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I am having tank problems ammonia has been reading .25 for 3wks, nitrates are down sense i changed so much water down to about 10 ive been having trouble keeping the nitrates down! the more water i change the higher the ammonia gets but my tank is just fowlr so i dont want to do ro/di

i have 1 mag 350 canister with filter plus carbon

4 power heads plenty of water movement if not to much about 14xhr

300w heater

15 crabs

1 puffer

1 clown yellow

1 percula clown

1 sixline

1 flame angel

tank is about a 1 1/2 yr old has been moved 2x

lr about 110lb but only 10lb of that is live

sand about 60lb of play and 40lb of live so got about 2 in behind the rocks and about 3-4 in front not good from what i have been reading just added the ls a mo ago

so as you can see i cut corners and also moved the tank about 7mo ago

souce water is full of phosphates, ammonia .25, nitrates 2.5 so water changes do a little but in the long run i think it makes it worse

my thoughts i only have about 150 bucks to due somthing and i wont get anymore money for about 3 mo!!!! period so what would be the best thing to do first?

cheap rodi unit offline (dont want to do) 160 bucks plus water bill!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

another canister with filter media 100 bucks (reading wont do much)

add 25lb of lr 120 bucks (wait 3wks for curing)

add more sand 60 bucks ( Drop in today!)

all this started to happin after i did hypo in the main tank and put my rocks into a bin witch i fogot to watch so my inverts died and the rocks go recured i guess you could say cuz it stunk for 3wks and now my rocks look dead as all of them had some life on them! thats another reason i think ro/di is not needed but would help!

http://www.cardomain.com/ride/2571255/2

I told you what I thought you should do in november. You probably could have had this settled by now.

Get an RO/DI unit for 100$ including shipping (make sure to get the hose adapter) in the link I just gave you a few days ago, and use the rest of the money for a new bucket of salt and go at it.

Cut the feeding, do 10% water changes twice a week with pure water, make sure you are skimming well and it will take care of itself.

I told you your tap was creating problems and wasn't going to get any better if you kept using it. 3 months with poor water quality and it's surprising you haven't had health problems with your fish yet.

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Critical Fertilator: The Micromanager of Macronutrients

yeah i know just dont understand why my first 3 1/2 was going fine you know just thought maybe better rock would do the trick?

http://www.cardomain.com/ride/2571255/2

Matty is right. If you have $150 you are willing to spend on this aquarium, buy an RO unit from Ebay or somewhere and just make your own water. If your tap water is as bad as you are saying, you don't want it in the tank. Also, just as a precaution I would try to have another source test your water with a liquid kit, just to be sure the numbers are accurate.

I didn't get to your question about waste water in the other post about RO. I'm not certain this is the case, but if RO waste water is just leftover tap water (same composition) then it should be safe to use for laundry and your dogs if you use faucet water for those already. However, if your water is really that polluted, I'm not sure I would use it for the dogs or even my own drinking water.

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And when he gets to Heaven, to Saint Peter he will tell: "One more Marine reporting, Sir! I've served my time in Hell."