Not very happy, could use some advice

[flvol77]

I have two fully cycled tanks (55 gallon and 29gallon) I do about a 20 to 25% water change weekly, and I check my water about every three days. each aren't fully stocked so no need for a larger water change.

I waited a little longer than a week this time to do a water change, I changed about 30% of my water this morning, went out and about three hours later checked my water to see my Ammonia was at 2 ppm....

So the first thing I did is check my tap water and of course its at 2 ppm of Ammonia, which is new.

I always use Seachem Prime when doing water changes and I go a little heavy on it and I know detoxifies ammonia for roughly 24 hours maybe longer by that time my tank should cycle the ammonia.

I know this isn't great for my fish, any suggestions, should I do water changes (larger ones) every two weeks to avoid exposure to the ammonia? Or should I just continue to do water changes as scheduled and make sure I use the Prime?

I am going to also reach out to the local utility district to see what happened. All I can say is thank goodness I use Prime and use it a little heavy.

 

[Mebbid]

I've seen this problem a few times and can only think of a few ways to get rid of the ammonia safely without resorting to outside water sources. Either using ammonia removing chips or a cycled filter in a water container. You could keep a sponge filter in the main tank and just run it in a Rubbermaid tote of water when it comes time to do a water change to get rid of the ammonia.

Although with a 20% water change you should only get about .25ppm ammonia level on your tank. The larger the water change you do the higher the ammonia concentration will hlbe.

 

[Rivercats]

As long as you have high ammonia in your tap water you want to only do smaller water changes but at least once a week. Doing smaller WC's allows the tank to breakdown the ammonia faster than if you did a big WC.