ammonia levels,Rookie?

[Etee]

Hello, I have a 36 gal setup for nearly 2 months and have got it to cycle and everything tested excellent except the ammonia levels. I changed out 50% and added ammonia remover. It would go from 8.0 and then I have been as high as 0.25 and since the 50% was done on Saturday, I checked it on Sunday and it was at 2.0. So I went ahead and did a 25% change and left it until Monday Morning and it was at .025 so I left it alone thinking it would clear up a little more in a 24 hr. period.
This wasn't the case, I checked it yesterday (Tuesday) and it had went to about a 5.
I left it alone again in the hope that it would cycle and come back up the next day when I figured I would do another 25% change, which is today, Weds. It was still reading 5.0 so I did another 50% change today and added the conditioner as well as some bacteria starter as directed by the LFS.
I am hesitant to do too many water changes and I felt like 2 in 2 days was to much and that being a 50% and a 25%.
I know I'm going to get over the hump with the ammonia levels at some point ,but my question is, How often or how much water changes can I or should I do per week? And should I use a bacteria starter at each water change if I clean the gravel as well? Which I do once or twice a week until I have everything established! Just a light cleaning but water test fine at the LFS except the ammonia levels. Should I add a little more water conditioner than directed by the manufacture or stay vigilant on the plan I have going now?

 

[Ashenwelt]

Have you checked your tap water? It honestly doesn't sound cycled.

 

[abw0004]

Do you currently have any fish in your tank? If not, just don't do a water change. Fastest way to get it to cycle. If there are fish in it, do a water change everyday as ammonia on any level, but especially your levels are extremely toxic to fish. Ammonia at .25 made my favorite fish blind, even though I did water changes every day.

 

[Ashenwelt]

Do you currently have any fish in your tank? If not, just don't do a water change. Fastest way to get it to cycle. If there are fish in it, do a water change everyday as ammonia on any level, but especially your levels are extremely toxic to fish. Ammonia at .25 made my favorite fish blind, even though I did water changes every day.

Usually yes. But always check your water. A while back my tap had insane lethal levels of Ammonia and Nitrites. San Diego Tropical Fish Society had a huge chat on facebook saying: DON'T USE THE WATER! So better safe than sorry.

 

[Etee]

Have you checked your tap water? It honestly doesn't sound cycled.

Thanks for the quick reply. As far as the tap water goes we are on a rural line but we treat the aquarium water with ammonia remover.
The wife has a 2.5 gal that she keeps in the kitchen and we had the same problems with it also but it resolved with time and a serious water change.
On background, in the early days of starting up our tank and subsequent weeks, we were taking water samples into the LFS to have it tested once a week as they told us to do. We didn't seem to be making headway where the ammonia is concerned. So we did a 50% change on the 2.5 gal, added the remover as directed and a bacteria supplement and the next day she went from 8 to O and it is maintaining ok.
Essentially, I was ,at the start doing a water change a week as the LFS suggested and test water once a week. We solved the problem with the ammonia test kit we bought on the 2.5 gal and test it every day!
This is where I'm curious about how much water changes should I do with out causing stress to the fish. We are basically at our limit for the tank and will be purchasing a larger tank to add to the 36 gal later as these fish grow to adult size. We were first told to do 3 feedings per day. I have cut that back to twice a day.
What would I test in the tap water? The wife has had an outside pond for twenty years and has very little to none fish dying off and she fills it right out of the outside spigot with a garden hose and she doesn't add treatment and has it filtered and cleans it when needed. I have lost 4 fish so far but some of it was due to a mollie chasing the angel and when that one died she took after the other and the 3rd one got some sort of fin rot and died. Your hint about testing the tap water may have something to do with it??? I did a water change 3 weeks ago and my seemingly healthy Dalmation mollie was dead the next morning but it has no effect on the remaining 2 mollies, 2 guppys, 5 Presitella tetras, 2 dwarf Gouramis or the 2 Corys. Like I posted, I plan to add a tank and larger in the month or 2! I have a feeling that I might have a bit of an over load but the LFS didn't feel that was the case because the ph levels and other tests were in the excellent range except the ammonia and the gave me the repot of the test. I will be buying the professional test kit today but for now I have just the ammonia test.
I guess the better question I should ask is How often can I do water changes and add purifiers and supplement etc.?

 

[Ashenwelt]

"We were first told to do 3 feedings per day. I have cut that back to twice a day."

Please switch to once per day. 5 minutes, and what is not eaten is too much food. Keep it simple.

