Acquiring their CO2 from the air rather than the water column is also why they grow faster (since there is more CO2 in the air than in the water) consuming more nutrients from the water...making it cleaner.
Take that Nitrate ;-) (6 week test)
- Thread starter nfored
- Start date
![100_1263[1].JPG](https://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/forums/data/attachments/432/432605-430b2927683cb011b87aa31b3b38951c.jpg?hash=QwspJ2g8sB "100_1263[1].JPG")
![100_1264[1].JPG](https://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/forums/data/attachments/432/432606-5be5abdda8b351ffb12d4d6cdc391f91.jpg?hash=W-Wr3aizUf "100_1264[1].JPG")
![100_1259[1].JPG](https://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/forums/data/attachments/432/432607-9e1c99ef55a97e3c044f749f8bd60292.jpg?hash=nhyZ71Wpfj "100_1259[1].JPG")
ok, i'm not gonna lie I didn't bother to read the whole 5 pages, but i thought i'd add on with some experience of my own with planted tanks and removing nitrate. I'm not proud of the fact that i've neglected my tank so much, but i have a ten gallon that I havn't done a water change in since about may. I have one dwarf puffer and half of the tank is packed with water wisteria, and a few java fern plants. I havn't detected any nitrates in the water from my api water test still. I have no detectible nitrites, or ammonia as well. I'm about to convert the tank to a planted one, so I will be adding nitrates to the tank in a few weeks, however I think plants have a very practical use in aquariums if you get the right number of plants to fish.
So I am a little puzzled. This week its 20ppm, so that must mean last weeks test was false, likely didn't shake the number 2 bottle good enough. I say it was false because, if it could go from 30 to 10, there is no way it should have went from 10 to 20. I did add 2 new fish but they are pretty small. I think I might go buy new nitrate kits for week 4, since I am only a couple months away from the expiration date.
The flash makes it look like 10 but its 20 for sure.
![100_1403[1].JPG](https://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/forums/data/attachments/433/433894-e2880dd792fae7db3edfb12da930810b.jpg?hash=4ogN15L659 "100_1403[1].JPG")
The flash makes it look like 10 but its 20 for sure.
While removing a bubble bar, I caused a cave in. So I went to fix it and notice a metric ton of organic waste trapped under the rocks. So I tore down all the rocks and busted out the vacuum, I removed about 1 cup of gunk. Lord only knows how much is in the sump, I just recently started using filter socks so I still have gunk in the sump.
I hope this gives me an advantage on the nitrate war.
I hope this gives me an advantage on the nitrate war.
