Leave one written baseline sheet listing ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, pH and temperature, filled in with your own tank's typical readings from the week before you travel. A sitter cannot judge a test result they have never seen before; a figure that looks alarming to a newcomer may be your tank's everyday value, and a figure that looks ordinary may be a sharp change for your system. The baseline turns their test result into a comparison, which is the only form in which it is useful.
Record Your Own Tank's Figures
Take readings on three separate days in the week before you leave, at roughly the same time of day, using your usual test kit in your usual way. Where the three readings agree, record that figure as typical. Where they vary a little, as nitrate and temperature often do, record the small range you actually saw. These are your tank's own readings, gathered in a normal week with feeding and maintenance running as usual, not figures copied from a book or another keeper's tank.
For reference, a cycled tank's sheet typically shows ammonia at 0 ppm and nitrite at 0 ppm, because a working filter processes both fully, a low nitrate figure that reflects your water-change routine, a pH that barely moves between readings, and a temperature held steady by the heater. If your readings differ from that pattern in a normal week, record yours anyway and discuss the difference with an aquatic specialist before you travel, rather than writing down values you hope for.
An Example Sheet, in the Same Fields
An example sheet, with the same field list as above, might read:
- Ammonia: 0 ppm
- Nitrite: 0 ppm
- Nitrate: 15 ppm
- pH: 7.2
- Temperature: 24°C (75°F)
Those example values are illustrative, showing the shape of a completed sheet for a cycled tank; the sheet you leave must carry your own figures from your own three readings, even where they differ from the example. Keep the field list identical on the sheet, in this article's list and in any copy you hand over, so the sitter matches result to baseline line by line without hunting for a value recorded under a different name.
Write Down What Should Trigger a Call
Beside the baseline, write what deviation should trigger a call to you, in plain terms the sitter can act on without judging chemistry. Any ammonia reading above 0 ppm is a call the same day, and any nitrite reading above 0 ppm is a call the same day, because both should stay at zero in your cycled tank. A nitrate figure clearly above your recorded figure, a pH visibly shifted from your recorded value, such as a move of 0.4 or more, or a temperature more than about 2°C (about 4°F) away from your recorded figure should each prompt a call rather than a wait until you return.
Add what the sitter should not do: no feeding changes, no filter cleaning and no large water change on their own initiative while they wait to reach you, unless you direct it on the call. Clear call triggers plus clear limits stop a worried sitter from either freezing or overcorrecting.
Leave the Sheet Where the Testing Happens
Keep the sheet beside the test kit, with your phone number on the same page, and go through it once with the sitter before you leave, testing a sample together so they have used the kit with you watching. Note on the sheet which day you last changed water and which day the next change falls due, so a test taken just before a routine change is read in that context.
Sent ahead of the trip through KinsLe, your Care Pass can include this baseline sheet word for word, so the sitter reads your figures on their phone at the tank rather than searching for a piece of paper.