Water Changes

[jman828]

I usually change 25% of my water weekly, but today I decided to test for nitrate just to see if 25% weekly was enough. So I did the test and it said 7ppm nitrate so that's not very much, so does that mean that I can wait longer to do a water change?

[Myates]

How big is the tank and is it filtered? You should always do weekly water changes because the filter itself won't rid of ammonia.

[jman828]

Originally Posted by Myates

How big is the tank and is it filtered? You should always do weekly water changes because the filter itself won't rid of ammonia.

10 gal filtered

[Micho]

5-10ppm of nitrate is normal, it means you're cycled if you have 0ppm of ammonia and nitrite with no spikes.

[jman828]

I know, the question was that is what it is at after a week so with those low amounts do I still have to do a water as Myates was responding to.

[bahamut285]

Originally Posted by Myates

the filter itself won't rid of ammonia.

What?

jman said that they had nitrATES present in his tank, which would lead me to believe that it is cycled, so YES the filter will break down the ammonia into nitrITE, which in then would be further reduced into nitrATE.


@Jman: If you have no other tankmates besides your betta then 25% weekly IMO is what you should be doing as you said. It just keeps it on the safe side rather than just wanting to stretch it out because you can :P

[Myates]

Derr on me.. forgot the basic chemistry of the tank (plus misread that he only tested for nitrate):
First, the waste from fish, plants, and food breaks down and releases ammonia.
This ammonia is very toxic to fish and must be converted to nitrite by bacteria.
Nitrite is also toxic to fish, and must be converted to nitrate by bacteria.
Nitrate is not nearly as toxic, and is used by plants or algae to help them grow.

For some reason was thinking back to when another member mentioned the filter won't filter out ammonia, etc etc and didn't finish out my thought process. Also, none of my tanks are cycled/filtered.. so didn't pop up in my mind immediately, my bad!

[Myates]

And I just saw your link in your sig. *facepalm*

[bahamut285]

@Myates: *pats back* lol don't worry XD

[jman828]

Originally Posted by Myates

And I just saw your link in your sig. *facepalm*

haha, it's ok! So I'll just stick with the 25% woth vacuum weekly. Thanks both of you.