Help! Frustrated with chemical readings

[NoahFL]

Hello all... I have a 55gal tank. I had 5 fish that I used to cycle the tank, mainly Platy's and Danios. All but one made it. Two weeks ago I decided to add more fish. I added more Danios, 2 Pearl Gourami's, 2 Sparkling Gourami's, and 6 Guppies. When I added the fish, I also added some StressZyme hoping that would help balance out the "good" bacteria. All was well for about 4 days, but then my ammonia spiked. I understand why the ammonia spiked because of the imbalance. The fish weren't showing any stress, but I added Ammo-Lock only because I didn't want to risk loosing any fish. I'm using a Mardel ammonia kit and it was showing 3.0ppm. I also did a 25% water change twice in 2 weeks. For the past several ammonia readings over 1.5 weeks, the color of the testing pad is blue which isn't even one of the colors on the bottle to compare to the test strip. The fish are still showing no signs of stress, eating fine, and I haven't lost any fish. Here are my other chemical readings:

Nitrate: 0ppm
Nitrite: 0ppm
Total Hardiness: 75ppm
Total Alkalinity: 80ppm
PH: between 6.8 and 7.2

Does anyone have any advice as to what to do? The last time I did an Ammo-Lock treatment was over a week ago, so by now I would have thought the filters would have filtered the non-dangerous form that Ammo-lock converts it to. As far as the type of filters I have. I have a UGF as well as a Whisper Intank filter 40i.

Thanks in advance for any advice anyone can offer.

 

[rdd1952]

The reason you had such a huge ammonia spike is the large quantity of fish you added at once. The tank was only cycled for the 4 fish you had. Adding that may (10 plus ever how many danios) introduced a huge amount of ammonia into the tank again and your bacteria simply couldn't handle it.

I strongly suspect that the Ammo-Lock is the problem with your messed up reading. Products like that (not totally familiar with this one in particular) usually transform ammonia into a non-toxic form rather than changing it to nitrite so the tank does not cycle. As a matter of fact, you quite possibly killed off the good bacteria you developed from the original cycling since they would not have had any ammonia to keep them fed. If at all possible, I would return all the new fish and start over. After that, just add 3 to 5 fish every couple weeks until you are completely stocked.

One other option that may be your best considering you have the fish already is to get some Bio Spira. That is the only cycling product that I have ever heard of that works (but only if it has been handled properly). It's pretty expensive but will probably be worth it if you don't loose your fish. Here is the one place that I have heard of that seems to handle it properly and sells good product. Let me say though that I have not used Bio Spira nor have I ever bought anything from the TN fish store so this is all based on what I have read.

 

[NoahFL]

Thanks for the reply. What you said makes perfect sense. I will look into the Bio Spira. I would have thought that after 1.5 weeks, the non-toxic form of ammonia would have been filtered out through my carbon filter (as that is what the directions say it does). If that was the case, I would have thought I'd see some cycling action happening if there wasn't a perfect balance of bacteria, but my readings aren't showing that (ie. no nitrites). I don't know what to make of the ammonia readings. I just recently bought the ammonia test kit, so it shouldn't be bad. On a positive note, I haven't lost any fish, they look healthy (fins are straight up) and they are eating fine. I even have baby guppies thriving in the fake plant brush.

Thanks again.

 

[NoahFL]

Should I do a 50% water change, but not take the water from the gravel to avoid removing any good bacteria?

 

[rdd1952]

From what I have read about carbon, I think it loses it's effectiveness after a couple weeks so that may be the reason it hasn't filtered it out. Water changes should have also helped remove it too. It does sound like there are still some remnants of the non-toxic form present though.

 

[NoahFL]

I just replaced the carbon filter on the 40i 4 days ago and today replace the UGF carbon. Prior to that, the filters were changed 3 weeks ago. Thanks again