Nitrate question

[TwelveL16]

Curious, I swapped tanks two weeks ago using Established rock for 3 years and crushed coral that had been sitting in saltwater for a couple years. Never saw a cycle but tested nitrates today and they were 75 on Hanna which is max. Did a 10% water change still 75. Corals are happy mixed reef. Surely I can’t be over feeding that badly? Didn’t add any new fish. I have no form of nitrate reducer running except a skimmer. Also worth mentioning used new rodi water for the swap. Where did all the nitrates come from? Ordered some Chaeto last night. Merry Christmas!

 

[TwelveL16]

Actually on second thought I did use some of the saltwater that had been sitting for two years with the crushed corals. I’ll bet that’s where they came from.

 

[malacoda]

Yeah, the crushed coral would be my guess. Unless you thoroughly rinsed it out, I'd suspect a lot of detrius was in it that didn't have a chance to fully breakdown and become 'inert'. Then got stirred up and released when you transferred it.

 

[TwelveL16]

Yeah, the crushed coral would be my guess. Unless you thoroughly rinsed it out, I'd suspect a lot of detrius was in it that didn't have a chance to fully breakdown and become 'inert'. Then got stirred up and released when you transferred it.

Yep, I’ll bet you are right. Was thinking I’d benefit from the bacteria in there, didn’t really think that through that there was probably some build up.

 

[srcleary]

But at least you got a skip cycle. :cool:

 

[Dan_P]

Curious, I swapped tanks two weeks ago using Established rock for 3 years and crushed coral that had been sitting in saltwater for a couple years. Never saw a cycle but tested nitrates today and they were 75 on Hanna which is max. Did a 10% water change still 75. Corals are happy mixed reef. Surely I can’t be over feeding that badly? Didn’t add any new fish. I have no form of nitrate reducer running except a skimmer. Also worth mentioning used new rodi water for the swap. Where did all the nitrates come from? Ordered some Chaeto last night. Merry Christmas!

Any chance the new system is generating nitrite? Reusing things from the old aquarium could have resulted in some die back on those objects.

 

[TwelveL16]

But at least you got a skip

Any chance the new system is generating nitrite? Reusing things from the old aquarium could have resulted in some die back on those objects.

No. Was never any ammonia. Meaning there couldn’t have been any nitrites the way the break down works.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

No. Was never any ammonia. Meaning there couldn’t have been any nitrites the way the break down works.

I don’t think that is true. You do not ever need to detect ammonia to have nitrite detectable.

 

[TwelveL16]

I don’t think that is true. You do not ever need to detect ammonia to have nitrite detectable.

Well you aren’t the person to disagree with, but I was under the impression ammonia gets broke down to nitrite and nitrite gets broke down to the least toxic nitrate during a cycle. Seems you’d have to detectable ammonia to have detectable nitrite. If I’m wrong I’ll take your word for it, just always been my understanding.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Well you aren’t the person to disagree with, but I was under the impression ammonia gets broke down to nitrite and nitrite gets broke down to the least toxic nitrate during a cycle. Seems you’d have to detectable ammonia to have detectable nitrite. If I’m wrong I’ll take your word for it, just always been my understanding.

You have the process right, but if there are lots of bacteria that convert ammonia to nitrite and not many that convert nitrite to nitrate, nitrite can accumulate with little or no detectable ammonia. That often happens in early cycling stages, and may happen at other times.

 

[TwelveL16]

You have the process right, but if there are lots of bacteria that convert ammonia to nitrite and not many that convert nitrite to nitrate, nitrite can accumulate with little or no detectable ammonia. That often happens in early cycling stages, and may happen at other times.

Hm that makes sense, learn something new every day. I still doubt that’s the case here considering the rock and sand have been saltwater for a few years. I imagine the bacteria would be plentiful. None the less appreciate your knowledge in the topic.

 

[Lasse]

Bacteria is not always bacteria. We are dealing with two different types of bacteria - Heterotrophic bacteria that breakdown organic matter and nitrite oxidizing bacteria which are autotrophic and oxidizing NO2 to NO3. Old rocks and sand have normally a lot of heterotrophic bacteria but few autotrophic bacteria because the compete of "sitting" places and the breakdown bacteria have a doubling time that can be more than 50 times shorter than the autotrophs.

I have found that - even if Hanna checker is much less sensitive for NO2 than other test - still get false errors when nitrite is present. The curve below shows nearly a doubling of read NO3 when NO2 approach 2 mg/L. I compare one place in my aquarium there NO2 differs from the one in My DT that´s normally is below 0.05 mg/L

Sincerely Lasse

 

[TwelveL16]

Bacteria is not always bacteria. We are dealing with two different types of bacteria - Heterotrophic bacteria that breakdown organic matter and nitrite oxidizing bacteria which are autotrophic and oxidizing NO2 to NO3. Old rocks and sand have normally a lot of heterotrophic bacteria but few autotrophic bacteria because the compete of "sitting" places and the breakdown bacteria have a doubling time that can be more than 50 times shorter than the autotrophs.

I have found that - even if Hanna checker is much less sensitive for NO2 than other test - still get false errors when nitrite is present. The curve below shows nearly a doubling of read NO3 when NO2 approach 2 mg/L. I compare one place in my aquarium there NO2 differs from the one in My DT that´s normally is below 0.05 mg/L

Sincerely Lasse

Interesting, I’ll get a nitrite test with that in mind. Better safe than sorry! Thanks