chemistry questions....

[Guest]

ammonia, ammonium, prime, chloramine....

I went to the fish store yesterday. The guy there said that Prime locks up the ammonia into ammonium and I will still read ammonium as ammonia on a test kit. He also said that prime will give a false ammonia reading even if the tank is cycled if there is ammonia in my tap water (which as you all know, there is).

I have also heard that chloramine contains ammonia and will give a positive ammonia reading.

i have heard ammonium is harmless to my fish.

I read positive for ammonia all the time. i also read positive for nitrates, but not nitrites (anymore. i have had nitrites before). I read positive for ammonia after water changes, which lately, i do every day. The reason i am doing daily water changes: positive ammonia readings.

i generally read between .25 and .5 ppm, consistently.

can anyone explain all this to me? I am confused. some of my tanks have been running for months and show ammonia readings, that are low stocked (like a 20 gallon with 6 glass cats and 2 dwarf gouris. that tank reads .25-.5ammonia, 0 nitrites, 10ppm nitrate).

My fish seem to be doing very well. they are breeding, eating, healthy. tanks look beautiful.

I don't add anything other than a pinch of salt, prime, and water. i rinse my filters about every other week in old tank water. i change between 25-50% of the water when i change it and do small partial gravel vacs when i do also.

i am getting pretty frustrated with the ammonia readings. i want to understand why it is there. if it is in fact ammonia or if it is ammonium or chloramine or something else.

I use an AP test kit.

what am i doing wrong?

 

[Ky'smommy]

do you use a dechlorer(sorry on spelling) like prime?
IME - I use prime , my family uses prime , a good percentage of people on this site use prime and i dont think everytime they test there water it show amonnia.

If you are not adding any kind of dechlorer that could very well why ur showing ammonia. since there is some in ur tap and salt doesnt remove it.
or u could be usings the test kit wrong or its old..
first thing i would do is test ur water before u do a daily water change and see where its at first. Or after a couple hours.
HTH

 

[joannde]

Got this on the Prime FAQ:
Q: I am using Prime™ to control ammonia but my test kit says it is not doing anything, in fact it looks like it added ammonia! What is going on?
A: A Nessler based kit will not read ammonia properly if you are using Prime™... it will look "off scale", sort of a muddy brown (incidentally a Nessler kit will not work with any other products similar to Prime™). A salicylate based kit can be used, but with caution. Under the conditions of a salicylate kit the ammonia-Prime complex will be broken down eventually giving a false reading of ammonia (same as with other products like Prime™), so the key with a salicylate kit is to take the reading right away
http://www.seachem.com/support/FAQs/Prime_faq.html

AP makes two ammonia kits - one with two solutions and one with only one. The one with only one solution is the Nessler type. The one with two is the salicylate type. Either way you would be getting false readings.

 

[QTOFFER]

Which ammonia test kit are you using? There are TWO types of AP liquid ammonia test kits. The one reagent kit gives false positives if your water is treated with chloramine. The two reagent kit gives accurate ammonia readings whether your water company uses chlorine or chloramine to disinfect the water.

I'm betting that your water is treated with chloramine and that you're using the one reagent kit. Pick up the two reagent kit, and I'll bet your tap water ammonia will be 0. (If it's not, call your water company and the EPA - there should be no ammonia in your tap water! ) If your tank is cycled, the biofilter will detoxify ammonia as soon as it is produced by the fish. In other words, the daily water changes probably are not necessary.

Most dechlorinators are formulated to deal with chlorine AND chloramine. They break up chloramine into chloride and inert, bound ammonia, which is processed by your biofilter. Prime, Anquel, and Aquasafe all claim to detoxify chloramines - check your dechlorinator label to be sure.

Ammonium (NH4+) is a form of free ammonia (NH3) that forms in slightly acidic water. It is slightly less toxic to fish than free ammonia. Dechlorinators and AmmoLock don't convert chloramine to ammonium - they physically bind to the ammonia.

Here are two really good articles about chlorine and chloramines:
http://www.csd.net/~cgadd/aqua/art_chlorine.htm
http://www.skepticalaquarist.com/docs/water/chlorine.shtml

Small amounts of nitrates in your tap water could be due to fertilizer runoff - the downside of all those pretty green lawns. My tapwater consistently tests 2 ppm nitrate. No big deal, since it isn't toxic below 20 ppm, and it can be reduced by water changes and by live plants.

 

[Guest]

OK

yes, i use prime. I also use a salicylate style (two reagent) kit.

My tap tests positive for ammonia with the test kit. I called the water company. they clame it is the chloramine giving the reading. my tap reads zero nitrites and zero nitrates.

 

[dskidmore]

I disagree about calling the EPA. Many water companies actually add ammonia to the water to bind with chlorine and form chloramine.

Leave out a glass of tap water overnight and run a full set of tests on it. If you have chloramine, then you have ammonia.

Use the labling on the side of the bottle of prime to figure out how much Prime you need to add to counter the ammonia reading in the tap water.

Every time you take an ammonia reading, subtract out the amount of ammonia you know came from your tap water and has been neutralized with Prime.

Unless the tank water goes above the tap water levels, don't do a water change to bring down ammonia. Continue weekly PWC with Prime treatment.

 

[Ky'smommy]

thats weird cause i dont get ammonia readings at all and i use prime and same with others i know? whats up with that?

 

[Guest]

this is so frustrating. i am getting really frustrated. i just want to have zero ammonia readings.


as far as i can tell, from what is in my tap, i should be at zero according to your post dskid. i use the prime to the letter for my tanks. i even use a measured syringe to get the correct amount.