As for how many changes? I normally limit to 10% per change and do multiple changes, many would think I am over careful. Using that method low stress and you can do a 100% change without issue.

Your mix is a little odd though. You may want to reconsider your stocking.

 

[abw0004]

First, stop adding fish to the tank until it is cycled. You don't ever want to add angels or cichlids to any un-cycled aquarium. Second, buy an API Master Test kit as you should test the water everyday, and liquid tests are more reliable than strip test. Third, how often do you do water changes? You need to be doing it everyday if you have ammonia. I do a 50% water change every week and my tank is completely cycled.

Your LFS does not seem to know what they are talking about if they are saying you are not overstocking the tank due to PH levels. That has nothing to do with it. The nitrite and nitrate levels should be perfect and ammonia high on a new tank because the beneficial bacteria has not developed yet to turn the ammonia into nitrite. That is another sign they don't quite know what they are doing and might just want you to buy more fish.

Do a 50% water change every day until the ammonia is 0 PPM. Your #1 goal right now is to get the ammonia to go down. Trust this site over your LFS or even me. There are a lot of people on here that know exactly what they are doing.

 

[Etee]

"We were first told to do 3 feedings per day. I have cut that back to twice a day."

Please switch to once per day. 5 minutes, and what is not eaten is too much food. Keep it simple.

As for how many changes? I normally limit to 10% per change and do multiple changes, many would think I am over careful. Using that method low stress and you can do a 100% change without issue.

Your mix is a little odd though. You may want to reconsider your stocking.

I'm a bit over careful also, they call us perfectionist and that is why I seek advice and yours seems sound to me. I thought about doing more 10% water changes in lieu of scheduled 25 or 50% changes.
What do you mean an odd mix? Now that the angels are gone, wifes choice, we added a 3 molly which was the Dalmation that died and so to have 2 females and 1 male, that did take the stress off of t he attacks by the lone female mollie but the damage to the angels was done. and with the ammonia levels it was felt that the angels wouldn't survive anyway .

 

[Etee]

First, stop adding fish to the tank until it is cycled. You don't ever want to add angels or cichlids to any un-cycled aquarium. Second, buy an API Master Test kit as you should test the water everyday, and liquid tests are more reliable than strip test. Third, how often do you do water changes? You need to be doing it everyday if you have ammonia. I do a 50% water change every week and my tank is completely cycled.

Your LFS does not seem to know what they are talking about if they are saying you are not overstocking the tank due to PH levels. That has nothing to do with it. The nitrite and nitrate levels should be perfect and ammonia high on a new tank because the beneficial bacteria has not developed yet to turn the ammonia into nitrite. That is another sign they don't quite know what they are doing and might just want you to buy more fish.

Do a 50% water change every day until the ammonia is 0 PPM. Your #1 goal right now is to get the ammonia to go down. Trust this site over your LFS or even me. There are a lot of people on here that know exactly what they are doing.

We haven't added any for more than a month and we are at our limit on the tank now. but as I said as the fish get bigger we will be adding a larger tank in the next couple months. No they aren't encouraging me to buy more fish. When we had it tested after about 3 weeks from set up. it was ok to add fish. If its safe to do a 50 % daily I can do that, Just didn't want to upset everything else that is ok in the environment.. I'm here to get advice. That was the gist of my question, How often can I do a change? We had the tank up and running a week prior to adding fish

 

[jeffruth]

Water changes depend a lot on the bio load. Lots of fish, WC more often. Less fish, less WC. Also, depends a lot on the filter system. If you over filter then you can do them less often. I don't really think you can do to many WCs on an ESTABLISHED tank.

For example, I have a 90gal with 65 fish in it. I do a 40% WC every 7 days. This keeps my levels @ 0 ammo, 0 nitrites, and 0-20 nitrates.

You say you had the tank running for a week before adding fish? My tank took 24 days to cycle fully. It really sounds as though the tank was not cycled. I didn't have enough bio media in my sump and I had some issues with ammonia but it was a constant reading, it didn't spike or change. Added a bit more bio media and the ammonia went away.

Once the tank is setup and running I don't think you can do to many water changes. I hear some people doing 80% changes every few days with no problems.


Feed once a day....

 

[Ashenwelt]

Just a mix is all. I would up the number of corries personally. Love their personality.

