Kelsta Posted October 16, 2007 Report Share Posted October 16, 2007 Hi, I'm SO sorry to still be asking for help on the same topic, but we've just discovered our tank is suffering 'new tank' syndrome and has very high levels of Nitrite and Nitrate, and we are treating with BioZorb. Thanks to all who helped Will it do the fish any harm to do daily 25% water changes until the Nitrite/Nitrate levels come down? I mean, right now, they're REALLY high - in the deadly range. We've already lost 5 fish. The BioZorb takes like a week to work properly and we thought doing daily water changes would help it along. Can anyone tell me if this is OK? I can't see any harm in daily water changes but we're new to this. Thanks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
evilknieval69 Posted October 16, 2007 Report Share Posted October 16, 2007 Daily water changes wont harm your fish no. I do daily water changes of up to 80% on some of my tanks! hope this helps Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ianab Posted October 16, 2007 Report Share Posted October 16, 2007 I agree, the new water is better than the stuff thats in the tank, so more water changes will be a good thing. Think about a fish living in a river.. it gets 100% water change every few minutes The only possible problem is if the tank water is very different to the tap water. (pH or temp mostly). Then a sudden change can upset the fish. But if you are only changing 25% at a time, no worries. If you do regular BIG water changes like EK is talking about, then the tank water is allways similar to the tap, so no problems. Cheers Ian Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jolliolli Posted October 16, 2007 Report Share Posted October 16, 2007 daily water changes would be fine, the bacteria that convert the ammonia to nitrite and then to nitrate attach themselves to your filter media and ornaments/plants so you aren't harming your bacteria populations by doing daily water changes Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kelsta Posted October 16, 2007 Author Report Share Posted October 16, 2007 OK great! Thanks heaps everyone! We're so please to hear that - we'll keep doing them daily and hope not to lose any more fish. Thanks so much - once again, don't know where we'd be without you! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kelsta Posted October 16, 2007 Author Report Share Posted October 16, 2007 Hubby has just raised a good point... We did a 50% water change on Sunday, and the Nirtrite/Nitrate levels in the water on Monday were at the top of the danger zone. Shouldn't that huge water change have helped bring the levels down, even a little bit? If the Nitrite/Nitrate is from the fish waste, and the waste all gets deposited into the foam in the trickle filter (on top of the tube things), would that foam be holding Nitrite/Nitrate? Should we wash it? Or just leave it? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ianab Posted October 16, 2007 Report Share Posted October 16, 2007 You may have stray fish food sitting in the gravel, that will increase the ammonia --> Nitrite --> Nitrate. Give the gravel a good going over with a gravel vacum when you do the water change. A bit of rotting food hidden someplace will foul up your water, especially if the filters are new and cant process the waste properly. Cheers Ian Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Discusguru Posted October 16, 2007 Report Share Posted October 16, 2007 Nitrite and nitrate are totally different. High nitrite can wipe all your fish out. It can only be coverted to nitrate by bacterial. High nitrate can be diluted by waterchange. Never wash filter material in tap water. Always do it in a bucket of tank water. ron Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kelsta Posted October 16, 2007 Author Report Share Posted October 16, 2007 Oh dear... the lady at Animates who tested our water again today told us to NOT stir up the gravel at all until the levels of N/N had gone down. She said just to skim over it lightly enough to pick up the poo, ut not to disturb it. She said giving the gravel a good vacume is good for established and fully cycled tanks, but that we should hold off until ours has come right. Don't know what to do now, really... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ianab Posted October 16, 2007 Report Share Posted October 16, 2007 Not sure either, but if the gravel is contanimated with old food then it might be causing the problems. Stiring it up with the vacum wont harm any bacteria on the gravel. Ian Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jayci Posted October 16, 2007 Report Share Posted October 16, 2007 Water change twice a day. lighty gravel vac. And don't feed the fish for a couple of days. And then only feed a tiny bit. