Tapwater has ammonia in it and other tank questions...

[nwin]

Having a problem with my fish tank. It's been set up for over 2 months now with six danios in it (29g tank). It looks like it's cycled as nitrAtes will usually show about 5ppm or so. It is lightly planted. However, ammonia is almost always .25ppm. It never really goes higher than that which leads me to believe the tank is cycled. We tested the tap water the other day and it came out reading ammonia as .25ppm. Now, we ARE adding PRIME to the tank whenever we add water, so the ammonia isn't toxic to the fish, but it still reads on the test kit...


Anything to do about this and the readings?


How could we make FULLY sure the tank is cycled? We started the tank up with stability and then added fish and plants and did water changes as needed just over two months ago. There was a time where we added three guppies. One died overnight, which the fish store said was likely due to stress. The second one died a few days later, and the store said our PH was too high, probably likely to not gravel vaccing the tank, which we then went and did. He also suggested we add aquarium salt to the tank, which we went ahead and did. The third guppy was doing fine for about 2 weeks and then up and died...no idea why. We suspected an ammonia spike, but tested the levels and it was .25ppm ammonia with 5ppm nitrAtes and 0 nitrItes. We exchanged one of the guppies for a glofish, and she's been doing fine ever since. I don't want to add ANY MORE fish until I figure this problem out.


Hopefully I can get some help on these issues and start enjoying my tank more instea of worrying all the time about it!

 

[neilanh]

Welcome to AA!

What kind of test kit are you using? If you don't have a qualtiy liquid test kit, I'd recommend you get one of those. I prefer the API freshwater master test kit.

Funny thing about ammonia from the tap is that the chlorine/chloramines the water company puts in the water can often cause the ammonia test kit to register, even if it's not really ammonia. Do a little test, collect a sample of water from the tap and let it sit out for 24 hours and then test it and see what you get.

Once you get a good test kit, a truly cycled tank will read 0 ammonia and 0 nitrIte at all times. If you're registering anything on those 2 elements then the cycle is not fully completed.

 

[nwin]

Welcome to AA!

What kind of test kit are you using? If you don't have a qualtiy liquid test kit, I'd recommend you get one of those. I prefer the API freshwater master test kit.

Funny thing about ammonia from the tap is that the chlorine/chloramines the water company puts in the water can often cause the ammonia test kit to register, even if it's not really ammonia. Do a little test, collect a sample of water from the tap and let it sit out for 24 hours and then test it and see what you get.

Once you get a good test kit, a truly cycled tank will read 0 ammonia and 0 nitrIte at all times. If you're registering anything on those 2 elements then the cycle is not fully completed.

API Freshwaster Master Test Kit, is what I'm using. My wife took a sample directly from the tap and sampled it, but did not wait 24 hours. The reading was .25ppm. I will have another test done where we wait 24 hours before testing. Thanks!

 

[ejaramillo01]

In my opinion you are at 0ppm in Ammonia, I found hard to read between 0 and 0.25 ppm, specially in the API Master kit.

If you compare the color chart between the one that comes in the master kit versus the chart that comesnin the individual API ammonia test, they bare slightly different in colors, in the individual test is more clear the difference between 0 vs 0.25.