# nitrate test results with seachem nitrogen



## pedietz (Dec 18, 2003)

Yupp. Double it.

The seachem.com site mentions a new test coming out soon called "Seachem Total Nitrogen" that will measure all 3 kinds of Nitrogen...


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## mr hyde (Sep 7, 2002)

My red sea phosphate and nitrate test kits finally arrived today. tested phosphates and I have .5ppm so I'm good there it looks like but my nitrates still read 0. This is a 46 gallon tank. I started dosing with seachem nitrogen 6ml at a time. I got up to 12 ml and still 0ppm. I waited 10 hrs and added 32 ml more. I tested every 6 ml waiting 10 minutes each time. After a total of 42 ml in 10 hrs which is about 21 times what the bottle recommeds as the beginners dose. My test kit is showing some color change to blue but it still doesn't make the mininum 2.5ppm on the test kit. At this point I'm getting sketchy about adding anymore. No dead fish so I guess that is a good sign. That seems like a huge amount of nitrate I've added with little change on the reading. Thats almost a quarter bottle of seachem nitrogen. I know most of the folks here use a different form of nitrate to dose their tanks and that the seachem nitrogen is not the same as adding straight nitrate. Has anyone had experience dosing and testing with the seachem brand?


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## SCMurphy (Oct 21, 2003)

Why didn't you test the kit on a bucket of water? You could add the nitrate to a fixed amount of water and calculate how much should be registered by the test kit.


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## pedietz (Dec 18, 2003)

I retested my "broken" Red Sea kit last night on my pleco tank I never do anything too...

It appears to work but takes over 2 hours for the pink hue of 5ppm to finally show up.

(my AP test shows the tank to be about 12ppm)


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## Wasserpest (Jun 12, 2003)

I don't have experience with Seachem Nitrate. All I want to say is... Do not add more fertilizer to your tank than what you calculate, or the bottle recommends, based on the test kit. If you don't get the expected results with the test, forget the test kit, and dose according to Chucks calculator, or the instructions on the bottle.
Especially if you know your NO3 source is good (like in the case of a bottle of Seachem), don't just keep dosing just to make the test kit turn to some color. You might get your tank into a big dirty mess.
Even if you underdose, it will still be much better than no dosing or overdosing. If your testkit doesn't give you the expected 10 ppm, so be it, at least you know you added some, which is now available to your plants.
Observing your plants rather than aiming for some recommended value via some unreliable testkit is better IMO.


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## mr hyde (Sep 7, 2002)

Thanks Wasserpest
According to the formula on the bottle .05 X v X n=m 
v=volume-tank gallons (46 gal)
n = desired nitrate increase (5ppm)
m= volume of product to use in ML
I should be using 11.5 ML to get to 5 ppm nitrates
A lot less than I added. Following the directions on the bottle to dose is easy the first time but then when water change time comes or when a lot of the nitrate is used up by the plants I'd be lost on how much to add. It would be a lot easier if I could get accurate readings and go by that intead of guessing and ending up with no nitrates or too much. I'm sure the seachen nitrogen is a quality product but trying to read it on test results makes it seem more of a pain to use. I guess my options would be to use a different form of nitrate to dose or keep buying test kits until I find one that works, or like you said, just go by the bottle directions


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## mr hyde (Sep 7, 2002)

Murphy 
I did the bucket test just now. Using a gallon of tap water and adding .5ml nitrogen my test kit still does not read any nitrates. According to the bottle formula it should read 10. My hagen test kit reads 0 and the same with a brand new red sea kit. I wonder if anyone here has ever used a known to be good test kit and tested water with seachem nitrogen for nitrates.


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## SCMurphy (Oct 21, 2003)

mr hyde said:


> Murphy
> I did the bucket test just now. Using a gallon of tap water and adding .5ml nitrogen my test kit still does not read any nitrates. According to the bottle formula it should read 10. My hagen test kit reads 0 and the same with a brand new red sea kit. I wonder if anyone here has ever used a known to be good test kit and tested water with seachem nitrogen for nitrates.


Are you sure about your calculation of the solution? If you are then now you know how good the test kit is. I hate to say it, but think about what you did to your tank trying to get a reading on your test kit. We should add that to a "basic rules" section: 

"Don't test your test kit on your aquarium."

Calculate and make a solution in a seperate container, and then knowing the reading you should get, test your kit with this solution.


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## mr hyde (Sep 7, 2002)

ya i was a little too excited to start adding the nitrates before doing the bucket test. I guess I had heard so many people recommend the red sea kit that I assumed it was good. It may in fact be accurate still and something else is wrong. As far as I know I got the formula right but I could be wrong.


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