Out with Prime, back to Aqueon Plus?

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Noviceafter2yea

Aquarium Advice FINatic
Joined
Jun 2, 2014
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I've been having a hard time with my water testing results. For the past few days, my ammonia levels have been dangerously high, the nitrites slightly high, and nitrates weren't yielding a positive result. My fish were showing no signs of distress at all.

For a while I'd been using Aqueon Plus for my ammonia and conditioner. I kept reading how great Prime is, so I decided to switch.

With Prime, my readings got whacky. I had read that this was a possibility with Prime, butand I posted a question here whether Prime could be affecting the readings. The responses indicated Prime can mess with the readings, but maybe not to the extent my tests were yielding.


Over the past week (even before asking questions here), I've done 20-40% water changes every other day, but with no success.

Today I did a 50% change using tap water treated with Amquel Plus instead of Prime. I did not have the new water sit over night and just used it right away, adding some Amquel to the bucket and some directly to the tank.

About 2 hours later, I tested, and my readings went down. My ammonia went from 2 this morning to .5 and my nitrites went from 0-.25 to the range of 0-.15. I know I still need to lower these readings.

Have others had such an extreme difference with their readings with the different products? Should I just stay with the Aqueon even though the consensus is Prime is superior?

Thanks.
 
Prime doesn't affect water parameter readings at all. It's just a rumor brought on by people misunderstanding how prime works.

I would like to draw attention to your water change parameters for a second....

You did a 50% water change on your tank with treated tap water. This water is presumably free of ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate.

After you removed 50% of your tanks water and replaced it with pure clean water you saw approximately a 50% drop in ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate, allowing for inaccuracies of test kits. How are you reasoning out that this is a result of amquel rather than the water change itself? Its expected to have that drop in parameters after a water change.
 
My past water changes with prime did not yield lower amounts.

What readings did it give you before and after?

The one and only thing that prime does to your readings is that it converts ammonia into ammonium. The test kits we use dont differentiate between ammonia and ammonium. So what we are reading as ammonia is actually the eless toxic ammonium at the exact same ppm. it has no bearing on changing the readings or else all aquarists would have the same problem.

It's very likely inaccuracy of the test kits giving you problems as they can be up to a full color grade off of what they really are.
 
5-28
Ammonia 8. (After first change using prime)

Water change.

5-29
Ammonia 4

Water change.

5-30
Ammonia 4

Water change.

6-2
Ammonia 4-5

Water change. Then retest. Ammonia 2

Another water change.

6-3
Ammonia 2

Water change. Retest ammonia 2

6-4
Ammonia 2

Water change using Aqueon plus. Retest ammonia .5
 
I didn't think using any water conditioner even Prime actually reduces the levels of toxic ammonia and nitrites so that your test kit reads a lower concentration.

They just bind or lock those compounds, temporariliy, to a non toxic form that won't kill the fish, but the concentration isn't reduced. They still come up as the same test result. And the effect is temporary. After the chemical dissipates, the compounds revert back to their toxic form.

I believe Amquel would work the same way, else everyone would be using Amquel. Imagine using a compound thats safe for using in your tank that actually removes Ammonia and Nitrite completely. Everyone would be all over it.

Something else has affected your test levels, including error in testing.
 
I retested again today thinking I could have made an error, but it was the almost the same result. I'm not loyal to one brand over the other, it may just be for my peace of mind. Even at the high readings, my fish seemed fine. After today's water change, the water did look a little more clear.
 
Your water change results looks normal, your tank isnt cycled. Every 50% water change lowers ammonia by 1/2 ppm.. A 25% water change would lower it by 1/4 etc.

Prime does not mess with water test accuracy. The ammonia is still there, it doesnt just disappear so you will have the same reading weather you use prime or not. The difference is that the ammonia you get for your reading is detoxified so it isnt harmful.

Since you are cycled. Continue adding prime daily until your ammonia is 0. No product can remove ammonia besides bacteria that you grow in your filter. The best you can do is temporarily (24 hrs with each dose of prime) detoxify it.