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kelsta Posted October 16, 2007 Author Report Share Posted October 16, 2007 Hmm... well, Ian, our goldfish do have a habit of gulping in all their food real fast and then 'burping' some back out. After feeding they always hoover up the gravel looking for letovers, but it could be that the food they 'burped' out is causing problems in the top layers of gravel. Maybe we should vacume the stones but just not too deep. Hubby has just decided to syphon out some tank water and wash out the filter foam. He's convinced the gunge and sludge in the foam can't be good - I have no idea myself and no better ideas so I'm not objecting. We also thought it might be a good idea to take out our ornament - it's a big rock with holes all over like caves. We thought the water in there may not be circulating properly or something... once again, just a guess!? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jayci Posted October 16, 2007 Report Share Posted October 16, 2007 The sludge in the foam is inert. It won't be affecting the water. Don't touch the filter until the water quality is sorted. That is where the bacteria live. Doing anything with the filter will reduce the bacteria population and make things worse. Most poeple only clean there filters when water flow is reduced abit. Some don't get cleaned for upto 6 months. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kelsta Posted October 16, 2007 Author Report Share Posted October 16, 2007 When you say the filter is where the bacteria live, which part of the filter, exactly? We have a trickle filter, and I thought the ceramic tubes (some people call them noodles) was where the bacteria built up and the foam on top was to stop the bigger debris from going through. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jayci Posted October 16, 2007 Report Share Posted October 16, 2007 The bacteria live through out the filter. The special thing about the noodles, is that they have a very large surface area. Bacteria need surface area. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ianab Posted October 16, 2007 Report Share Posted October 16, 2007 Well everyone agrees - do more water changes 8) If your Nitrate level is high thats the only real way of fixing that, and it will help temporarily with the nitrite levels too. I'm just wondering why the Nitrate is so high in a fairly new tank. It must have been REALLY high before your first big water change First thing that comes to mind is overfeeding and excess uneaten food left in the tank. I dont KNOW that thats the problem, but it would explain all the problems you are having. Putting the fish on a diet for a week or 2 while the tank comes right can only help things as well. Cheers Ian Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kelsta Posted October 16, 2007 Author Report Share Posted October 16, 2007 Thanks Ian, we are doing the daily changes now, so that should help. I know there's never any left over food in the tank as there's never any debris coming up the syphon when we vacume the gravel, and we basically watch the fish eat all their food. But we've put them on a diet and are feeding them about a fifth of what we used to. That's about what they can consume in 1 minute once a day, as opposed to 5 minutes. I suppose less waste from the fish will help. Yes, the people at Animates were stumped about that too, and they said for a new tank it was way overstocked. We added: 4 Goldfish 4 Suckers 9 WCMM And all this only 1 day after setting it up and switching it on!! The people we bought the tank from knew how many fish were going in there and never said anything. There was no warning at all abot new tanks and the possible problems. Animates said we should have been advised to add only one or two, then SLOWLY add the rest once the cycling was complete. No one told us that and we wish they had of. Plus, the store told us just to do once fortnightly water changes, so we thought we were being really responsible by doing them once a week, but it turns out we should have been doing at least twice as many as that during cycling. All this information would have been helpful BEFORE we set up the tank - ie at the store. Oh well, I guess we'll put it down to experience. Thanks heaps for all your help Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jn Posted October 16, 2007 Report Share Posted October 16, 2007 I disagree about not rinsing the filter wool. The top layer can accumulate alot of rotting food especially when the fish are new to a tank and haven't got the hang of where and when to go feed and the owners haven't got the hang of exacly how much to feed. I'll use my tank as an example, I recently converted a tank to a goldfish tank and the fish I put in it were used to feeding on the bottom.. but I had mainly floating food and was eager for them to learn to eat from the top... so yes.. my filter wool was gettign VERY mucky with visible food bits etc.. and yes my tank although previously established with a lighter fish load, was cycling as a result of the bigger fish I now had in there. I found my nitrite levels would drop significantly after rinsing the top layer of the filter wool. In the aqua one trickle filters, there is anoter sponge plus a layer of noodles below the filter wool. I think the rotting waste has got to be more harmful than the amount of good bacteria on there at this stage. Surely as bad (if not worse) than food decomposing on the gravel. To be safe I'd say if there is rotting food on the filter wool then rinse it in the water you take out of your tank when you do your water changes. