Lfs's Opinion On Ammonia Removers

[DiscusKeeper403]

I've never used this stuff personally but there is a product called bactinates (i think thats what it is called) which is suppose to speed up your cycle. I know maidenhead aquatics sell it, i'm sure there are people that have used it that may be able to give some info about it. I think it contains the bacteria which live in your filter. I use a product called prime which imo is one of the best conditioners ammonia removers out there.

I believe the stuff you are talking about "supposedly" feeds the bacteria, thus helping the bacteria and such. To be honest, the only one I have ever heard of working is Bio-Spira, which is hard to find because it needs to be frozen. If it gets too warm during shipment then it doesn't work...

 

[andywg]

I believe the stuff you are talking about "supposedly" feeds the bacteria, thus helping the bacteria and such. To be honest, the only one I have ever heard of working is Bio-Spira, which is hard to find because it needs to be frozen. If it gets too warm during shipment then it doesn't work...

Refrigerated, not frozen.

And Bactinettes does indeed help with the cycle as it contains live Nitrosomonas bacteria, so should cut down any ammonia spike quite quickly. Sadly they still persist with Nitrobacter to deal with the nitrites, despite all the research by Hovanec et al showing tht in an aquarium the bacteria that deal with nitrites are Nitrospira (hence where Bio-Spira, developeed by Tim Hovanec and Marine Labs gets its name).

 

[scotslasszoe]

You said you are going to Buy Api liquid test, what have you used at the moment to take your current water readings, If test strips i would not go buy the results

Wait till you use Api and that will tell you if you have ammonia Nitrite Nitrate on a more accurate level.

Zoe

 

[andywg]

You said you are going to Buy Api liquid test, what have you used at the moment to take your current water readings, If test strips i would not go buy the results

Wait till you use Api and that will tell you if you have ammonia Nitrite Nitrate on a more accurate level.

Zoe

In my experience the API nitrate test is as much use as a chocolate tea pot. The colours above 40ppm are so close together as to not be able to tell apart, and my two kits I had would read 160ppm and 0ppm on two contemporaneous samples from the same tank.

I thoroughly discourage anyone from taking API nitrate readings as anything like accurate.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

You said you are going to Buy Api liquid test, what have you used at the moment to take your current water readings, If test strips i would not go buy the results

Wait till you use Api and that will tell you if you have ammonia Nitrite Nitrate on a more accurate level.

Zoe

In my experience the API nitrate test is as much use as a chocolate tea pot. The colours above 40ppm are so close together as to not be able to tell apart, and my two kits I had would read 160ppm and 0ppm on two contemporaneous samples from the same tank.

I thoroughly discourage anyone from taking API nitrate readings as anything like accurate.

while that may be true, unfortunately for those of us without a science lab at home there isn't a lot of alternative. never found any decent nitrate test kit, just use the API one's and take the reading as 'indicitative' not 'accurate'.

however that being said nitrate isn't half as big a worry as ammonia and nitrite so worry about those two for the time being.

it sounds like you have a very good lfs who are giving you good advice. I'd advise you to take a sample of your water to them for testing, they may have a more accurate test kit than the strips you are using.

read the link in my sig 'what's cycling?' which should give you advice on your current situation. crux of it is water change, water change, water change and prepare yourself for losses of delicate fish such as the tetras.

 

[scotslasszoe]

I would rather go with a Api Reading than a test strip reading.

i have also found Api to be inaccurate as My LPS got a different reading from me,

As i said it will give him a result on a more accurate level, did not say it would give him a total 100 % accurate reading

Zoe

 

[rdd1952]

I would also recommend Prime from Seachem as others have.

I would agree with using Prime as it will detoxify the ammonia, thus relieving the stress on your fish. Be sure to use enough to completely detoxify as it my have a limit that it will lock. Ammo-Lock for instance, will lock 3 ppm of ammonia per dose so if the ammonia level was 5 ppm, you would have to double dose to detoxify all of it.

You said you are going to Buy Api liquid test, what have you used at the moment to take your current water readings, If test strips i would not go buy the results

Wait till you use Api and that will tell you if you have ammonia Nitrite Nitrate on a more accurate level.

Zoe

In my experience the API nitrate test is as much use as a chocolate tea pot. The colours above 40ppm are so close together as to not be able to tell apart, and my two kits I had would read 160ppm and 0ppm on two contemporaneous samples from the same tank.

I thoroughly discourage anyone from taking API nitrate readings as anything like accurate.

I agree 100% about the color chart for nitrate. Anything above about 20 ppm to m looks the same. Having said that, unless you have nitrate in your tap water keeping nitrate below 20 ppm is relatively simple. I do prefer the API kits to any other off-the-shelf kits I have seen or used.

Back to the original question, I think the only thing that really will remove ammonia are the filter medias like Zeolite and Nitro-Zorb. The problem with removing ammonia though is that it isn't available for the filter to build a bacteria colony so your tank never cycles and you become dependent on the removal agent and have to change or recharge it on a very regular basis.

As already mentioned, you should do water changes as often as needed to get and kep the ammonia and nitrtebelow .25 ppm. And if your pH is higher than 7.0, you probably need to keep it lower than that if possible as ammonia becomes more toxic as pH and temperature rise.