Seachem Stability New Tank Log

[CrustyOnEastCoast]

Curious, how bad is ammonium (not ammonia) for your fish? My tap water sometimes (not always) has as much as 2ppm ammonia (bundled in the chloramines). So, worst case scenario, if I replace 20% of my tank water with water from my tap dosed with Seachem Prime ... that means I am exposing my fish to 0.4ppm of ammonium for however long it takes for my cycled filter to consume it. Probably not a big deal I hope. I know there are plenty of other people that have chloramines in their tap water and keep fish.

 

[CezzaXV]

Having ammonia in your tap water (in whatever form it comes in) isn't an ideal situation, but if you have a strong biological filter it's workable. As you said, people do successfully keep fish when their tap water has ammonia in it. It's an unfortunate situation but workable. It's not, however, something that anyone with any knowledge would choose to subject their fish to given the option.

 

[FishFanatic04]

I have 1.0 ppm ammonia in my tap and now with a fully cycled filter it can completely clear out in about 8 hours, including nitrite. So with the Seachem Prime, my fish don't seem bothered.

 

[Sly13Cat]

Just a update. I believe that my tank's fully cycled I'll get the full check tomorrow. My fish are happy, my crowntail even built a bubble nest for the first time since I bought him. But today I noticed that he has ICH

. So I'm buying treatment for all the fish tomorrow. I geuss that's why he's been acting a little different yesterday and the day before. I did the research, gonna get some ich treatement and hope all goes well.

 

[CezzaXV]

Ich, not at all caused by a weak immune system caused by exposure to ammonia.

 

[soybean]

Just a update. I believe that my tank's fully cycled I'll get the full check tomorrow. My fish are happy, my crowntail even built a bubble nest for the first time since I bought him. But today I noticed that he has ICH

. So I'm buying treatment for all the fish tomorrow. I geuss that's why he's been acting a little different yesterday and the day before. I did the research, gonna get some ich treatement and hope all goes well.

Happy fish with ich, eh? These guys really are going through it!

Bettas just build nests, it's nothing to do with being happy or sad.

 

[Sly13Cat]

Well the mollies were as far as I know never exposed to levels above 1 PPM Ammonia (or even .5 PPM) so it could possibly be the fact that they were in a huge tank with lots of other mollies at the pet store. It's very hard to tell if they have ich because they're black and white

. The ich medication will be good to have anyways in case of another outbreak.

 

[sadguppy]

If you have ich, they are NOT happy.

If one has it, you need to treat the whole tank and kill the parasite. First do a proper gravel vac and large water change (60%+), adding aquarium salt in the water. Then turn the temp up gradually to 30 and leave it for a week. Do daily gravel vacs, more if you can, as you can then pick up the parasites. Change the water daily adding salt. This aids healing.

Meds are a last resort and not always effective in a badly maintained tank, I have found that a mature tank combined with salt and heat is the easier answer, on you and the fish.

 

[soybean]

Well the mollies were as far as I know never exposed to levels above 1 PPM Ammonia (or even .5 PPM) so it could possibly be the fact that they were in a huge tank with lots of other mollies at the pet store. It's very hard to tell if they have ich because they're black and white

. The ich medication will be good to have anyways in case of another outbreak.

I refer you to this post http/www.fishforums.net/index.php?/topic/390266-seachem-stability-new-tank-log/page__view__findpost__p__3282327

You had your water tested at 5 ppm.

This aside, ANY TRACE of ammonia is bad news for fish. 5ppm, 1, 0.5, 0.2, it doesn't matter. It causes damage. It weakens them. The only acceptable reading in a cycled tank is 0.

If you think your tank is cycled I'd be interested to see all your readings showing your ammonia spike, then the nitrite spike.

I hope you've learned for future tanks that there is a much easier and fish friendly way of doing this now.

 

[Sly13Cat]

Well it seems that the ich has subsided after I did a 50% water change. I plan on buying the medication soon. But here's the problem. On the 17th, I thought that I had my tank cycled. So I stopped adding stability and prime. Bad idea. As of tuesday (the day after i discovered ich) I had Am-> 2 PPM Nitrite ->.5 PPM and Nitrate -> 10 PPM. So the fish store lady said not to buy any medication and to fix my parameters first. That's the day I did the 50% water change and started to add stability daily again. So today I have Nitrite -> 2 PPM and Nitrate -> 30 PPM and pH -> 6.5 (Normally 7). Can anyone help me as to what's going on in my tank and where it goes from here?

Side note: the fish aren't showing any obvious signs of stress.

 

[TwoTankAmin]

I have used DrTim's One and Only twice with excellent results. While some folks have given me positive reports regarding Stability, I have never used it nor even taken a look at what is in it. I finally went to the SeaChem site and read their info on the product which they claim works in both sw and fw.

