Nitrates

[Mike Chesmer]

Anyone know what plant is good at absorbing nitrates? I know all plants do at some point, and some better than others. I have a 75 gal low tech planted tank, but I need more plants. I do not have enough. Mostly Java Fern and amazon sword, both of which are sprouting runners and new plants, and a few lily types that grow the pads to the surface. Java moss? Stem plants of some kind? And also, I have a couple large driftwood in the tank. Is it possible to get Java Moss to grow and spread all of the wood? 

[Guppysnail]

For nitrate reduction hornwort, guppy grass, pogostemons, and water wisteria that are fast growers work well. I also use emergent plants like lucky bamboo and pothos. Java moss I struggle to get to spread on wood and actually look good. My go to is Christmas moss. It grows fast, attaches well and always seems to look good for me. In my tanks Xmas moss is also less prone to algae. 

[Mmiller2001]

Hygrophila Polysperma.

[Mike Chesmer]

Good choices, thanks everyone! Going to try Hygrophila Polysperma and christmas moss and water wisteria. 

[Sora]

most floating plants  are great at reducing nitrates, such as water lettuce, salvinnia, duckweed and amazon frogbit.

[Ninjoma]

I think dwarf sag is a pretty decent carpeting option since it spreads fast and gets pretty big.

[Lennie]

Def floating plants, hornwort and elodea. Crazy fast growth = sucking up nitrates while growing up

[TOtrees]

Honestly, I couldn't choose just one as the best suggestion out of all the good ones here. House plants that tolerate roots in water are a great option, if you have the light and setup for it. Hornwort is a nitrate sucking machine, but not always the prettiest. Floaters need light, the right ventilation, and sometimes a corral. Duckweed, well... is duckweed. All these will do the job you ask, but I also like @Pepere's reality check: no amount of plants will remove nitrates as fast as a water change. 

Remember, just having plants doesn't mean big reduction in nitrates. The plants need to be growing. The faster the growth, ie the more biomass they put on, the faster the nitrate use. Photosynthesis operates like a diaphragm pump. Something gets sucked up the tube, something turns the mechanism, and something comes out of the tube. CO2 + H20 and nitrates go in, and sugar/starch/cellulose (molecules built from H, C & O) come out, along with oxygen and a few complex molecules that also include N (eg chlorophyll and amino acids). These are where the nitrates go. The pump is powered by light (how very modern 😂). No light, no pump. Low light, slow pump. Low CO2, pump can move but process lacks ingredients. No input = no output. Even if only one of the ingredients is missing, no output. All this means, if you want your plants to really remove lots of nitrates, you need plants that can grow fast, and you need to provide the conditions where they can do that. How much plant matter you have to remove (trim or thin) and how often is a good barometer of whether this is happening. I love pulling out loads of plants from my working tanks. It makes me feel like I'm literally netting out nitrates 🙂

[nabokovfan87]

Moss does well. Floating plants like salvina. Pogostemon Stellatus octopus and hornwort as well.

[BuzzDaddy21]

On 4/26/2023 at 10:40 AM, Mike Chesmer said:

what plant is good at absorbing nitrates

Well plants aren't really needed for nitrates.

I have very little plants in my 40B, and my nitrates are usually under 0.55ppm. Right now, in the 40B nitrates are 0.26ppm.                                                                                      In my 20T I have a bunch of guppy grass and nitrates are 0.07ppm. (This was the first reading I got was 0.02ppm and I thought it was too low.)

This tells me that I have a lot of good bacteria.

 

[BuzzDaddy21]

On 4/29/2023 at 2:38 PM, Pepere said:

what testing method

I switched to the Hanna checkers and find them easy to use, sort of expensive but worth it to me.

 

On 4/29/2023 at 2:38 PM, Pepere said:

how you get nitrate levels so low.

Well, It's not because of plants.

I`m getting to set up another 40B using kitty litter (A certain brand) and like my other tanks this will have a slow-moving plenum - I feel that this is why my nitrates are so low.) 

There's a 1" empty space under the plates and I also have media there. On top will be about 4 to 5" of kitty litter.

Seems that good bacteria is the real answer. 

[BuzzDaddy21]

On 4/30/2023 at 12:21 PM, Pepere said:

 

i am curious as tohow long your tanks have been running this way

Thats a good question for sure. Somewhere around 8 - 10 months.

Nitrates didn`t drop until I got the plenum set up correctly. (Slow moving.)

Nitrates have been dropping as the tank ages.

Nitrates before this were 60ppm to over 80ppm.