EDIT: i am about frustrated enough to tear all my tanks down.

 

[dskidmore]

Facts Summary:
Your tap tests 0 NH4.
Tap + prime tests 0 NH4?
Your aquarium looks cycled, showing 0 nitrite and positive nitrate?
You use Prime in your daily water changes
Your aquarium consistantly shows .25 - .5 NH4 with daily water changes.

Questions:
I'd really like to see a water quality report for your area. My city and county water authorities both have websites with water quality reports on them. Could you find such a site, or tell us who your water supply is from? Do you know for sure if they are using chlorine or chloramine?

Describe your PWC method.

How long has this aquarium been running?
How long has it had fish?

Stop the water changes for a few days, and test the aquarium water for a couple times a day, chart the results. Is ammonia going up or down with time? Resume changes if you show the ammonia level is going up past 1.0. The test kit isn't really reliable enough to conduct the experiment without risking this ammonia shock.

Alternative theory:
The water company is using chlorine instead of chloramine, at a higher concentration than a default dose of Prime can nuetrialize. Chlorinated water is killing some of your bacteria, causing ammonia spikes.

 

[Guest]

Tap tests 2ppm ammonia using AP salicylate test.
Tests .25-.5 ppm after using prime
Aquarium shows .25-.5, sometimes as much as 1 ppm ammonia, 0 nitrite, 5-10 nitrate
I use prime



water report: http://www.melbourneflorida.org/watercon/water.htm

PWC: using a python. I change anywhere from 25-80% of water, depending on ammonia reading, usually gravel vac lightly at least 25% of the tank. Rinse filters in old tank water every other week. I add prime as I start filling according to the directions on the bottle, sometimes a little more.

Tanks have been running between 4.5 months and 2months

all have had fish since day 3


Hope this helps.

 

[dskidmore]

Yikes! According to that report, your chloramine level varies between 0 and 12.4 ppm! I think between what the report says, and your experiences, you have a highly variable chloramine content, and the few tap water measurements is not fully indicative of what is going into your tank with each water change.

Prime only removes 3 mg/L of chloramine per standard dose. "a double dose may be used safely" but that's still only 6 mg/L, and you've got a max of 12.4!

Are you dosing according to aquarium volume, or replacement volume?

You can switch to a double-dose of prime, and hope those 12.4 days are rare; test the tap for ammonia every time you use it; or get a good filtration unit for your tap water.

 

[Guest]

*sigh* i give up. anyone want a bunch of fish and fishtanks?

 

[dskidmore]

That would be sad if you gave up.

 

[Purrbox]

Perhaps it's time to consider RO Water in your situation. Depending on the size of your tanks, you can buy RO Water from the grocery store fairly inexpensively. You could mix it 50/50 with your tap water which would bring the max Chloramine levels down to treatable with the safe dosage of Prime. Or you could use 100% RO water and add either Kent RO Right or Seachem Equilibrium to add back in the minerals and buffers. This would give you ideal water without any worry of the stuff in your tapwater. For larger tanks it would probably be more economical to consider buying an RO Unit as it would quickly pay for itself.

 

[dskidmore]

Perhaps it's time to consider RO Water in your situation. Depending on the size of your tanks, you can buy RO Water from the grocery store fairly inexpensively. You could mix it 50/50 with your tap water which would bring the max Chloramine levels down to treatable with the safe dosage of Prime. Or you could use 100% RO water and add either Kent RO Right or Seachem Equilibrium to add back in the minerals and buffers. This would give you ideal water without any worry of the stuff in your tapwater. For larger tanks it would probably be more economical to consider buying an RO Unit as it would quickly pay for itself.

:nod:

 

[Guest]

i can't keep spending money to get my water right. i can't afford an RO/DI unit. I can't afford to buy RO every week. I just can't. I have too many tanks to buy RO and RO/DI units are slow and expensive.


EDIT: i already paid for a python. if i could afford to switch to RO/DI, i'd be back to buckets. hell no.

 

[joannde]

FishyPeanut - don't give up ! use the double dose of Prime and see how that helps. You could also do smaller water changes. Since your water is actually ADDING ammonia then the large water changes you are doing to remove it could actually be counterproductive. Do your gravel vacs once a week as you've been doing trying to remove only 25% of the water and use a double dose of Prime (dose for the entire tank volume). After 24 hrs you can add more Prime without ill effect. So 48 hrs after your gravel vac do a 25% water change (w/out gravel vac) - with the Python that's a snap. Do a double dose of Prime (again calc'd for the entire tank).
That should help keep your ammonia levels reasonable.
Give it a shot - don't give up !!!

 

[Mosaic]

Don't give up! It'd be one thing if your fish were sick and dying. I could understand that. But your fish are happy, healthy, and breeding, even in your confusing water. It doesn't get any better than that. How could you say goodbye to those little faces?

 

[Guest]

i'm just really frustrated. i'll stick it out a little longer, another month or so.

i went to my trusted LFS (this guy is incredible, i actually do trust him. i have never seen a single dead fish in his store, never seen any disease, although he has admitted to me he has had problems before but treats asap) and told him about my fishues. he told me not to worry so much. he tested my water and said it looks ok. he also saw ammonia, but told me it is because of our water supply. told me that he could sell me RO/DI water, but i don't really need it. That i am doing just fine. He said if my fish are ok, i am doing ok.

EDIT: He basically did everything he could to talk me out of giving up. not because he wants my business, but because he can tell i am actually a good pet keeper, and that i have shown a lot of passion for the hobby and have learned so much in a short period of time

 

[joannde]

FP - I like your LFS guy too Glad he showed you that everything is ok and not to worry