 

[Betta keeper]

Test the tap water

If you have ammonia in your tap water, you won't be able to dilute it out with changes

I suggest a bacterial supplement to help process the ammonia into less harmful nitrates

You can also dose Prime daily until it is under control. Prime will neutralize the ammonia whilst the bacteria deals with it

 

[Mark_the_shark]

Dont feel bad. I had 8 ppm ammonia in my tank and I did a 50 percent water change, but nothing changed

 

[Ingy]

When I first started reading, I thought what is the problem. Ammonia is great to have during s cycle. Then, much later on I saw you had fish in there. Crap.
A 50% water change at 8ppm ammonia (an extremely highly toxic level) means half the ammonia is left behind. That's 4ppm, a very toxic level.
Water changes cause water instability. Alkalinity levels generally lower causing high pH swings killing fish. Ammonia meets hydrogen and acids are created, killing fish.

But, there is one thing that can really reduce the risk. Plants. As much plants as you can stuff in there with the lights. Fish should be looking at you and asking "dude, am I a salad?"
Plants will consume all the evil ammonia you have been adding at a rate that would embarrass an fishless cycle fanatic.
Easy to grow plants like ferns and swords.

And on a side note, please research how to do a proper fish-in cycle, and never do it. Fishless cycles or death.

 

[Ashenwelt]

When I first started reading, I thought what is the problem. Ammonia is great to have during s cycle. Then, much later on I saw you had fish in there. Crap.
A 50% water change at 8ppm ammonia (an extremely highly toxic level) means half the ammonia is left behind. That's 4ppm, a very toxic level.
Water changes cause water instability. Alkalinity levels generally lower causing high pH swings killing fish. Ammonia meets hydrogen and acids are created, killing fish.

But, there is one thing that can really reduce the risk. Plants. As much plants as you can stuff in there with the lights. Fish should be looking at you and asking "dude, am I a salad?"
Plants will consume all the evil ammonia you have been adding at a rate that would embarrass an fishless cycle fanatic.
Easy to grow plants like ferns and swords.

And on a side note, please research how to do a proper fish-in cycle, and never do it. Fishless cycles or death.

Well wrote!

 

[Betta keeper]

Hornwort is another great one for using the ammonia in the tank. Java fern and wisteria are very easy beginner plants and have little to no requirements (tie the java to a rock, don't plant it)....great starter plants


I must've missed the part where it was 8ppm.... I thought we were dealing with the standard levels of high ammonia (.50-1ppm)

I would be doing a series of 30%water changes, spread out over the course of the day, so that I could lower that ammonia without causing shock to the fish by adding too much clean water at once. I would do this until ammonia reads about.25-.50.....your Prime will bind that and make it safe until the bacteria in your filter deal with it

You can add Prime daily during a cycle, to protect your fish from up to 1ppm ammonia but past that, even with Prime it's going to kill

I would space them about an hour apart, and do my best to match the temperature of the tank with the new water

I would also add a bacterial supplement, like Tetra safe start, nutrafin cycle, API stress zyme+....to deal with the ammonia being produced because the bacteria in the filter isn't enough to do the job

I just went through my own ammonia issues, though mine were caused by .50-1ppm in my tap water, so I couldn't water change....and the fish loss was devastating to my tanks


Good luck with your struggles

 

[Etee]

Hello, I have a 36 gal setup for nearly 2 months and have got it to cycle and everything tested excellent except the ammonia levels. I changed out 50% and added ammonia remover. It would go from 8.0 and then I have been as high as 0.25 and since the 50% was done on Saturday, I checked it on Sunday and it was at 2.0. So I went ahead and did a 25% change and left it until Monday Morning and it was at .025 so I left it alone thinking it would clear up a little more in a 24 hr. period.
This wasn't the case, I checked it yesterday (Tuesday) and it had went to about a 5.
I left it alone again in the hope that it would cycle and come back up the next day when I figured I would do another 25% change, which is today, Weds. It was still reading 5.0 so I did another 50% change today and added the conditioner as well as some bacteria starter as directed by the LFS.
I am hesitant to do too many water changes and I felt like 2 in 2 days was to much and that being a 50% and a 25%.
I know I'm going to get over the hump with the ammonia levels at some point ,but my question is, How often or how much water changes can I or should I do per week? And should I use a bacteria starter at each water change if I clean the gravel as well? Which I do once or twice a week until I have everything established! Just a light cleaning but water test fine at the LFS except the ammonia levels. Should I add a little more water conditioner than directed by the manufacture or stay vigilant on the plan I have going now?

Problem solved! Just to follow up after the advice. It was water hardness problem. Purchased pH 7.0, I did a 25% water change and added the pH7.0 and problem began to clear up later in the day and was with in all normal the next day. I took a sample to the fish store and explained what was going on and he tested it and directed me to 7.0
On the strips that he used showed KH and the GH were on the wrong end of where they were supposed to be but not far out of range