water change for 50Gallon tank

[BengBear]

Hi,
Did almost water change each week for 3 weeks, trying to bring nitrates down. Just change on 30Oct and thinking of next change on 3Nov08.

Is this advisable? Current nitrates is around 40ppm or less.

The tank has 11 fishes (4" emperor, 3" koran and 3" yellow angels, 2 common clowns, 1 pertula clown, 1 fire clown, 1 yellow dottyback, 1 cleaner wrasse, 2 tangs blue regal and naso), some 10 scarlet hermits, 2 nasa snails and 2 cleaner shrimps.

[charlie]

I hate to say this, but I think alot of your nitrate problem may lie in the fact that you have way to many fish in your 50 gallon. The tangs themselves both require at least a 150 gallon aquarium to be marginally safe to keep. You can do the water changes on the schedule you have been doing, but in the long run, I would reduce the fish bioload first. Sorry, but you are a little bit overpopulated IMO.

[lps]

Agreed. Sorry to bring bad news, but that is a very heavy load on a 50 gallon. Also the tangs really do need a much larger tank. How much water are you changing each week?