Those moments that make you shake your head

[HN1]

+1 for brimac for the thread. It can be frustrating at times, but you gotta keep trying. If only 1 out of 5 people listen, you've still done good.

As far as the female fishkeeper stuff goes... (sorry, I skimmed lol) there is nothing to it. We men can be just as ignorant and some of the fishkeepers that I respect the most happen to be female. Just my random thoughts...

 

[severum mama]

Such as your wife? LOLOL

 

[dkpate]

LOL

 

[Mark Hewitt]

I guess it's the same with me. My wife was the one who wanted the fish. But it's ended up me who's spent countless hours online reading and researching, and whenever I have a new interest I usually join a forum, which is why I'm here!

 

[brimac41]

I can't believe I actually started a thread that generated some interest , lol . I normally do not have a lot to say , I just like to read .

In defense of all our women on here , I am a guy and I am as hard headed as it comes to anything other than my pets/animals . My wife can tell how to get to a destination and I will go the exact opposite direction .

But on a side note , I keep a notebook close at hand when I am on this site to write down tips , hints and how to's when I see something I did not know and a lot of this came from the female aquarists here . I have learned a lot since I have became a member of this forum , and for that I thank you all .

 

[HN1]

Such as your wife? LOLOL

LOL

Yes Dear.

 

[Tivaala]

i have to admit to being guilty of the whole "do this, do that" "whatever!" thing a little. when i first set my little tank up back in my teens, went to get some fish and the lfs said "cant sell you fish until your tank is 2 weeks old" i was kinda like really? well it wasnt when i was a kid and my fish never died. in fact looking back i think i did everything i could wrong back then. couple of goldfish in a tank, no filter (thats for proper tropical tanks not goldfish right?) when the water got dirty the fish got plopped in the sink and id empty the tank, thoroughly rinse the gravel and decorations and completely fill it with lovely fresh tap water. then plunk the fish back in. the only thing that stops me feeling too guilty right now is that i always seemed to find forgiving fish that could stand that sort of treatment. bloody things lasted years! thankfully now im a card carrying adult and a scientist so im doing things (mostly) properly and having great fun doing lots of research. i hope ive grown up enough to listen to advice from my betters even if my experiences differ.
oh and ive given up trying to explain the fishless cycle, fish per gallon and in fact everything else including how to switch the kettle on, to my boyfriend!

 

[DragonFish71]

Well, I am a chick, and I can tell you that I am the one who does all the research in the house. If it was left up to my husband, NOTHING would get done and everything would be suffering.
My problem is that I buy what I want, and THEN I start reasearching, but then I will read and read and read. I become obsessed with knowing everything I can about my hobby. And then to top that off, I am a perfectionist, so in all reality, my husband thinks I am the crazy fish lady, and I tell everyone I know about keeping fish so they don't have to go through the same thing I did.
I have had the opposite experience as mctypething, with the guys always asking, "Why do you have a huge tank, and only 2 little fish in there?" And I have to tell them, AGAIN, "Because that black one you see in there? He will get up to 18 inches, and I don't want to have to rehome the other fish when that happens." "Well, just leave them all in there, they'll be fine." "Yeah, that's like putting a cat in a room full of mice."
I am the one in the house who takes the dogs to the vet, takes care of the pigs and fish. If I wasn't there, everything would get done the wrong way.

Nice ta'meet ya crazy fish lady. I'm crazy tank lady

 

[VonUberReefer]

back to the original post, i totally agree. but, i do have to say, in my years having a tank or two, i've seen a lot of crazy stuff, and a lot on the internet forums, in where something new comes to market, it works, and the ones who have the "experience" dismiss it without understanding it or even trying it.
now THAT is ignorance lol
but yes, i agree, those who ask for help and then don't follow it, will surely learn or leave the hobby /shrug

 

[HeathB]

Most of the people I've seen ignore advice is when its gonna really drain their wallet. This can be a cripplingly expensive hobby.

 

[dskidmore]

People dont want to do water changes to remove ammonia when products like "Ammo-lock" are available. These products, imo, should not be made.

Ammonia naturally converts to ammonium in low PH water (and soft too I think). So, if you have soft low PH water then you are throwing away your money... So, you'd think it'd be a good thing to convert all that ammonia to ammonium until you realize that in hard high PH water it naturally converts to ammonia. So, basically what you are doing is converting ammonia to ammonium so it can naturally convert back to ammonia.

