Test strips and green water

[Don G]

Hey everybody so I’ve got green water That originally started as an Infusoria culture I started with brewers yeast a few months ago it’s been green water for at least a month I was wanting to use it to grow out threadfin rainbows but when I checked it with aquarium co-op easy test strips the nitrite and nitrate went as dark as it could and all the indicator pads started bleeding color really bad I’ve checked test strips with other tanks and they’ve done fine I didn’t think green water would be that high has anyone else had this experience could the green water be messing up the test strips thoughts and opinions?

[Fish Folk]

What sort of containment and filtration do you have operating this water? Has it been sitting idle a long while? (Could there be fermentation going on?) Just hard to gauge without more info. Can you put a drop under a microscope and see infusoria?

[DaveO]

I have seen test strips "bleed" badly from bio-film on the surface resulting in unreadable strip.

[Don G]

I haven’t had any filtration on it I’ve got a heater in it on 78 I don’t have a microscope but it’s very hard to see any active Infusoria with the naked eye like I could before I’ve had a light in it too try to keep the green water going I have a few plants in it as well I didn’t think it would ferment do you think that’s what’s going on and if so how would I keep something going that I can put fry in to raise up without messing up my parameters I need something long term I need something I can leave them in  for the eggs to hatch because if I don’t get them out as soon as they hatch they fungus and die