Chlorine/chloramine Testers

[ZoddyZod]

Firstly a bit of background....

I'm now in the 9th week of a fish-in cycle with no sign of nitItes and daily ammonia readings of 25ppm (now doing at least 33% water changes a day to keep under control).

I added Bactinettes on Thursday and also some sponge from a mature filter (kindly donated from here) on Friday - still no sign of nitItes but I guess I'm a little impatient with seeing the affect of these additions.

Anyway, although I am adding enough Nutrafin Aqua to remove Chlorine/Chloramine during every water change, I want to make sure that the levels of these two in my tap water is not higer than the dosing of the dechlorinator can handle - thus hampering the bacterial growth on the filter.

What is the forums opion of the most accurate and readily available chlorine/chloramine tester? I'm probably only ever going to use it once, so the smaller/cheaper the better!

cheers

 

[loachman]

Personally, I'd just put a little extra dechlorinator in if you're worried. It's pretty hard to overdose on it (you have to really try hard). If you use a pond dechlorinator (a more concentrated version of what is used for aquariums) it costs almost nothing. 1 bottle lasts me about a year on a 75 gal and a 20gal.

Chlorine concentration of tap water is something that is rarely tested.

 

[jmkgreen]

I'm almost certain that you are not being hampered by chlorine/chloramine. It doesn't kill the bacteria in the filter without sufficient dosage (i.e. running directly underneath the tap, and then sometimes you get away with it), let alone diluted to minute quantities by the dechlorinator. Check to ensure your tank temperature really is at 29-30C and you're following the standard procedures (see elsewhere).

 

[ZoddyZod]

Check to ensure your tank temperature really is at 29-30C and you're following the standard procedures (see elsewhere).

As stated, I am in a fish-IN cycle (due to believeing the hype on a bottle of Nutrafin Cycle), so cant run at 30c otherwise I'll be cooking the sub-tropical Zebra Danios that are already in there.

Found this (dechlorinators) interesting review of dechlorinators. It states that Nutrafin Aqua Plus doesn't have the correct ingredients to properly break down chloramine, even stating that this will release the bonded ammonia.

I wonder if this is riasing the ammonia levels in my tank significantly given the amount of water changes, and therefore addition of dechlor, that I am currently performing???

 

[mattlee]

Check to ensure your tank temperature really is at 29-30C and you're following the standard procedures (see elsewhere).

As stated, I am in a fish-IN cycle (due to believeing the hype on a bottle of Nutrafin Cycle), so cant run at 30c otherwise I'll be cooking the sub-tropical Zebra Danios that are already in there.

Found this (dechlorinators) interesting review of dechlorinators. It states that Nutrafin Aqua Plus doesn't have the correct ingredients to properly break down chloramine, even stating that this will release the bonded ammonia.

I wonder if this is riasing the ammonia levels in my tank significantly given the amount of water changes, and therefore addition of dechlor, that I am currently performing???

the warmer you can run your tank the quicker the bacteria will grow, so it might be worth while tweeking it up a little.....

 

[coldcazzie]

I'm now in the 9th week of a fish-in cycle with no sign of nitItes and daily ammonia readings of 25ppm

25ppm?! Please tell me you mistyped that LOL!

You should be able to go to your water suppliers website and read the latest water report which will tell you how much of either chlorine or chloramine they use in the water, and from that work out if that might be the source of your problem.

If that's not it then I have no idea...

 

[waterdrop]

I'm pretty sure he meant to type 0.25ppm for that listing.

I agree with loachman and mattlee up there. Even though its true you might find a number at the water authorities website, we've been advised by Tolak and other experienced members that many water authorities will "spike" the water with pretty big hits of extra chlorine/chloramine when they perceive a problem and are worried about meeting standards out at the end of the pipeline. This poses no problem for a mature biofilter, but the small fragile colonies of a newly cycling filter might really suffer a hit.

I am also a believer in saving money via pond dechlor once one has a cycled and normally running tank. But during the cycling process, especially if one is having trouble, it might be worthwhile to try knocking out both of your worries. The first worry would most easily be covered by dosing the conditioner at 1.5 or 2.0x the recommended dosing. This will handle any extra chlorine products the water folks throw in. Don't go over the 2x multiplier because there's a tidbit of evidence it might slow the N-Bac growth.

For the second worry, you're getting into a more controversial area (many would say that the main dechlor chemicals used are just that, the same chemical, lol) but if you want to reassure yourself with the things that have done the best in those more detailed types of reviews, I'd say probably Seachem Prime and Amquel+ get the best reviews for the specific needs of cycling and fragile colonies, but maybe only the Prime would be available near you in the UK. Many here do cite Prime as their top recommendation if comparing.

OK, so all that said, is it really the problem? Well, at least its a couple actions you can take, but I suppose it could be some other unknown, some excess of some chemical we don't really measure or some unusual bacteria that's gotten in there and is competing with your good ones and is throwing things off, who knows? Sorry to hear of your troubles and good luck. Persistence usually pays off in the end.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[ZoddyZod]

Ok, thanks for all the replies.

So my next steps should be....

1 - up the temp. Will raise it from 23.5c to 26c (not keen to go higher due to zebra danios)

2 - double dose decholr during water changes

3 - invest in Prime (I'm sure the wife will love another £15 going into my watery money-pit )

4 - cross fingers

 

[waterdrop]

if you don't want to deal with that irritation you could just skip the Prime part.. on the other hand you could just pride yourself in how much money your aquarium hole in the water for money is compared to the hole in the water for money that a sailboat is, lol.

--wd--

 

[OldMan47]

I always run with about 1.5 to 2 times the recommended dose of dechlorinator because I do not trust my water supplier to advise when the decide a sharp spike in chlorine is called for. It keeps me from having my fish killed off by the chlorine spike, much less a bacterial colony. I never do trust my water company to let me know if they think it time to help keep the water safe for consumption by doing a large dose, they know better than us when it comes to our health and don't want to "alarm" anyone with the announcement that they needed to increase the dose. If all I was worried about was people with their huge tolerance for chlorination, I might agree, but that is not all that I care about. My local fish club gets warnings from their water supplier but unfortunately it is a different water supplier. Don't be afraid to move the dechlorinator to double the recommended amount. Most of them have labels that say that amount is fine.

 

[ZoddyZod]

Week 10 now and still no change.

For the past week the tank has been upped to 26c and I've been double dosing on the declor.

Ordered Seachem Prime as my dechlor was running out anyway.

Fingers are still crossed but the cramp is now unbearable.