Nitrite Concerns

I

im4god2

The King's Kid
Jan 6, 2003
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Hi,

Tell me if I should be concerned.

Tank is 6 weeks old, 10 gal, 78 degrees, ammonia 0, nitrites 5 or more (off the chart), nitrates 5, ph is around 7.4, 20% water changes daily. I'm feeding once a day now, and not very much.

2 cories, 2 columbian tetras, 6 zebra danios, 1 otto
No live plants

The ammonia spiked then went to zero.
The nitrites spiked about ten days ago, and haven't dropped.
The nitrates went to 20 about five days ago, then dropped to 5.

I've been adding a teaspoon of aquarium salt every other day (afraid I'd get it too concentrated).

Should I get some live plants, or do something else to get the nitrites down ?

Thanks !
 
Water changes. Water changes. Water changes.

This sounds like a normal fishy cycle with a heavy bio-load. Adding salt will help reduce the toxicity of the nitrites, but you don't want to just keep adding it, only add enough to replace what is removed with the water changes. For example, if you add 1 tsp/10 gallons, and remove 2 gallons of water, you only need to replace the salt that was in that 2 gallons of water--significantly less than a full teaspoon. It doesn't sound like you've added enough to cause a problem yet, but be careful on future salt additions. Do water changes in enough volume to reduce the nitrites below 1. Anything else and your fish are getting toasted gills.

Adding some live plants will help. Anachris, water lettuce, duckweed--all of these are quick growers that will help soak up the excess nitrogen from your system.
 
I take it you're only adding salt when you take water out in water changes? You need very little to combat nitrite toxicity; you've probably got enough already, so you don't need to add any more. A teaspoon total in the tank would be enough for this purpose.

According to http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/BODY_VM007 20ppm of chloride is all you need. I make that around 1.5 grams in a ten gallons.

(10 US gallons = c. 35 litres.
1 ppm of 35 litres = 0.000035 litres
=> 20 ppm = 0.0007 litres, which would be .7 grams. If we're talking weight for weight, therefore we need .7 grams of Chloride.

Now, atomic weight of Cl = 35, of Na 23. For a ball park figure, that means just over half the NaCl will be Na, so 1.5 grams of NaCl will be about right.)

Adding plants might help, as long as they hit the ground running as it were - undemanding stem plants like Egeria densa, not something like an Aponogeton.
 
OnionGirl,

You said to "do enough water changes to get the nitrites below 1". That's my goal :confused: , but doing 20% changes every day hasn't helped. I did a 40% change over the weekend - no difference. I bought a new nitrite test kit over the weekend, (plus a second set of test strips) to see if my original kit was bad - same results.

Faramir - I've only added the salt after a water change, and then by dissolving it in a cup first.

I'll look for those plants, and see if I can get them around here.

Thanks for the quick replies !
 
im4god2 - what you have to ensure is that you are not adding more salt than you are taking out. If you take out 2 gallons of water, and put back 2 gallons with a teaspoon of salt, then you will eventually reach an equilibrium of 1 teaspoon per 2 gallons - far more than you need.

If you are doing daily water changes, but only putting in the salt every other time, you will reach equilibrium at 1 teaspoon per 4 gallons. Better, but more than you need.

Hope this helps.

:)
 
You can do larger water changes than 20%. And you can do more than one per day. Try doing a 50% change in the morning, and another in the evening. Make sure the new water is close to the same temp and pH. For large changes, this is important, though in smaller changes I don't worry about the temp as much.
 
OK, I got some anachris at lunch and put it in.

I'll hold up on the salt. My box says one tablespoon per 10 gallons, so I figured one teaspoon per every four gallon change wouldn't be too much. (I'm not a cook :p)

I've been matching the temp in the changes, but haven't paid attention to ph. When I first set it up, I spent about a week with "ph down", not getting it to do anything. Some of the posts say not to worry about a barely high or low level, just not to change it drastically.

Skittyfish - I'm in Richmond.

Thanks !
 
Agreed--don't use the pH down stuff. Some of those products contain phosphates, which can cause algae problems, and all (IMO) are a short term fix. Long term stability is way better.

You just don't want to do a huge water change that results in a drastic change to the pH. Not a biggie for most fish, but it can cause problems for some species.
 
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