When I was done reading I went to their contact page and sent them a message. It basically said their info was mostly incorrect and they were putting the wrong stuff in the bottle for fw use. I told them that I have liked and used their plant additives (Excel, nitrogen, potassium and phosphorus) for over a decade but I would flush a free bottle of Stability before I would add even one drop to any of my fw tanks.

This product may be of benefit to sw tanks, I don't know. But it has no place in fw, imo. If their claims were true their biggest business would not be in aquariums but in waste water and drinking water treatment because they would have developed the miracle bacteria mix these industries have tried to find for decades.

In a nutshell, bacteria that thrive in high ammonia environments don't do so in lower level enivirons and vice versa. Moreover, if the discoveries over the past 6+ years regarding ammonia oxidizing Archaea in the ocean are correct, it would indicate they, and not bacteria, are the primary ammonia oxidizers in sw. They don't list Archaea as being in the bottle. So how good might it be for sw if that research is correct.

Finally, if you use DrTims or Tetra's Safe Start, neither tell to dose the product for 7 days in a row. One dose is all it takes. Now they do say you could add some after water changes or when adding new fish. The first is clearly a sales gimmick and the second makes some sense in some cases. Why are the bacteria need able to come out of the Stability bottle in one dose? Could it be you have to buy 7 times as much? And of course Sechem suggests " For optimum biofilter performance use 1 capful for each 40 L (10 gallons*) once a month or with each water change and whenever introducing new fish or whenever medicating an aquarium."

Come on folks do any of you believe that takes a monthly dose of anything to keep the biofilter in your cycled established tank optimal?

 

[sadguppy]

Your cycle is exactly where you should expect it to be. There is no miracle cure for the cycling process as twotankamin has explained very well, and various people told you at the start of the thread. Ammonia will go down, nitrite will go up, do daily large water changes to bring both under 0.25. You will have to do this for three weeks or so until they are both zero.

Moral of the story...next time, go fishless.

 

[CezzaXV]

Well it seems that the ich has subsided after I did a 50% water change. I plan on buying the medication soon. But here's the problem. On the 17th, I thought that I had my tank cycled. So I stopped adding stability and prime. Bad idea. As of tuesday (the day after i discovered ich) I had Am-> 2 PPM Nitrite ->.5 PPM and Nitrate -> 10 PPM. So the fish store lady said not to buy any medication and to fix my parameters first. That's the day I did the 50% water change and started to add stability daily again. So today I have Nitrite -> 2 PPM and Nitrate -> 30 PPM and pH -> 6.5 (Normally 7). Can anyone help me as to what's going on in my tank and where it goes from here?

Side note: the fish aren't showing any obvious signs of stress.

That's the thing though - you're not going to get your parameters sorted until you start doing a proper cycle and stop playing with the lives of your fish. Since you never bothered reading up on why a cycle is important (I know you didn't because if you had, you wouldn't be doing this), you also had no idea what really constitutes a cycled tank (a week of 0 ammonia and 0 nitrite with no water changes). I know you didn't know this because you thought you were cycled but you've been having ridiculous readings for ammonia AND nitrite. Similarly, you've clearly not done any reading on ich either because you think a water change will help the situation. While it's true that a water change will rid you of some of the waterborne parasites, you are never going to cure the ich with water changes alone. There are several stages in the ich lifecycle. If it appears to have subsided, it's more likely that they're in the stage of the lifecycle where they can't be seen by the human eye. There are very few obvious signs of stress fish can give you. They can't tell you that they're stressed, they can't talk or hold up signs to tell you this, but that doesn't mean that they're not. They're in water laden with ammonia and nitrite and they've got ich. It's difficult to imagine that they're not stressed. If you were ill and couldn't breathe properly, you'd be pretty stressed too.

So, what's going on in your tank and where does it go from here? Well, you've got ammonia and nitrite in your water. Your first priority will be to do a massive water change, perhaps several, to bring both of these levels down to 0.25ppm or less. Dosing Prime and Stability is NOT going to do this for you. The ammonia in the water will also be causing your pH to drop. Not that this is a real problem, but that's why it's happening.

I just don't understand why you're doing this. To be honest I'm quite surprised that your fish are still alive. The ammonia and nitrite readings are demonstrating that the Stability doesnt work, or if it does, it doesn't work well enough. Now stop this "experiment" and care for your fish or get out of this hobby.

 

[FishFanatic04]

A brick wall has no ears.

 

[KkAaNnEe]

People are putting in real effort to try to convince you that you're going wrong but what is the point if you will not listen and take on their advice. I would advise people to stop wasting their good advice on this thread, its getting ridiculous, and frustrating.