Thanx for the insight Tom. I pretty much stopped dosing NO3 when I noticed
an increase of some algae and assumed that was the issue. The only things
that has changed in the last few months in my aquarium was a sudden growth
of a few fish and a cut-back and cleanout of a lot of my old ludwigia.
Anyways...

having inaccurate nitrate counts could be pretty detrimental to the health
of the aquarium system. I've done some research and couldn't find any
suppliers in Canada where I can order the LaMott test kits. I've heard that
the Salifert ones are just about as good but much cheaper.

Where could I get these kits?

Thanx!
Dave
" wrote in message
om...
"Dave M. Picklyk" wrote in message
news:6Nipc.9590$RM.5153@edtnps89...
I've been having a really hard time trying to decipher my NutraFin
nitrate
test kit results. The color chart is basically a light to dark hue of
purple...the water in my test tube looks more like a fuschia/pink bright
color which doesn't match anything. I usually pull the test tube back a
few
inches and the hue changes color and I guess.

I've noticed that Tetra has a kit that I might like better; it has a
color
chart that has different color shades from yellow to orange to red. This
might be easier to read.

Any opinions?

Thanx a lot!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Dave


Tetra kits are pretty much unless.
Lamott test kits are one of the few worth while kits out there. Cost a
lot more, but if you want something that actually measures the levels
in a meaningful way, then it's worth it.
Cheap NO3 and PO4 kits are, well, cheap. If you need to see if there's
presence or absense, they are not really good there either.

Seeing if a kit is any good is not too complicated, make a known
solution with the weight of KNO3 to a known volume of water, then you
can figure out how much NO3 is in there.

Lamott held up well, I have not found others that do well in the
ranges folks need for planted tanks, many times people think they have
enough NO3 bwecause the kit reads 15ppm or something, when they are
really at 0.0ppm and this can cause algae indirectly and other issues.

Regards,
Tom Barr