Ammonia Level

[ohough88]

Hey guys, i'm fairly new to fishkeeping and looking for some advice about my tank. About 10 weeks ago I bought a 60L tropical tank from my local petsathome, the woman that served me told me to set it up and leave it for a week before putting fish in. I went back a week later and was told by a different member of staff that guppies would be good to start with so I bought 5 guppies. Needless to say 2 days later I discovered guppies are not good to start with as I only had 2 left, one of which I discovered had tailrot which I then had to treat the tank for. I was taking my water to be tested about twice a week and they kept telling me all the levels were high and to just keep doing water changes. After I took the guppies that survived back to the store I didn't have anything in the tank for about a week. Because of the bad advice I was given they gave me two danios for free which I still have in the tank. I bought an API freshwater test kit about 3 weeks ago so I could test the water myself, for the first couple of weeks I had quite high ammonia levels (about 1-2ppm)and very high nitrite levels (5ppm). About a week ago my ammonia started to come down and then my nitrite came all the way down to 0. My ammonia level has never gone down to 0 though, everytime I test it I always get 0.5ppm. The nitrite level has stayed at 0 and my nitrate level fluctuates between 5-20ppm. I use nutrafin aqua+ as a water conditioner and I use nutrafin cycle in the tank after water changes, I don't think i'm overfeeding because I only feed them a small pinch of food every other day so i've got no idea why the ammonia level is stuck at 0.5ppm.

Any advice you could give me would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

 

[OldMan47]

Welcome to the forum Ohough88.
I am a bit confused by your numbers myself. You should not have gone through the nitrite spike without getting to the point where you effectively process all ammonia. Two zebras in a tank that size is not much of a biological load so they should not give much of a build in ammonia to start with. Have you tried measuring your water change water to make sure it is not the source of your ammonia? When a dechlorinator breaks the chemical bonds of chloramine to remove the chlorine part, it leaves behind traces of the ammonia that was once a part of the chloramine. I have that problem myself. My own tap water shows as much as 1 ppm of ammonia right after I treat it with dechlorinator.
You say you are doing water changes but the idea during a fish-in cycle like yours is to always keep both ammonia and nitrites below 0.25 ppm. That can sometimes mean enormous water changes. If I have any trouble with a new cycle, I often will do a 90% or larger water change daily until the problem has passed. Because I use filter clones from my mature tanks, the problem usually lasts less than a week so such big water changes are not that much trouble.
Don't waste any more money on the "Cycle", it is useless in my own experience. My filters cycle in the same amount of time with or without it. I only tried it out because I got a free sample at a fish convention. Such products almost never work. The only one I am aware of that ever did is no longer sold because it had a very short shelf life and required constant refrigeration even then to survive until people could use it.

 

[ohough88]

Thanks for your reply, i'll do a water change later tonight and test the new water after i've added the conditioner. If that is whats causing the ammonia in the tank what can I do to remove it?

 

[arobinson1984]

Do you have gravel?

If so have you got a gravel cleaner and given it a good clean since you started the tank?

Andy

 

[ohough88]

Yeh, I have a gravel cleaner. I gave it a good clean with it again last night but still got 0.5ppm when I tested it this afternoon.

 

[chigwellhammer]

Strange yu had bad luck with your guppies? im new and doing fish-in cycle with guppies and a betta and they are all doing fine and getting along fine

 

[ohough88]

Does anyone think it might be worth me putting a couple more danios in and seeing what happens?

 

[Harlequins]

I would try to sort out your ammonia first...

Adding fish will possibly make it worse for a while has it will add to the ammonia problem

Have you tested the tap water for ammonia?

 

[ohough88]

Yeh, the tap water is fine.

Oldman47 said: Have you tried measuring your water change water to make sure it is not the source of your ammonia? When a dechlorinator breaks the chemical bonds of chloramine to remove the chlorine part, it leaves behind traces of the ammonia that was once a part of the chloramine. I have that problem myself. My own tap water shows as much as 1 ppm of ammonia right after I treat it with dechlorinator.

If this is the problem how would I go about resolving it?

 

[arobinson1984]

Have you tested you tap water?

Andy

 

[Harlequins]

I think oldman means to test the water in the bucket once you've added the dechlorinated but before you put it in the tank to see if its thats the source of your ammonia.

If so then maybe try a different dechlorinated?

 

[OldMan47]

If that is the problem, a water change using any source will never remove the last bit of ammonia. It is not the dechlorinator that is the problem, it is the chloramine the water company is using. In that case you do a water change any time you detect any ammonia increase and you use one of the better dechlorinators that can also neutralize the ammonia for a few days. It will not remove the ammonia but will change it to the less toxic form for a short time. After that few days you still need to do a water change. You can't expect the dechlorinator to keep the ammonia in its non-toxic form forever.