I'd like to speak in defense of Ammo-lock. I actually prefer Prime, which does much the same thing and is also a dechlorinator. Yes, it is really stupid to use Ammo-lock as a long term solution to biological waste. Only a bacterial or plant filter combined with water changes (and trimming in the case of the plant filter) can remove a significant amount of waste compounds from the system. But no, it is not evil and it does have it's purposes.

As for the chemical effectiveness, the direction of natural conversion is not a one way street. A low pH may favor one end of the equation, and a high pH another, but in both situations molecules are constantly transforming back and forth, and there will be some of each. Ammonia neutralizers affect the balance of this equation to have a higher percentage of Ammonium than you would have naturally at either pH.

For examples of good uses:
1. Your water supply uses chloramine instead of chlorine. Chloramine is desireable by the water authority because it does not dissipate as quickly so they can use less of it. But when you add your dechlorinator to that water, a byproduct of ammonia is left over. Using both a dechlorinator and an ammonia neutralizer will keep you from shocking your biofilter with too much ammonia at once.

2. You have an emergency. Somebody gifts you with an incompatible fish, or some critter needs QT, and your QT is not set up or is already occupied. In either case you need to set up a QT fast and don't have time to cycle. Sure daily water changes and borrowed materials from your other tanks will help, but adding the emergency detoxificaiton level of ammonia neutralizer will keep the ammonia level from getting up to a stressful level before your next water change.

3. A newbie buys fish too soon and can't return them to the store. Ammonia neutralizers will relieve stress on the fish, but not completely stop the growth of the biofilter. Cycling with fish and without Ammonia neutralizers will lead to either massive fish death, or daily water changes for a very long time.

For these reasons I always use Prime as my dechlorinator. It takes care of the chloramine problem, and I have it on hand for emergency situations that arise.

Ammo-Lock® - API
Seachem. Prime
Chloramine - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Chemical equilibrium - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[TCool]

Well, I'm no chemist, so I'd just say it would depend on how long it takes nature to take over. In my situation I figured I have hard water that is off scale of my test, and PH of 8.2, so I probably don't have much chance of that stuff working.

Regardless tho, I'm sure that the natural conversions take over after a short period of time, but you probably know more about it than I do so it'd be interesting to hear about what you know about that.

 

[dskidmore]

H3O+ + NH3 <-> H2O + NH+4

pKa of NH+4 is 9.25
pKa of NH3 is 38

Ug. It has been way too long since I took chemistry to get it down to numbers.

Assuming no bacterial action and no other reactants, both NH3 and NH+4 will be in the water. It is possible to determine the relative concentrations from the data above, the pH, and the temperature, but I don't remember how any more.

My brain is not as young as it used to be to be able to absorb this: Wikipedia: Acid dissociation constant

Anyway, by this reaction alone, you will never be rid of all the ammonia. Nature will start to take over immediately, but she won't convert all NH3 to NH+4 via this equation. I don't have the reaction in front of me for the ammonia locking stuff, but unless it's exothermic (releases heat), I'd expect it only tips the scales more, it doesn't fully react with all the free ammonia.

I don't think it would be worth doing the math anyway, because those two chemical reactions are not operating in a pure environment. You have buffers in the water. You have other acids/bases in the water. You have ammonia getting eaten by bacteria or evaporating into the air. You have several other nitrogen compounds that can break down again.

The short of it is the ammonia locking products provide a little extra help, but neither acidic water nor ammonia lockers will completely rid the system of ammonia. The long term solution is a healthy bio-filter and water changes. When the long term solution is not yet fully functioning, that's when ammonia lockers can be helpful to the aquarist.

 

[TCool]

The short of it is the ammonia locking products provide a little extra help, but neither acidic water nor ammonia lockers will completely rid the system of ammonia. The long term solution is a healthy bio-filter and water changes. When the long term solution is not yet fully functioning, that's when ammonia lockers can be helpful to the aquarist.

While it may do something, chances are the help it provides is very minimal. Yet, the makers of this stuff make it out to be a fix for your ammonia problem. So, depending on how long it'll tip the balance, it might end up being good if you're in a pinch and need the toxic ammonia lowered immediately. Then again, you could always just pick up a python or aqueon water changer instead of this stuff (would probably be cheaper than using ammo-lock in the long run) and do a quick water change. It really only takes me 5 to 10 minutes to do a 50% water change on my 55 gallon.

