Salt man coming back to Freshwater - Nitrate help

[skiwez]

Hi,

Been keeping a 75 saltwater tank for a couple of years and am a big fan of using deep sand beds to help keep nitrates under control. My saltwater tank has had almost undetectable nitrates since I put a deep sand bed in my sump.

My current dilemma is I’m in the planning stages of getting a 240 gallon freshwater tank to house some Oscars along a few other fish. In the past when I kept freshwater fish I always had problem with nitrates even with frequent water changes.

I’ve read the sticky on substrates but it just seemed to add more questions than answers.

Does anyone use deep sandbeds in freshwater tanks or have some other method of controlling nitrates other than water changes?

Thanks for looking

 

[fly boy]

growing floating plants works well for me , water lettuce seems good because not even the uaru will eat it

 

[drdrewr]

Hi,

Been keeping a 75 saltwater tank for a couple of years and am a big fan of using deep sand beds to help keep nitrates under control. My saltwater tank has had almost undetectable nitrates since I put a deep sand bed in my sump.

My current dilemma is I’m in the planning stages of getting a 240 gallon freshwater tank to house some Oscars along a few other fish. In the past when I kept freshwater fish I always had problem with nitrates even with frequent water changes.

I’ve read the sticky on substrates but it just seemed to add more questions than answers.

Does anyone use deep sandbeds in freshwater tanks or have some other method of controlling nitrates other than water changes?

Thanks for looking

I use a DSB in my freshwater 265g setup and I love it. I did this about 10 months ago as I was sick and tired of vacuuming my gravel and desperately needed to get control of nitrates. That battle is over and I won!!! On MFK, it doesn't seem to be a common practice to use a DSB on a freshwater tank, but, I had to try it. Even though not many MFK members are actually using FW/DSBs, they still provided so much valuable information that help guide me in this direction.

I'll provide some pics of my setup later on today, but in the interim, you can read this article from a FW/DSB-experienced source via the following link:

http://www.wetwebmedia.com/ca/volume_7/volume_7_1/dsb.html

 

[Cablemonkey]

When you use a DSB in FW, do you still need to occasionally stir it or are you letting snails/clams or some other natural way mix it up?