I have a 30gal with an assortment of fish and plants. It should be cycled but the ammonia level has remained high so ive been using ammolock. I added ammonia chips to my filter last week and the level was coming down. I had also added a little crushed coral. I think the crushed coral made the water cloudy even though i rinsed it thoroughly. It wasnt like the cloudiness of high ammonia, i can see stuff circulting in the water. Today the water was still milky. I did a partial water change after testing the water. Everything appears normal except the ammonia. It was through the roof. I changed the filter and recharged the ammochips. What am i doing wrong?
Freshwater Been Cloudy and had a Sudden Ammonia Spike
- Thread starter pixelcatt
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aqua_chem
Aquarium Advice Addict
Ammonia should be kept around 4 ppm while cycling. Any higher than that and it will start to inhibit some of your nitrifying bacteria.
The cloudiness is likely a result of a bloom of heterotrophic bacteria. It is very common in new tanks and should go away in a few days on its own. If it starts to turn green instead, then you have a case of Green Water (very possible if you have high light + ammonia), which has its own treatment, but you can worry more about that if it comes up.
The cloudiness is likely a result of a bloom of heterotrophic bacteria. It is very common in new tanks and should go away in a few days on its own. If it starts to turn green instead, then you have a case of Green Water (very possible if you have high light + ammonia), which has its own treatment, but you can worry more about that if it comes up.
RDerrick
Aquarium Advice Apprentice
I would hate to disagree with aqua_chem but since you have fish in your tank ammonia should be kept lower than 4ppm. PWC time again. What type of filter do you have? If you changed all the media at once you might have just lost most of the bacteria that you need to finish cycling. I do agree with the fact it is probably bacteria bloom and should go away by itself pretty soon.
phoenixkiller
Aquarium Advice Addict
Yeah, most likely a pretty bad bacterial bloom, it should clear up soon with a few PWC's and time. I don't know this for sure, but the AmmoLock may have just reduced the ammonia, and then when it wore off, the ammonia went back up. I may be wrong, but I would say the high ammonia has the AmmoLock as a contributing factor.
I have an aqueon power filter in it.
All the ammolock does is neutralize it. You add it every two days till water changes and chips remove it. Until today the ammonia was dropping below 4 with the help from ammolock + ammochips. The ammonia has never been as high as it is today.
Its also a planted tank. Almost over night it rocketed over 8. I was do for my weekly cleaning today. Its down some since the water change and recharging the chips. Ill check it again tomorrow.
I'm still curious what the silt in the water is. I'm not sure it would be so milky without it. The silt came about after adding the crushed coral.
I'm having doubts about this filter doing its job. Ive added a external canister filter built for twice my tanks water capacity I originally got for my turtles tank and never used.
As far as the bacteria being removed, i regularly use api stress zyme. Would i still have that issue?
All the ammolock does is neutralize it. You add it every two days till water changes and chips remove it. Until today the ammonia was dropping below 4 with the help from ammolock + ammochips. The ammonia has never been as high as it is today.
Its also a planted tank. Almost over night it rocketed over 8. I was do for my weekly cleaning today. Its down some since the water change and recharging the chips. Ill check it again tomorrow.
I'm still curious what the silt in the water is. I'm not sure it would be so milky without it. The silt came about after adding the crushed coral.
I'm having doubts about this filter doing its job. Ive added a external canister filter built for twice my tanks water capacity I originally got for my turtles tank and never used.
As far as the bacteria being removed, i regularly use api stress zyme. Would i still have that issue?
phoenixkiller
Aquarium Advice Addict
I dislike all Aqueon filters due to their poor filtration, and they just plain don't do very much. An AquaClear or possibly a Marineland Penguin would do a far better job. Just my two cents.
Thats been my goal. But regular water changes werent helping so I resorted to using ammolock till its under control so it doesnt kill off my fish. Its a pretty full tank. A couple weeks ago the regular initial algae bloom cleared up and the ph became solid. I was told that meant it had become established. It took about a month. The power filter only has the one insert with carbon. Ive been changing them regularly.
If by stock you mean fish, there are dwarf gauramis, mollies, a cory cat, a jag. cat, and a green phantom pleco.
If by stock you mean fish, there are dwarf gauramis, mollies, a cory cat, a jag. cat, and a green phantom pleco.
There's a big part of your problem. Never regularly change the filter media. Swish it in old tank water when you do a PWC and put it back. Don't replace it until it is falling apart. Then, when you have to replace it, you put a new one in and find a way to cram the old one in for a week or so until the new one is well seeded.
Anyhoo... Your tank is now cycling so you will probably be doing one or more PWCs daily with all that stock until things stabilize.
Anyhoo... Your tank is now cycling so you will probably be doing one or more PWCs daily with all that stock until things stabilize.
aqua_chem
Aquarium Advice Addict
For some reason I thought he was doing a fishless cycle because his ammonia was high and he wasn't doing water changes. If that's not the case, water changes water changes water changes. Unless you have ammonia coming from the tap (which is possible), they are helping. Keep doing them periodically until the ammonia drops.
Don't rely on ammonia removing products as anything but an extremely short-term fix to hold you over until a water change.
Hopefully your turtle filter has an established population of BB that will alleviate your problem. Otherwise, water changes!
Okay. So hopefully new filter helps. I had been doing 10%wc almost everyday for a while and someone at work (i work in a petstore) said that was overdoing it. So Ill go back to doing that. That also explains why this canister would be so much better long term cause of leaving the ceramic media in it to culture.
Thanks for the advice. Atleast all my fish are behaving normally. One of my balloon mollies is about 2-3 weeks prego.
Thanks for the advice. Atleast all my fish are behaving normally. One of my balloon mollies is about 2-3 weeks prego.
pixelcatt said:
This someone at work is wrong. You will need to be doing 50%, or more, water changes daily. 10% won't help you with ammonia that high. Let's take one of your previous tests... Ammonia of 4ppm. Assuming your tap water has zero ammonia, changing 50% of the water would still only bring it down to 2ppm. You would need to do four 50% water changes to come down from 4ppm to 0.25ppm.
Best thing to do is get that ammonia down ASAP. Do a test now and then do a 50% water change. Then do the math: (test_result / 2) + 0.25
Wait a half hour and then do another 50% if you need to. Do the math again and repeat if necessary. Since there is ammonia in your tap water you will never get it below 0.25ppm, don't worry, as long as you get it below 0.50ppm and use a conditioner that temporarily detoxifies the ammonia all should be fine. I suggest keeping a close eye on it as you have quite a large stock and the ammonia will build up fast. Ammonia toxicity also depends on your pH and temperature but it is usually best to try and keep it as low as possible.
Wait a half hour and then do another 50% if you need to. Do the math again and repeat if necessary. Since there is ammonia in your tap water you will never get it below 0.25ppm, don't worry, as long as you get it below 0.50ppm and use a conditioner that temporarily detoxifies the ammonia all should be fine. I suggest keeping a close eye on it as you have quite a large stock and the ammonia will build up fast. Ammonia toxicity also depends on your pH and temperature but it is usually best to try and keep it as low as possible.
You might want to give this a read...
http://www.aquariumadvice.com/forums/f12/your-guide-to-ammonia-toxicity-159994.html
http://www.aquariumadvice.com/forums/f12/your-guide-to-ammonia-toxicity-159994.html
That was a very intriguing article. Unfortunately, i cant really use his chart because his chart doesnt list a ph below 7. However if my ph were 7 at the xurrent temp Id supposably be in the green. It would explain how it coyld be ao high without my fish suffering. Though I'm more inclined to beieve thats cause i used a product to detoxify it.
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