Ammonia Spike in QT

[HumuhumuFan]

So yesterday I placed a 3" YT and a 3" melanurus wrasse in my QT. The QT was setup for about a week and I had a peppermint shrimp, a big trochus, and 3 green leg hermits in there for about a week before moving them to my parents tank. This morning they are behaving pretty normal for being in a barebottom tank, I added a small Tupperware tray of sand from my DT for the wrasse and he slept in last night. Both fish ate eagerly today.

I have an ammonia alert badge on there but it probably needs to be phased out of service because it has been in use for a while. (New ones arriving tomorrow via Amazon) Anyways just as a precaution I used my test kit (API) and it read at 2.0 ppm! I ran it again, same result. I added another alert badge from a different tank and it looks untriggered to me. I tested my tap water with the API kit and it read 0.25 ppm. I'm wondering if the API kit is bad.

My options:
(1) Add Prime and/or Stability
(2) Water change (Salt H20 will be ready tomorrow)
(3) Just add them to the DT

I was planning on treating them with PraziPro as a precaution and that complicates things because from what I recall you shouldn't use it with Prime. Input?

 

[The Aquatic Arsenal]

API test for total ammonia in the water, so it isn't the most accurate test. I would do a water change to bring the ammonia level down to zero. I will see if I can find where I read that about the API test kit.

 

[HumuhumuFan]

Here is badge 1:

Badge 2:

Do I believe the badges or the API kit? That is the million dollar question.

 

[The Aquatic Arsenal]

I would just do a water change to take care of any worries. Don't use prime with medication.

 

[HumuhumuFan]

I did a 50% water change and Ammonia reading on API kit dropped from 2.0 to 1.0. The alert badge continues to read 0 and the fish continue to eat and not look stressed. At this point I'm more worried about ammonia than parasites so I guess I'll skip the Prazi and add the Prime just to be safe.

 

[Big G]

The best way to read a Seachem Ammonia Alert badge is to shine a small flashlight down through the water from behind the badge.