 

[dskidmore]

Last time I had to set up an emergency QT, the ammonia levels were going from 0 to over .25 in less than a day. Water changes are essential, but they're not always enough in emergency situations, especially if your tap water has chloramine in it, and is introducing ammonia to the system with each water change.

 

[Andrewz00]

figured this is a good enough place to share my story...

i had a friend in college... who loved my tank so much she wanted her own... so i gave lectures and speeches on how to maintain and care for her new fish etc... i gave her a 10 gal (def wrong for a beginner, i would go larger) bc i had an extra sitting around, gave her the stand, lights, filter, substrate and plants from my tank so she didnt have to do a FULL cycle, test kit, nets, etc... everything she would need.

she assisted doing water changes on my tank, testing for water conditions etc... for practice.... then we filled her tank 50% with my water 50% new water .. we buy fish. i believe it was 2-3 balloon mollies (she thought they were cute, blah)

i get a call a 2 weeks later.... they are all dead. i come to find out the glass was getting dirty so she decided to "CLEAN" it..... by draining all the water and using windex!!!!?????? if i spray you in the face with ammonia, how would you feel?!

some people just dont get it even when shown and explained....

 

[TCool]

Last time I had to set up an emergency QT, the ammonia levels were going from 0 to over .25 in less than a day. Water changes are essential, but they're not always enough in emergency situations, especially if your tap water has chloramine in it, and is introducing ammonia to the system with each water change.

See, my concern would be that the effects of the ammo lock would be so short lived that you'd have to add the stuff every day, which would probably get pretty expensive.

Also, if it is a QT then that suggests to me that you have an established tank, unless you're setting up QT for the heck of it. So, why not take some media/gravel and move it over to the QT?

Anyway, if the ammo lock would tip the balance and hold out for a week or even a couple days I could see how it'd be helpful. But, if it only holds out for a day or less it seems like you are going to be throwing a lot of money at keeping your ammonia in check. Like you said though, it depends on a lot of different factors in your tank, so I guess the only way to know if it'd work is to get a test that can differentiate between ammonia and ammonium.

 

[dskidmore]

See, my concern would be that the effects of the ammo lock would be so short lived that you'd have to add the stuff every day, which would probably get pretty expensive. ...

Anyway, if the ammo lock would tip the balance and hold out for a week or even a couple days I could see how it'd be helpful.

Gosh no, I never said I was using it in place of water changes, I'm suggesting in addition to water changes. I buy Prime in big bottles for dosing the 75 gallon aquarium water changes, so the amount used in the course of an emergency situation in a 5 or 10 gallon QT is not that much in comparison, just a few weeks worth.

Transferring active bacteria from the main tank does no good if you're running a course of antibiotics. You just have to deal with the ammonia in other ways until it's time to stop treating the replacement water.

 

[Blueangel4730]

I was at my LFS a few weeks ago, a family was buying a 55g, gravel, decor and about 15 fish. I asked them if the fish were for an established tank at home to which they replied that they were for the new tank. I tried to explain that it doesnt work that way and you need to cycle etc.... the cashier interupted me and told the customer that was incorrect and that they shouldnt listen to me because I didnt know what I was talking about.

 

[Chronos313]

Ya I love some people who work at lfs chains. I was at my lfs by my work, which I'll be working at starting Wednesday. Yay discount prices lol. But ya there was a young couple bout my age and they were looking at the juvie bala sharks. Nobody was around so I asked what kind of tank they had and such, found out they had a ten gallon and a 26 gallon bow. The ten gallon was new. So I kindly told them that a bala IMO would need a 90+, thankfully the store had a few adult balas in the large tanks so I showed them how big they get.

Their 26 gallon they got from a friend who helped them cycle it over a month and they wanted to add some friends. Ended up helping them pick out 5 panda corys, 6 galaxy rasboras to start them off. And all I went in for was to by some frozen food and some spiraluna.

The worst incident I've overheard was someone wanting to put a clown loach in a ten gallon. Thankfully the guy at my lfs said they need a 90 minimum and that the ones they have are babies/juvies. Looks are definitely deceiving in the aquarium world