Seachem Prime And Nutrafin Liquid Tests For Ammonia

[Kaidonni]

In a bit of a bind tonight - as some of those who have read my topics before know, I leave the replacement water for my tank to stand for 24 hours even though I am treating with Seachem Prime. I've always done it that way, and it makes it easier to tie myself to changing the water on a particular day...I might break out of it one day, but at the moment I'm more concerned about other things.
 
I decided to do a test on my tank water as something is irritating the Clown Loach (and when I'm aiming to rehome, any potential signs of illness are red alerts!), but the Ammonia, Nitrites and PH are coming in at 0, 0, 7.5 as usual. I did an 11L and a 10L change over two days on the weekend as Nitrates are a bit of an issue, definitely in the 30-50ppm range, didn't bother with them tonight.
 
I then tested the replacement water for tomorrow evening...it is over 1ppm on the Nutrafin Liquid test for Ammonia, and I have *never* had a positive on any tests on tank water so it's really surprised me and concerned me that my replacement water should test positive. I have tested untreated tap water, which gives me a result of 0 Ammonia, so that leaves me with the following questions:
 
1) Is it my bucket which I rinse out prior to filling each time ? I do leave the gravel vacuum and jug that I replace water with during changes in that bucket between uses (but not when I leave water standing in it).
 
2) If not 1, then is it the Seachem Prime? Untreated water supply tests negative for Ammonia, so that means no Chloramine - the Nutrafin Liquid test should pick up the Ammonia whether or not it is bound with the Chlorine...right? In that case, it can't come from out of nowhere within 2 hours!
 
I hope to clean the tank tomorrow night, but this positive on the replacement water has me worried. I know (okay, just remembered after searching about Nutrafin Ammonia tests and Chloramine) that Seachem binds the ammonia, but it doesn't really console me much at the moment.

 

[Byron]

It could be the bucket; I would rinse it very thoroughly and then fill it with tap water as you normally would but do not use Prime, then test for ammonia after 24 hours and see.  That would clear up the bucket issue.  [I see you mention untreated water testing zero for ammonia, but I'm not sure if this was after standing in the container or not.]
 
To the Prime, this is also a possible.  Many of the chemicals we use do interact in various ways.  I am not myself a fan of Prime, simply because it does "too much" with stuff I do not want messed with.  As for ammonia, Prime does not bind it but changes it to ammonium which is basically harmless.  Most (but not all) conditioners do this.  Test kits unless they are specialized ones that distinguish between ammonia and ammonium will read both as "ammonia."  But as it is ammonium, it is not an issue.  Though I would be intrigued to know where it is coming from, if this were me.
 
Another thought on this.  You mention high nitrates, and I am wondering if any of this is in the tap water?  My thinking here is that Prime does somehow bind nitrate (Seachem told me they don't know exactly how... which is another concern for me) and I'm wondering if ammonia/ammonium may result?  Just a thought, but if you have no nitrates in the tap water this may not be pertinent.
 
Byron.

 

[Kaidonni]

Just a little update to this thread - Prime does indeed mess with the Nutrafin Liquid Ammonia test. The bucket of water that had tested positive for ammonia/ammonium 2 hours after dosing later tested negative a full 24 hours after dosing. I conducted an experiment whereby I tested my tank itself as I've replaced a quarter of the foam filter media out for some new foam media (only a quarter - basically half of one of the two foam pads in a fluval filter), so I need to keep an eye out for ammonia and nitrite spikes, i.e. any mini-cycles - I'm not taking any chances, so I'm using Prime to detoxify any potential ammonia during this period, plus I'm conducing water changes every other day. Last night, about 5 hours after dosing, it tested positive for ammonia at about 0.6ppm, but this morning at 7.30am (~13 hours after dosing), everything was back to normal. I tested this evening before dosing with Prime and again, everything was fine; I dosed with Prime, and having tested almost 2 hours later, ammonia at 0.6ppm...seems a little too convenient! It appears that it doesn't matter even if there is no ammonia/ammonium present, Prime will interfere with the test and give a false positive.
 
I do swear I always get an ever-so-faint reading on the test, though, even without Prime. Almost zero, but not quite. I'm getting an API test kit due to the easier to read ammonia test, but with a past API kit it hasn't changed from 0 to 0.25ppm (yellow to light green) even when the Nutrafin kit detected the faintest traces.