Im At My Wits End - Can Anyone Shed Some Light On This Nightmare?

[Gilli]

Just an update to keep this thread alive in the hopes that someone somewhere will read it and maybe able to help.....

Im now doing a water change every 3 days instead of daily. As some people are telling me to stop water changes and some telling me to carry on daily I thought the best thing to do was the middle thing! I dont feel able to leave it any longer than 3 days as ammonia is between 0.50 an 1.0 and I dont want my fish to suffer any more than they have to. Nitrite is still at 0 and nitrates are 20.......

 

[coldcazzie]

Is it possible to get yourself some ammo chips or zeolite or something, and put it right at the end of your filter, so that the water coming through the filter media is still being exposed to the ammonia but the zeolite is removing it so you can give yourself a break from the constant water changing?

 

[MisterAtlantis]

tey larger water changes 50-75% I know its a lot but if you do 25% on a .50 reading it will be .30 after the water change...if you get my meaning, try the bigger change and see if it boosts, plus check your pH. if its 6 or less the cycling will stall

I really dont know what to do for the best now - im totally confused. I didnt do a water change yesterday and the ammonia reading is now between 0.50 and 1.0. I have not fed them for 5 days now. Some people are telling me to to do water changes others not to - i just dont know what to do.....

My Ph is 8.0 and always has been.

Hi Gill,
Sorry to hear things have not improved. Do you know anyone at your lfs whose advice you can trust? or fish vet could pm you the number of a guy I know if that would help.
Since you have not fed your fish for 5 days don't know where your ammonia is coming from, is your tank planted? if so are they healthy (not decaying) what fish do you have? do you have large number of fry whose death could go unnoticed?
Also your Ph is high at 8.0 ammonia is more toxic at Ph above 7(forms ammonium below Ph7) most freshwater fish prefer lower Ph 6-7.5 see http/freshaquarium.about.com/cs/waterchemsitry/a/waterph.htm not that i am advocating altering your Ph as that would probably add to your problems, if you have a lot of calcareous rock ie limestone would remove it overtime and add bogwood.
Andy

 

[Gilli]

Thanks for your reply. Ive already thrown a couple of my plants out that were looking weedy incase that was adding to the problem. I dont have any limestone in the tank and I already have a largish piece of bogwood in there for the plecs.

My Ph has always been the same since I started keeping fish 2 years ago and has never given me any problems. The only fry I have are a couple of baby Bn plecs who have survived being eaten and im sure in these leans times where im not feeding those have been gobbled up as I havent spotted any for days. My plec only laid around 20 or so eggs and out of that only half a dozen got to hatch with the other fish snatching the eggs that was all dad could get under his belly so its not the problem, and they are only about 3 weeks old whereas this ammonia problem has beeen going on 6 weeks now.

No one seems to know whats wrong - ive spoken to countless people on here and ive even emailed the fluval filter water experts.

I have a 250L 4 foot tank. I dont think im overstocked - I have the following fish

10 x cardinal tetras

10 x serpae tetra

2 x Bn plecs

3 x kribs

3 x panda corys

5 x Rainbow fish

 

[MisterAtlantis]

Hope you find a solution soon, guess with time your filter will catch up. It must be frustrating that you can't get a definite answer on the best solution. How are your fish doing? are they showing signs of ammonia poisoning. Ammo lock may help if you haven't tried it already. Good luck.

 

[Gilli]

Hope you find a solution soon, guess with time your filter will catch up. It must be frustrating that you can't get a definite answer on the best solution. How are your fish doing? are they showing signs of ammonia poisoning. Ammo lock may help if you haven't tried it already. Good luck.

Thanks. Fish are looking fine - I lost one panda cory a few days ago but id had him 2 years so dont know how old he was. the filter has to catch up eventually i guess.........

 

[MisterAtlantis]

Just a thought, if you can grow plants in your tank without them dieing and your tank is not heavily planted why not add some more? Presumably they would use some ammonium, however I am not a plant expert so maybe one of the plant teccies could advise better, since there is a lot of things to consider when it comes to planted tanks.

 

[Gilli]

Just a thought, if you can grow plants in your tank without them dieing and your tank is not heavily planted why not add some more? Presumably they would use some ammonium, however I am not a plant expert so maybe one of the plant teccies could advise better, since there is a lot of things to consider when it comes to planted tanks.

Thanks i'll try that - I wanted to replace the 2 i've taken out anyway so I will buy a few more and hope that helps.

I would just like to say a very big thank you to everyone who has taken the time to try and help me on this thread - this forum has the best people on it!

 

[Gilli]

Hello all - just thought id give you an update - FINALLY after 7 weekes my tank is once again fully cycled!!!To say im relieved is an understatement, and my poor fish are glad to be back on a regular feed!

I lost one cory panda which im gutted about as id had it for 2 years and some of my fishes tails are looking a little ragged, but with good food and a few water changes im hoping this will fix them. The only one that seems to be bad is my female krib who has popeye........

I finally decided that I would stop doing 30% water changes every day and do a 10% water change every 3 days as my ammonia wasnt rising too much in that time between around 0.25 - 0.50. Whether this was just a co-incidence that after about a week all was back to normal or if it was the fact that in around 8 weeks a tank would fully cycle anyway or not I dont know. Its still a complete mystery as to why it took that long in the first place!

 

[MisterAtlantis]

Great news Gill

 

[ellena]

I'm so glad for you Here's hoping this filter lives a long and happy life and doesn't put you through the same again.
How many bottles of ammonia test did you get through?

 

[Gilli]

Well I actualy went out and bought another APi liquid test kit as i'd had my other for over a year and thought that maybe I was getting false results as it might have been past the sell by date (couldnt find one on there by the way)! So all in all a f*$!*.g expensive time!

One good thing to come out of it all though, I decided that with all those water changes I am not going to boil pans anymore (my hot water comes from an emmersion tank in the airing cupboard) as so many on here have said theres no need - so combined with my new self made extra long tube gravel vac which runs straight down the loo im now doing a water change in just 10 minutes instead of over half an hour!

 

[ellena]

Genius! If I ever get a big tank, a python style gravel vac will be high on my list.
I read this on here once about sell by dates on API kits

"each reagent bottle has a Lot # printed on the bottle. The last four digits are the month and year of manufacture. Example: Lot # 28A0108. This is a pH reagent manufactured in January of 2008. Wide Range pH, High Range pH, Ammonia, Nitrate, Phosphate, Copper, Calcium and GH all last for three years. Nitrite and KH will last for four years. Freshwater pH (low range) and Pond Care Salt Level will last for five years. I would not use or trust these kits after they have expired."

 

[Gilli]

Thanks for that - i'll go check on my new bottles!

I dont have a python as they are expensive - I just have one of the manual self start gravel vacs that you shake and bought an 8 meter length of tube off of Ebay (you can buy it by the meter) the same width as the one already on it - took that off and attached my extra lenght. Now instead of syphoning it off into a huge tub and then emptying about 10 bucket loads when im done (I have a 250L tank) as I vac the gravel it just goes straight down the loo!

 

[Schmill]

When you added the extra tubing did you notice any loss of suction on the gravel vac?
I did something similar using hoselock connectors and hose pipe, but by the time i had enough pipe to get to the drain / loo the suction on teh gravel vac wasn't enough to lift most of the crud
Wondering now whether it was the connectors that were slowing the flow if your length of pipe hasn't had any effect?