High ammonia after water change!!!

[Em29uk]

Just did a water change about 40 % and then checked ammonia and it's 1.0ppm the water smelt bad too!! Nitrates have gone Down to about 2.0ppm when it was 5.0 last week, do I do another pwc or wait until later and check again !!

 

[Old Scales]

Do you have fish in the tank?

 

[Em29uk]

ammonia noooooo

 

[Em29uk]

Yes 6 , 4 neon tetras and 2 make guppys , 3 shrimps 39L tank 10 gal

 

[Old Scales]

First thing I would suspect when it smells AND has an ammonia spike is that something is fouling the water. Check every nook and cranny closely and check under all hardscape. It could be excess food trapped under something or a dead fish or snail. Do you give your gravel a good vacuum when you do a WC? OS.

 

[Em29uk]

Yea well my fella scatters pellets around the tank for the shrimps, I notice that those pellets end up rotting and don't get eaten , will have to check the gravel again I only did the gravel I could see n didn't move any ornaments

 

[Em29uk]

Not as bad now just removed more rottin pellet under an ornament , the tap water here contains 0.25ppm of ammonia anyway before it enters the tank

 

[Rivercats]

Your BB can quickly and easily convert a small amount of ammonia in your tap water but you need to make your fella understand he is adding way too much food which is fouling the water and can actually cause fish fatalities over time. Fish and shrimp really don't require that much food to stay healthy and in a small tank water can foul very quickly. Even in my 220g planted tank with numerous bottom feeders I only add 3 algae wafers every other day. If there are pellets not being eaten then way too many are being added. You will also need to go to doing a good gravel cleaning weekly.