Gemmer

Hi everyone,

I know it's been over a month and I promised I would keep you informed. I'm not really used to using the forum yet unless of course I'm having a problem. Sorry, I'll try to get better and keep in touch more but the family occupies alot of my time. I want to say again how much I appreciate all the help I recieved before. You all are awesome. I probably would have lost all of my fish if not for you but, sadly, I did lose five: my precious angel, 2 dwarf gouramis, a danio and 2 plecos. I haven't added anything since. I am left with 4 danios and a dwarf gourmi "my Cid" who thankfully survived the whole ordeal. (thats short for "Acid", don't ask, my fiance named him and it just stuck) Anyway, I'm still having a slight prob. My nitrates won't drop below 10 I've been doing 25-30% changes every other day. My ammonia and nitrites have remained at 0 but I can't seem to get the nitrates down. I hate to ask this but, obviously my tap water is high in all sorts of chemicals and was wondering if there is a supplement I can buy to lower the nitrates. Also, I live in Florida and even though we have been having a bit of a heat wave, we are protesting to turing on our AC (mainly for financial reasons). Does anyone know of a safe way I can actually COOL down my tank. It averages about 84 degrees, I know this is high but we can't really afford to turn on the air at this time. Any help will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance
Gemmer

momo9700

If you can buy a cheap fan, just stick that next to your tank and turn it on.
It's kinda funny really, right now, I'm trying to get my tank temperature UP. For some reason it went down to 74....But I got it to 76 so w/e, as long as it comes back up.

Martinismommy

Drop a ziplock baggie in with ice cubes......I live in Phoenix, AZ where the average high in the summer is 115....My freezer is full of frozen bottles and ice cubes in case of a power outage....

hockeyref88

The only way to deal with nitrates is water changes. 10 is good really anything under 40 is ok. I usually do a change when they go over 20. There is nothing to add as far as chemicals for the nitrates. It sounds like your doing fine. If you put plants in your aquarium they help with the nitrates if you can keep them healthy and keep your fish from eating them. As for the heat, exactly what martinismommy said. Keep frozen bottles of water in your freezer and just drop them in. I just had the same problem and it worked great. If its a large tank you need large bottles as they melt fast.............Good luck.

Rick