I have only used prime, i know it works and I am happy with it. I cycled my tank fish in and didnt lose a single fish and I still have the same fish 5 months later.

Also, if you were referring to ammonia making your tank cloudy in your last post, thats not the culprit ?
 
Everyone says ammonia must be 0 so this has been my journey trying to get there. I know the products don't remove ammonia, but "disable" it temporarily. :)
 
So Hulka, are you saying I should go back to Prime? Adding it daily even in the absence of a water change? When you say my tank isn't cycled because of the large water change, does that mean it has no cycled-ness despite it being an established tank and if so, should I add some quick start?
Thanks
 
Yes it definitely should be 0. It will happen with time. Sometimes well over a month. One of my tanks took 2 months when I did fish in. I went thru 2 big bottles of prime on that tank lol
 
When I say it isnt cycled it is because you still have ammonia present. When a tank is completely cycled ammpnia and nitrite are always 0 without adding any products to the tank. What I did was just continue doing once a week water changes and add prime daily straight to the water in your tank. Dose it for how much water is in your tank per instructions. This worked for me and not a single fish died.

Only exception would be if it got up to 8 like you said it did. Then do a water change immediately ?
 
I wouldnt add quickstart. Ive tried a couple kinds and havnt noticed a difference. It cant hurt though..

As for cloudiness, the only time my tank gets cloudy is when I stir up the substrate when I'm either planting or during a water change. After about a day the substrate will settle and become clear again.
 
Just want to clarify, when I did that 2 month cycle with water changes once a week and prime daily directly into the tank, my ammonia never got above 2.0ppm.

Yours could be high because of the amount of fish in it. Cant really say without more info though.
 
Just read your other post. You definitely have wayyy too many fish for a tank that isnt cycled yet. I would shoot for 3 fish in the tank max until your ammonia and nitrite are consistently 0.
 
Oh no! I have a 5 gallon quarantine tank established, but that would only house at the most 3 fish. Right now, they are all in the 20 gallon. I don't know how to solve this because I would have to wait for additional tanks to cycle to transfer some of the fish. A catch 22.
 
Yeah tough situation. only two options i see would be to keep doing water changes all the time and hope they survive the cycle, or return some fish and do less water changes. Up to you.

Hope this helps!
 
Thanks Hulka. I have had these fish for a while and I've grown attached to them. Plus, they'd be better off with me than at Petco. I'll continue to do the water changes.

Thanks so much for your comments!
 
API Liquid ammonia test measures total ammonia(NH3 and NH4+). Prime converts ammonia(NH3) to ammonium(NH4+) as mebbid mentioned earlier and the latter is not toxic to fish. We measure ammonia until cycled as it is toxic to fish in high amounts. The false readings mentioned are an apples to oranges comparison, which can be averted by using Seachem(manufacturer of Prime) Ammonia Alert constant ammonia monitor. It suctions to the glass inside the tank, and shows the ammonia(without ammonium) levels as it is in your tank.
The owner of my lfs told me he had heard mixed results on its accuracy, so at $10 bucks I thought it was worth trying in lieu of using a liquid test everyday, as no fish were in the tank. At the time I was cycling my 46 gal. using seeded filter media from another tank, dosing straight ammonia purchased from Ace hardware. As the cycle progressed I tested occasionally with the API liquid kit to verify the Ammonia Alerts accuracy. API was measuring @ 4 ppm(what I was dosing to), while the Seachem A.A. was reading 0.2 ppm. Intrigued by this, and having no way to test ammonium only as a control, I doubled the the next days amount of ammonia that I added, and found the difference in results to be the same at higher levels...
Novice, have you tested your PH? Too acidic of a PH can stall out your cycle, and render BB useless. If that isn't the issue, you may consider moving the seeded filter from your QT to your tank in question, and run both together allowing the bacteria to spread to your other filter. This will also help, with the issue of being overstocked.
 
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