Water Changes...Unnecessary?

[Deadliestviper7]

Hello; let me add a speculation about the value of live plants in a closed system. I keep live plants in pretty much all my tanks, the exception being a hospital tank.
For live plant growth to be an aid in removing nitrates I have come to think some god fraction of plant matter needs to be harvested. I have been doing this for a time. The nitrates become bound up in the plant bodies.
I "harvest " plants from my tanks from time to time. By that I mean I take perfectly healthy plants out of the tanks. The free floating plants like hornwort are just removed and thrown into a bucket when I do a WC. It was difficult to toss the first few batches of healthy hornwort out like trash.
The rooted plants are pulled up when they overrun a tank. I have had some success getting a couple of area fish shops to take some of the plants. One shop about 50 miles away will only take the crypts and give me a store credit. Another shop about 78 miles away will take the crypts and the valls. One other shop will not take any plants at all.

I also try to remove detached leaves and dead leaves from the tanks. My thinking being to allow them to rot in the tank will put the nitrates back into the closed systems.

Not sure about emergent plants whose roots are in the water. I guess as long as their is new growth they are pulling nitrates. perhaps some judicial pruning?

Try feeding them to silver dollars or turtles.

 

[skjl47]

Hello; I do not have either of those, but a good idea anyway.
I

Try feeding them to silver dollars or turtles.

Hello; The photo is at the fence in my back yard that separates my place from the pasture next door. The big guy is the bull. I call him Big Mack.
Not sure why they wrote numbers on his side. He had gotten free a couple off times lately by breaking thru the fence. The numbers may be sort of like his prison tats.
I think he got to wanting the grass on the other side of the fence and that fence will not stop him.
I think Beef Stew and Sirloin are in the background.

 

[Hendre]

Plants will take up nitrogen in the water to use as proteins in growth. The faster it grows the more nitrogen compounds it uses. Common sense there

 

[Coryloach]

The vast majority of my fish are wild caught South American fish. When the nitrates hit 40, I can tell without testing the tank. Small little fin tags here and their, an ever so slight cloud to the eyes.

Scenario: The only metric of pollution one knows about is a nitrate test. Fish become sick. One tests the nitrate, its risen, therefore the fish have gotten sick because of high nitrates. One's conclusion, nitrates are toxic to fish. ....My conclusion: "One" is suffering from a tunnel vision...

Point is, water is composed of much more than just nitrates and it changes its composition continuously due to human inputs and outputs, chemical processes,micro-organism activity, etc...Leave said water in an enclosed container for a period of time, it is never going to be better than the first day you filled the container. From that day on, it deteriorates. The rate of deterioration depends on many factors but the solution is always the same, water change...

Nitrate is a metric of pollution. Regardless of how limited a nitrate test is in regards to giving an idea of the much bigger picture, as long as the conclusion is water changes, then a nitrate test is better than nothing. What is not o.k. is when one's logic is flawed and instead of increasing the level of water changes, one starts to find ways for artificial nitrate removal as an alternative to water changes...

 

[Deadliestviper7]

Hello; I do not have either of those, but a good idea anyway.View attachment 1311838
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Hello; The photo is at the fence in my back yard that separates my place from the pasture next door. The big guy is the bull. I call him Big Mack.
Not sure why they wrote numbers on his side. He had gotten free a couple off times lately by breaking thru the fence. The numbers may be sort of like his prison tats.
I think he got to wanting the grass on the other side of the fence and that fence will not stop him.
I think Beef Stew and Sirloin are in the background.

Funny names, my fiend used to have a chicken named nugget, nuggets favorite food was KFC . Lol

 

[RD.]

Seeing as this weeks interest is on nitrates. A classic example of how sometimes a little information on a topic can be dangerous.
Coming soon to a YouTube channel near you....