Prime Giving False Water Parameter Readings?...

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Jackiee

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I have an API freshwater master test kit.. Liquid drops.

I have recently had chaos break out in my tank for unknown reasons.. My cichlids in my 90 gallon came down with hex/hole in the head and one caught a secondary fungus infection. My pleco's stomach also began to sink in even though he was eating, and has continued to sink in, as well as his eyes now dispite treatment. This all happened after cleaning my canister filter and adding dechlorinated tap water into my tank after street work being done on my water lines, after a boil order. Many people I have spoken to on here said I either A) killed too much bacteria in my filter and caused my parameters to go crazy or B) there was some sort of disinfectant or other means in my tap water that killed bacteria in my tank or introduced issues with my water.

Being that I had two additional filters running besides my canister filter, and I didn't touch either of them because I knew they held important bacteria, we're leaning more towards the "bad" tap water that was introduced into my tank..

I still haven't been able to use my tap water because ongoing street work.. So I had to resort to going to the grocery stores and getting a ridiculous amount of one gallon jugs of water..

Well, despite doing a 30% water change on my main 90 gallon tank, and a 50% water change on my 10 gallon hospital tank that I have my dying pleco in, I'm still getting readings of 0.25-0.50 of ammonia in both tanks.. My 90 gallon is giving me extremely high nitrate readings despite the water change, and the hospital tank nitrates only went down very, very slightly.. But hardly.

I've been dosing both tanks with Prime as a precaution because I don't know what else to do!!! I'm so stressed.

Could the prime be giving me these false readings by chance?!

My nitrites in both tanks are zero!
 
I have heard that prime will give false readings.
 
Incorrect readings if any due to Prime should be correct after about 1 to 2 days from what I've heard on the forums.   I personally never had an incorrect reading after a water change--it read the same as before the change.
 
Prime can give ammonia readings for the first 24 hours. Usually it's a small amount (up to .50)
 
Yes, Prime can give a false reading.  Here is a link/quote from Seachem's website. 
 
http://www.seachem.com/support/FAQs/Prime.html
 
 
A salicylate based kit can be used, but with caution. Under the conditions of a salicylate kit the ammonia-Prime complex will be broken down eventually giving a false reading of ammonia (same as with other products like Prime®), so the key with a salicylate kit is to take the reading right away. However, the best solution ;-) is to use our MultiTest: Ammonia™ kit... it uses a gas exchange sensor system which is not affected by the presence of Prime® or other similar products. It also has the added advantage that it can detect the more dangerous free ammonia and distinguish it from total ammonia (which is both the free and ionized forms of ammonia (the ionized form is not toxic)).
 

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