Tammy's Tank

[TammyLiz]

I'm going to treat this thread as kind of a journal because I know I'll have stuff I want to ask and stuff I want to share about this tank in the future so I might as well keep it all together.

So here's my tank.

55 US gallon (4 feet long)
1x 36 watt T8 bulb 4100K
1x 36 watt T8 bulb 6500K
Soilmaster substrate
Penguin 350b HOB filtration
Penguin 100b HOB filter (temporary to seed the larger one)

Fish:
7x Odessa Barbs
1x Checkered Barb (should have been an odessa but wasn't)
5x Three-Spot gouramis (2 opaline, 1 gold, 1 platinum, 1 brown)

Plants:
red ludwigia
wisteria
moneywort
Aponogeton hybrid
amazon sword
valisnera spiralis
java fern windelov
java fern
java moss
anubias sp.
hornwort
lily bulb that hasn't sprouted yet
cryptocorne wendii red

OK, now to the real stuff.
Currently my biggest problem with this tank is where to get the water from. My tap has a KH of 0 and Ammonia 1. The KH doesn't seem like that much of a problem but I am having trouble buffering it up with the baking soda. Adding it daily is hard to remember and when I forget the pH crashes. The I have to bring it back up slowly in consideration for the fish. They seem to be doing well now that the bio filter has removed all the ammonia despite the low pH. The tank is about a week overdue for a water change and I am in dire need of making a decision of what I am going to do about the water! Water conditioners, even ammo lock, does not remove the ammonia, it only 'neutralizes' it, and it still shows on my test kit, which tests for both NH3 and NH+4. I am not sure how good of an idea it would be to continually expose my fish to ammonium every time I do a water change, and until the bio filter removes it. The other, more costly and irritating option, would be to buy and use R/O water from Walmart and use that.
I know there are people on this forum who are, in my opinion, experts on water (you know who you are). Please tell me what you would do if this was your tap!
After I make this decision we can talk about the finer points of plant keeping. I look forward to it and hope you will enjoy sharing the experience with me!

I know everyone likes pictures so here is the tank. This was taken about a month ago. I will take more within the next few days.

Talk to me!

 

[littleimp]

If you have a spare basket in your external filter you can add coral sand to it in a filter bag, this will raise the KH quite considerably, you'll have to play around with the amount to get the right level, but it won't need replacing for years, just give it a wash out every filter change, it will even increase filtartion slightly.

Adding baking soda & calcium carbonate in powder form doesn't really work too well.

Coral sand is mainly calcium carbonate.

 

[TammyLiz]

Thanks littleimp, that does sound like a better, easier way to take care of the KH issue. I knew it was a possibility but someone else had reccommended I use the baking soda. He said his tank didn't need it to be added anymore once he got it up to where he needed it, but I am finding something in my tank is "eating" it, for lack of a better word.

Does anyone have any suggestions on what I should do about the ammonia?

 

[Lenna]

I don't know about the ammonia. I just use water conditioners and never have any problems, though I don't think my tap water is as bad. The plants are what's "eating" the baking soda, particularly the vallis which can use the carbon in carbonate directly from the water.

 

[TammyLiz]

Hey, I know when posts go unanswered its usually because the question was stupid, (I see those all the time where its just so obvious that nobody wants to bother with a reply) but could someone please tell me if theres something stupid about my question about the ammonia in my tap, or if its just because there really isn't a good fix for my problem? Doing a search on the forum for "ammonia" is obviously not going to do me any good 'cause every post where someone lists their stats is going to come up!
I am taking a guess here and I feel I must be right, but I'm thinking that these things like "ammo lock", which "detoxify" ammonia, are basically turning the ammonia into ammonium, because my test kit tests for both and when I add these things there is no difference in the color of the tube. So maybe I should ask if it would be bad to put 1ppm of ammonium into my tank once a week? I mean, I guess it would be more like .2 ppm because it would be a 20% water change. I just feel like I would be poisoning my fish, changing dirty water for dirty water. Another thing I can ask more specifically is what should I do in the case where my quarantine tank needs to be medicated and I need to do a larger water change and the fish are already stressed and sick? I feel like theres just no good option! Ahh!
I know these might seem like dumb things to ask but I just can't seem to find anything where someone has the same problem and I am really hoping someone here will be able to help me. Or is it hopeless? If it is, just go ahead and tell me even though it will break my heart since I'm sick of hauling jugs of water in and out of the car to refill them at the store!

Lenna, thats interesting about the vals using the carbon in the baking soda. I did know that they do better in hard water and I guess thats why. I love it when things make sense like that.

 

[FishOwner]

It's not a stupid question Tammy!!
The problem you are having is because of the chloramines in your water supply. I have them too. When you use a product like Amquel to neutrilize the chloramines, it will give a false reading of ammonia unless you are using a particular kind of test kit. Salifert I believe. Anyway, to answer your question I would not worry about this at all!! It will not harm your fish or plants (heck, I use my tap water in my saltwater tanks without ill effects).
What I would be more concerned about is if your pH is bouncing all over the place. That WILL affect your fish so you will want it to be more stabilized. What is your pH reading and is fairly stable if left alone? Using crushed coral is a good way to have a constant buffering solution, just put a handful in an old nylon stocking tip and tie it off. Rinse the coral and the nylon first!! Plop it in your filter and you should be good to go...
HTH

 

[TammyLiz]

Thanks for the reply. I don't know...false reading? I would like that to be true. I think I will see if I can get the city to test the water for me and see if they have something more accurate that will tell exactly what it is.

 

[FishOwner]

Let me clarify.....if you are getting readings of ammonia from your tap, then that means your city water supplier is using chloramines to disinfect the water. Chloramines are the combination of chlorine and ammonia and you must use a chloramine remover to break the bond of these two chemicals. Regular chlorine remover will not do the trick. You can certainly call your water supplier to confirm this. I don't know of any other source of ammonia that would come out of your tap like that.
On the test kit, again I'm not exactly sure of the brand, but I will copy directly from the bottle of AmQuel that I have...."AmQuel is compatible with ammonia test kits using Salicylate regents such as Kordon's AquaTru. Do not use a kit based on Nessler regents." You can look at the test kit you are using to see which regent it uses. Using the 'wrong' regent will give you a false reading of ammonia after using the chloramine remover.

 

[TammyLiz]

I get the reading straight out of the tap, before using chlorine/chloramine remover, and after.

EDIT: I got the crushed coral today from the LFS. We'll see how that does.