Ammonia problem..

[okpondlady]

My ammonia is down to 2.0. I have done water changes 25% until yesterday when I didn't do one at all. Today I put in the Zeolite that my local pet shop sold me to get it down. 2.0 down from almost off the scale 8.+ is pretty good but still need to get down to 0. The snails making whoopie didn't help. Hopefully that will be all the eggs I will get for awhile and the ammonia will stay down. After testing and getting a 2.0 I added some ammonium lock stuff so it will be safe.
Hopefully I am getting this down right. Everything else is fine, NitritItes at 0 and NitrAtes at 7 so it is finished with cycling. If I can just keep my snails going. I also brought in some Pennywort from the pond and planted. We will see how that looks, I can't wait. Mark is just laughing at me. He says I am fixing to have the monumental algea attack from He!!... Just because I brought in some pennywort?? I don't know.. maybe.
Also I have one question. Does keeping the lights on 24/7 make the ammonia increase? I don't see how that can happen. I havn't read it anywhere but he says it does.

Thanks,

Karen

 

[Toirtis]

The lights should nor affect ammonia at all, but it will stress plants and fish (even to death, given time). The zeolight will remove immediate ammonia, but will not fix your problem (or speed-up your cycle)....I am assuming that this tank is quite new and currently cycling?

 

[okpondlady]

I didn't realize I had a dead snail and also snails doing "whoopie"... I now have removed the dead one and have eggs on the top wall. The tank has been up about 5 months or so. Not quite new but still cycling I am sure.

Karen

 

[greenmaji]

do a big water change and remove the ammoina removing media.. it will make it impossible to cycle the tank..(you are either going through a new cycle or never finished the origanal one. other wise you wouldnt have had the ammonia problem) are you sure you have enough bio-media and filtration for the bio-load(amont of livestock) you have? this could have caused a new cycle.. how many, what type, and how big are the fish/inhabitants in what size tank do you have?

 

[Fishyfanatic]

Does your local water source use Chloramines? What kind of dechlorinator are you using?