Amonia Spike From Dead Fish?

[wildechild_01]

So i woke up to a dead Tiger barb this morning, my first dead fish so a little sad... first thing i did after removing him was to do water tests, its a fairly new tank, fishless cycled, then added the barbs, waited a week and added my polka dot loaches a few days ago, water test were fine when i added the loaches, tank did a mini cycle and tests were back to Normal last night, but then this morning there was a noticable spike in Ammonia and nitrite levels, i did a rather small water change and will be testing the water a few more times today, i am just wondering if these spikes are normal with a dead fish being in the water or did something else maybe happen over night causing death of this barb? All of my other fish seem to be happy and healthy.

 

[anwhyte]

So i woke up to a dead Tiger barb this morning, my first dead fish so a little sad... first thing i did after removing him was to do water tests, its a fairly new tank, fishless cycled, then added the barbs, waited a week and added my polka dot loaches a few days ago, water test were fine when i added the loaches, tank did a mini cycle and tests were back to Normal last night, but then this morning there was a noticable spike in Ammonia and nitrite levels, i did a rather small water change and will be testing the water a few more times today, i am just wondering if these spikes are normal with a dead fish being in the water or did something else maybe happen over night causing death of this barb? All of my other fish seem to be happy and healthy.

in my experience fish decompose really quickly in warm water so an ammonia spike wouldn't be unusual, you did the right thing (removed the corpse/water change) so i wouldn't worry.

 

[ellena]

I just lost 2 endlers (they disappeared) and had an ammonia spike at the same time, so I think it's possible.

 

[natalie265]

I had an ammonia spike (and subsequent algae bloom) after realizing that i was missing one of my african dwarf frogs (body never recovered). A major water change should sort it out.

 

[aaronnorth]

any living thing that rots produces ammonia.

 

[waterdrop]

Hi wildchild and welcome to the beginners section!

Sorry to hear about your Tiger Barb. How long has your tank been running? How many days did your fishless cycle take? What brand of household ammonia were you able to find for your fishless cycle? (always interesting to those members who have a hard time finding the right stuff!)

What brand/type of test kit do you have?

~~waterdrop~~

 

[wildechild_01]

Okay, so my Amonia Levels have been absolutely nuts since the fish died, I have no idea what is going on, My fishless cycle ran me 4 weeks, which after more reading may have been pretty quick, but it is a smaller tank, I ran it with 3 fish for a week, daily water tests were good so i added the 2 more tiger barbs, then a week later the loaches.... amonia was at 1ppm and nitrite at 0ppm this morning so i did a small water change as i had to get to work, when i got home nitrite was still at 0ppm and amonia had gone up to 2ppm, its like my tank stopped processing the amonia, i did a 25% water change to help cut the amonia levels but am not sure what else i can do for right away. I have read almost everything i can find about fish in Cycling and am going to do my best to try and get a few small water changes in when i can and keep a close eye on my levels, at this point i am thinking i jumped the gun on putting fish in the tank. I guess this is turning into one of those Learning experiences... any other ideas on what is going on would be appreciated.

 

[waterdrop]

I'm confused. You said you did a 4week fishless cycle but do not say if you added household ammonia during that time to grow the beneficial bacteria colonies before adding fish. A fishless cycle is a process where you feed the tank with ammonia and test to see if the bacteria are present. Were the first 3 fish added only after the 4 weeks of fishless cycling?

In any case, it sounds like you are in a Fish-In cycling situation currently and that you somehow have the feeling that -small- water changes are necessary. When there is ammonia or nitrite(NO2) showing up on tests, that problem "trumps" any benefit of small water changes. It is much more important to remove the poisons than to worry about a water change being a stress. You need a couple of large (50 to 70%) water changes close together to start and then 50% daily until you can get a good liquid-reagent base test kit if you don't already have one. If you have one then you need to figure out what percentage and frequency of water changes will keep your ammonia and nitrite going down and up between zero and 0.25ppm. The trick is for it to not go above 0.25ppm before you can be home to change water again. The testing will usually help confirm that you don't need quite so many water changes as we start out with.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[wildechild_01]

Sorry for Confusion, yes i did add household ammonia during that time and brought ammonia levels up to 4ppm a few times untill it started processing quickly, then to about 1ppm while i wated for the Nitrite (NO2-) to process, thats why i am confused at this point now.... i will definitely start doing the larger water changes (did a 50% after reading your post) and will check levels again in the morning. I do have liquid reagent test kits for the different tests, i worked for years as a pool operator and understand water ballancing, i was unsure of doing large water changes because i did not want to remove all of the ammonia if the bacteria are just starting to grow again but i guess with the fish in there i always have a supply of ammonia so the more i can get out the better. Thanks for the advice, i will try to let you know how things are going again tomorrow

 

[OldMan47]

Don't worry about removing all of the ammonia, it can't happen. No matter how far you drop the ammonia measurement, the fish will continue to pass water through their gills which means a few moments later there will be traces of ammonia in the water. We really do intend to bring ammonia as low as practical with water changes but don't get too carried away if you can't reach a perfect zero.

 

[waterdrop]

Agree, just follow what OM47 said, even when we water change and our tests read zero, the immediate traces will be enough to feed the bacteria and let it develop.

OK, glad to hear you did indeed try to perform a normal fishless cycle. You say that you brought the ammonia to 4ppm a few times to get it processing quickly and then only to 1ppm while waiting for nitrite to process.. All that's good but we -have- found that it pays off to be pretty picky about the ending conditions of a fishless cycle. What we do here is to be sure that we are back up to feeding it 5ppm each 24 hours (if its gone to zero within the previous 24 hours) and then ensure that both ammonia and nitrite(NO2) drop completely to zero ppm within 12 hours after ammonia was added. We then watch it perform this feat for a week to ensure that its not fooling us (and very often we find out during the first part of that week that yes, it wasn't quite ready yet!)

~~waterdrop~~

 

[wildechild_01]

Thanks for all the help here, this has definitley been a learning experience and next time will be more picky with results on my fishless cycle, that said, the fish all seem quite happy and healthy so i will just keep an eye on things and keep doing my water changes as needed.. i am about to go do a 50 - 75% since the ammonia is about 1ppm (as acurate as can be with test tubes and plastic cards) and then will check levels and maybe do another change before bed.

 

[OldMan47]

Glad to see that you are on the right track now. The 75% will do much more good than a 50%. The 75% will drop 1 ppm to about 0.25 ppm while 50% will only drop it to 0.5 ppm.

 

[wildechild_01]

AAAck... ok so, my barbs are freaking out now, water levels seem to be okay... ammonia seems to be around .5ppm and i will do another water change before bed, but my Barbs are all hiding and breathing like crazy, looking very stressed out... is this just because of the larger water change??? PH is good, Chlorine is Nil, Ammonia is about .5ppm and Nitrite is still at 0... any ideas here?

 

[OldMan47]

Don't even think about using a chlorine test to decide not to use the dechlorinator. Use it every time at least at the recommended rate. I use a double dose because my local water supplier ups the chlorine dose at times without telling anyone.