Sudden Ammonia Problem With New Tank

[Miss Wiggle]

exactly what it say's.... once the tank has established and completed cycling it should always read 0.

during the cycling process you will see an ammonia spike as it builds up before the bacteria colony can deal with it. this is why the reading may go up and then down. dunno if it's right that it would only spike to 4, guess it depends how your cycling, but aside from that what they have said is correct.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

this is really bothering me that i can't work out what's happened you know, let me just check i've got it right in my head what's happened.

got a new tank 3 weeks ago and set it up with a bag of liquid from the fish shop they said contained good bacteria
added fish straight away??
unable to test for the first week due to no test kit but no signs of ill health in the fish
for the next 2 weeks you've got consistent readings of 0 for ammonia, nitrite and nitrate
do a 25% water change and gravel vac and suddenly get a reading of ammonia
done a 10% water change to help bring it down, confirmed readings of 0 for nitrite and nitrate

is that what's happened? have there been any other things happening in the tank, other water changes, cleaning, new additions (plants/decor as well as fish).

I simply don't understand how you can have had fish in there for 2 weeks and not even get a reading for nitrate. even if you'd got a completely mature filter and therefore no ammonia/nitrite readings there would still have been nitrate there. and if you did get a mature filter then why would the ammonia have shot up now??

Duchie you have me well and truly baffled!

 

[cane76]

my first thought on this matter was a out of date test kit coz of the strange readings have you checked the use by date?

 

[Dutchie]

Miss Wiggle,

You may not remember on eof my first post where I lost 5 out of the 7 fish within the first 48 hours.

Thankfully the store replaced them all and i added them in within 72 hours not before I did a 40% water change. ......only a neon and the male Swordtail survived and doing really well.

I had the store do a water test 5 days later and they said everything was perfect, whatever that means, and to monitor it..........A week later I purchase the API Master kit.

The rest is as per above................

Tank look really clean, driftwood and plant look very healthy, and I have the tank light on for about 6-8 hours before switching the light off.

I feed them food that is gone within 2-3 minutes.............now changed to 1 minute today..............

Nothing more I can add.................yep, I'm stumped bad as well.................all seems Double Dutch to me and thats bad cause I'm Dutch.........

 

[Miss Wiggle]

ah ok so that means the tank did have an ammonia spike at first so it's not just miraculously stayed un cycled, that means something has triggered the bacteria die off and subsequent ammonia spike.

when you did the water change did you add dechlorinator to the water you added back in? have you tested your tap water for ammonia?

 

[Dutchie]

All I can see is a batch stamp of 05/06 nothing more................

 

[Dutchie]

ah ok so that means the tank did have an ammonia spike at first so it's not just miraculously stayed un cycled, that means something has triggered the bacteria die off and subsequent ammonia spike.

when you did the water change did you add dechlorinator to the water you added back in? have you tested your tap water for ammonia?

When you mention Declorinator, are you referring to Water Conditioner?? Yes I did..........I added approx 2 ml.....says need to add 10 ml per 60 litres..
As I only changed about 10 litres......
I also added something called Water Crystal salts each time I change my water..............1 teaspoon per 10 litres............lfs stated this was needed......

Could I have added to much or something like that???

Plot thickens............much like me!!!!!!!!!

 

[Miss Wiggle]

water conditioner is probably the right stuff, they call it all sorts of different things.

water crystal salts ??? hmmm why are you adding them?

salt is used to medicate tanks in some cases, unless your planning on a brackish/marine tank you shouldn't have it in there all the time. and things like your catfish and clown loach can be extremley sensitive to it, it could well kill them

hmmmmm actually if salt is an anti bacterial agent.... your cycling your tank and trying to grow your bacteria then this could kill off your bacteria colony and therefore cause your ammonia spike...... thoughts anyone? it's a possibility!

i'd definately stop adding the salt though, there's no reason for you to be using it.

 

[Dutchie]

Not sure if its a salt as such..............lfs was adament that I needed to add it each time I change the water..............because i did not do this the very first time when I first got the fish, they think this was what killed them...........not really sure.........I might go there tomorrow and ask what it is and what it is used for.............

 

[Miss Wiggle]

Not sure if its a salt as such..............lfs was adament that I needed to add it each time I change the water..............because i did not do this the very first time when I first got the fish, they think this was what killed them...........not really sure.........I might go there tomorrow and ask what it is and what it is used for.............

what does it say on the packaging that it's for.

as you should know by now in an uncycled tank it'll be the initial ammonia spike that's killed them or made them poorly. nothing else. i think that's the lfs just trying to sell you stuff tbh

 

[BigIan]

Righty oh.....
Whats happened to cause this isn`t really the issue. you cycle is what you need to concentrate on.
Id stop adding the salts (sounds like an LFs trying to make money out of you.)
i don`t know if you understand how a tank cycles so...

fish produce ammonia in several ways........

Bacteria eat the ammonia, and produce nitrItes

then a second colony of bactera colony grow that consume NitrItes and produce nitrAtes.


what you should expect to see over the next few weeks is....
1) Your ammonia slowly start to rise (try to keep this between 1 and 2 ppm)
2) your nitrItes should start to show just as you see your ammonia start to drop (or just hold at the same level.
3) your nitrItes will spike and you will have litte to no ammonia in the tank,
4)your nitrates will start to rise and your nitrites will fall, once you have a steady reading of no amonia and no nitrite your tank is cycled.




As i said the reasond for ammonia not showing before don`t really matter. for now, there could be any number of reasons, just concentrate on getting them down and your tank cycled.
Have a look through THIS thread and see if any one near you can give you some mature media to speed your cycle...

 

[Miss Wiggle]

As i said the reasond for ammonia not showing before don`t really matter.

yes it does! it's bothering me

 

[BigIan]

It could be any number of reasons...
faulty tests, contaminated test tubes, the rise could have been so sudden because of over feeding,

there are any number of variables that could cause this, either singularly, or collectively. i can`t see it becoming an issue once the tank has cycled. the main thing is as i said to mature the tank and cycle it

 

[Miss Wiggle]

yeah i know, we've gone through water changes etc to get it under control. i do think the only issue now is to stop using the salt.

but i'd still like to work out what's caused it to spike so suddenly now

 

[xoedusk]

I read on these forums yesterday that one member took his water in for a testing by the local fish store. They told him/her was fine. But the person ended up bying their own test kit and measured the tank -- it had measurable ammounts of bad stuff! Ammonia (and I think nitrite, can't remember).

It's possible the LFS lied to you when they said everything was good. "Good" may be a synonym for "as expected."

Just wanted to throw that out there.