Water Tests

[Kod88]

hey everyone looking for some advice, recently I had alot of fish dieing on me, but I done a huge water change about 90% (still do weekly 20% changes), changed all the sand and plants, kept same filter pads (been told to keep them till they fall apart)and they've stopped dieing, and look to be in really good health now, only thing is when i do a test (using API liquid test kit) my ph is 7, ammonia is between 0 and 0.25ppm, nitrite is 0ppm and nitrate is 5.0ppm, what else can I do to get those readings of ammonia and nitrate to 0ppm? please help

 

[soybean]

still do weekly 20% changes

If your tank is showing ammonia, you need to be doing more frequent changes than this. Ammonia is dangerous to fish. There has been a few topics/posts this evening explaining how ammonia can do damage we can't see and affect fish in the long run even if there are no other problems - perhaps have a read of these.

Nitrate doesn't need to be at 0 - a presence of nitrate in a cycled tank is normal, and is controlled by WCs and plants.

In the meantime - patience, really. Do more generous WCs more often and keep testing. Assuming you aren't overstocked beyond a level your filter can handle, it should come down to 0 eventually.

 

[Kod88]

its a 100l tank and its mostly tetras and one plec in it, so not overstocked ( made sure i didnt overstock as i knew ammonia would go through the roof and kill the wee guy) u think 2 water changes a week will help or more??

 

[soybean]

Any ammonia = waterchange. Take out as much as you can and replace it, test again 24 hours later.

Repeat as required!

What kind of plec do you have?

 

[fluttermoth]

Test every day and change water anytime you get any reading at all for ammonia or nitrite. You don't need to worry about nitrate; that only becomes harmful to most fish (some are more senstive) when it gets up into the 100s.

 

[Kod88]

thats great thanks guys will keep at it, and the plec is a tiny bristlenose plec, about the size of my thumb, not grown at all and had him for 7/8 months now

 

[soybean]

thats great thanks guys will keep at it, and the plec is a tiny bristlenose plec, about the size of my thumb, not grown at all and had him for 7/8 months now

Good size for the tank. They produce a lot of waste though, so keeping on top of substrate vacs will also help keep ammonia from spiking.