real change. I've left my tank for over a week without a waterchange and still had around the same readings of nitrates and nitrites and 0 ammonia. Used the test kits on other tanks and levels were higher for than when I left for that week.

Maybe it could have to do with too much media in sump and it collects more "sludge" and this raises nitrates? Just open thoughts...

Hopefully some gurus can tell me why leaving all that waste in the sludge bucket, not cleaning the sock or replacing the filter floss is working so well

 

[ado124]

I'm new and doubt my data will be of much use but I thought I'd contribute anyways. I think this will be really informative.

1. What type of test kit are you using and age?
API few months old

2. Where is your location?
Northern Virginia

3. Size of tank?
120g

4. Stocklist?
8 hybrid rays between 4-6"
2 6" IT datnoids
2 3" NTT datnoids

5. How much do you feed and how often?
Once a day. roughly 4 shrimps cut up, a few red wigglers and maybe a dozen carnivore pellets.

6. What type of filteration..
fx5 with ehfisubstrat pro filled in all containers, ehiem 2028 filled with pro as well.

7. How often to you change the water, and amounts changed?
30-35% daily

8. What are your nitrates before and after water change?
I tried to make measurements before but must have done something wrong because it came up with 0ppm. After was at 20ppm.

I guess I should redo this tomorrow with better measurements before and after. I just wanted to contribute since I think this is a great idea.

My nitrates were higher (40ppm) a few weeks ago even with bigger water changes so I rinsed out my fx5. it was disgusting. looked like motor oil and it was just cleaned before the rays were put in about a month ago! I'll know for sure tomorow when i retest the before nitrates.

 

[Zoodiver]

Nitrates (to me) are a relative thing. You see a LOT of people swear up and down that high nitrates kill fish. Then you go and look at real world water quality of places doing well with rays and (I kid you not) you can see levels over 1000ppm.

High nitrates are a result of natural process. Feeding animals means creation of ammonia, broken down into nitrite, then nitrate. Nitrate can build up in the system several ways - the most common being biological debris hainging out in dead spots in your water.


In short, I don't worry about them as much as most will.

 

[sbuse]

Ok in this thread here
we have been talking about nitrate levels... Some folks seem to have an easier time keeping nitrates down that others. WHY?? is it location, differences in filteration, Amouth of food fed..or other reasons..

Please take the time to post your readings...accurate up to date readings..

1. What type of test kit are you using and age?
api...way to old(several years) still reads that same as the new test
2. Where is your location?
east central minnesota
3. Size of tank?
55gal grow out
4. Stocklist?
3 5-7" retics, 2 pbass 6", 1 black ghost knife 10"
5. How much do you feed and how often?
have a constant supply of live black worms in the tank, also do feeders for the pbass, 50 at a time till they run out...
6. What type of filteration..details
an emperor 400 with 2 polishing pad and bio-balls, a biosystem75 with the supplied filter meadia + an ac70 size bag of ceramics
7. How often to you change the water, and amounts changed?
every 3 days +-, 75%
8. What are your nitrates before and after water change?

average 20-40ppm, after i never check...
Maybe it could have to do with too much media in sump and it collects more "sludge" and this raises nitrates? Just open thoughts...

mine

 

[keepinfish]

So what are the point of waterchanges? I thought the main reason was to keep nitrates low???

 

[PeteLockwood]

So what are the point of waterchanges? I thought the main reason was to keep nitrates low???

Nitrates are measurable. There's other stuff in the water that builds up along with nitrate that maybe isn't so easily measured. High nitrate probably means other stuff in the water that you may want to dilute. For the most part, the best growth rates appear to coincide with the best water change regimes.

For me, water changes in my ray tanks are as much about restoring Kh as they are about removing nitrate and DOCs (not to mention nitrate zaps the Kh too).

 

[Gshock]

So what are the point of waterchanges? I thought the main reason was to keep nitrates low???

To get rid of the crap before my filters or sumps suck it up. I wouldn't wanna go cleaning my filters and sumps that are loaded with crap frequently. I wouldn't be doing daily changes if it wasn't for this reason.

 

[DB junkie]

I gotta get a new kit before I mess with this. Mines really old. I really don't think nitrates are super important. I'm just confused why some read so much higher then others. I'm under the impression that nitrate is nothing more then the amount of food the tank's filter has broken down. Kind of filter is irrelevent, none lower nitrate, it just attempts to keep nitrite and ammonio fluctuation to a minimum, if they are the filter works. Nitrate can only be removed with plants and WCs. So without either how are some keeping thiers in check and others struggling? Amount of food being fed/uneaten food?

I change water to keep rays happy. I think drip systems are nice cause I watched my own rays become more active and seem to eat more, just acted a lot more energetic as opposed to daily WCs. This is why I need a new test kit. I never really tested a lot cause if I thought about testing I'd just do a waterchange. I'm gonna get a new one, test the water and do a waterchange. Or maybe think about getting a test kit, assume nitrates are high, and do a waterchange. The rays seem to enjoy the last option. KISS seams to work.

I'm sure there's something to be learned from these #s... I just don't know what yet...