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tHEcONCH Posted October 17, 2007 Report Share Posted October 17, 2007 I disagree about not rinsing the filter wool. The top layer can accumulate alot of rotting food especially when the fish are new to a tank and haven't got the hang of where and when to go feed and the owners haven't got the hang of exacly how much to feed. I'll use my tank as an example, I recently converted a tank to a goldfish tank and the fish I put in it were used to feeding on the bottom.. but I had mainly floating food and was eager for them to learn to eat from the top... so yes.. my filter wool was gettign VERY mucky with visible food bits etc.. and yes my tank although previously established with a lighter fish load, was cycling as a result of the bigger fish I now had in there. I found my nitrite levels would drop significantly after rinsing the top layer of the filter wool. In the aqua one trickle filters, there is anoter sponge plus a layer of noodles below the filter wool. I think the rotting waste has got to be more harmful than the amount of good bacteria on there at this stage. Surely as bad (if not worse) than food decomposing on the gravel. To be safe I'd say if there is rotting food on the filter wool then rinse it in the water you take out of your tank when you do your water changes. I agree - I always wash the crud out of the top (fine ) layer of wool - the Biological filtarion remains intact throughout the rest of the pump (not washed, only drained and refilled with old tank water). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kelsta Posted October 17, 2007 Author Report Share Posted October 17, 2007 Oh thanks HEAPS for that jn! Hubby was right then! We figured that there MUST be a source of the nasties because even straight after the 50% water change the levels were still sky high. Thank you so much for sharing your experience with your tank. We had lost all hope last night when hubby finally decided he would just go ahead and wash the wool (against the advice of many people) as it was the only logical thing we could think of! I suppose everyone's sick of hearing about our saga now but I'll update you with whether washing the filter wool helped. It might help others in the same situation. Thanks so much!! Thanks heaps also to tHEcONCH - your reply came through while I was typing! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jn Posted October 17, 2007 Report Share Posted October 17, 2007 Kelsta - you're doing really well...hang in there. Do be aware though that even with rinsing the filter wool there will still be days where you may need to do 2 water changes/day as things get established. The levels CAN build up that quickly especially if they've had a feed. I expect your test kit will be getting alot of use for a while!! Don't change water more often than you have to but don't let the levels get too high. Do take the advice given above and feed VERY sparingly. Fish will be fine even if they don't eat every day....if they're not eating they're not going to produce alot of waste and it gives the good bacteria time to digest things a bit better and hopefully catch up sooner rather than later. I read somewhere that the ammonia levels will most likley be highest about 20-30 mins after they eat so if you're testing, try to do it then Also if you're changing water often, don't worry too much about cleaning around the gravel every time (like twice a day I mean!!) Do you have any live plants? Some sources on the net say reckon that some plants are able to use up some ammonia directly rather having to use it only after its been converted to nitrate. Some bunches of cheap stem plants might help. Don't expect them to look pretty though. The goldfish will eat them and uproot them and they will eventually start getting algae on them.. but they might be another source of 'biological activity' to help things along until they settle. then you can worry about it looking nice later with some plants the goldies won't eat Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kelsta Posted October 17, 2007 Author Report Share Posted October 17, 2007 Thanks heaps jn. There are 5 live plants in there at the moment so that should be helping. And we're feeding very little, despite hubby's protests! I think we must be on the right track finally, so thanks heaps Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scuba Sam Posted October 24, 2007 Report Share Posted October 24, 2007 Just a thought - have you tested nitrate levels (and possibly nitrite) in the source water you are using for your water changes - tap water for example. Cheers, Sam Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kelsta Posted October 24, 2007 Author Report Share Posted October 24, 2007 Yep!! Good point, as we only thought of doing that afterwards as well - but all is well - no nasties in the tap water. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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