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Re: [APD] Sechem Flourish Nitrogen




Can anyone answer a question about dosing with flourish nitrogen. When I dose my 34 Gal tank with the calculated quantity of nitrogen to increase the nitrate level by 10ppm and I test it later in the day with an Aquarium pharmaceuticals nitrate test kit it tells me the nitrate level is only 5ppm. Has anyone come across this before or is it a problem with the test kit? The tested nitrate before adding the nitrogen is 0ppm. The formula on the bottle said to increase the nitrate level use the following equation 0.05 x Tank volume in gal x desired nitrate increase - 0.05 x 34 x 10 = 17ml or have I read the label wrong.

You have read it correctly and you are getting exactly the expected nitrate reading. This additional information is listed below the directions:


Because one-half of the nitrogen in Flourish Nitrogen? is from nitrate you can get a reasonable estimate of nitrogen levels by doubling a nitrate reading

So for example, you actually added 5 ppm worth of actual nitrate and an equivalent quantity of nitrogen in the complexed ammoniacal form. If one were to express this equivalent quantity of nitrogen in terms of nitrate equivalence it would be 5 ppm. But it's not in the "nitrate" form per se so it of course does not show up a nitrate test kit... but in your case you fall under the ideal scenario of simply doubling the reading to get a reasonable estimate of how much nitrogen is in the system in terms of nitrate equivalence.


I think the confusion here comes from the concept of "equivalence"... hopefully I have not added to the confusion with my explanation ;-) Let me know if you need more help.

-Greg Morin
--
Gregory Morin, Ph.D.  ~~~~~~~President/CEO~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Seachem Laboratories, Inc.      www.seachem.com     888-SEACHEM
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

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