Ammonia

[graeve11]

My tank cycled but ammonia is still up. I know it’s cycled because I’ve been testing every day and have watched the ammonia rise and fall to about .5 ppm and the nitrates and ites rise and fall to zero. The problem is my ammonia is still at .5. I have two astrea snails in there right now, should I do a small water change? The tank is about two weeks old and I haven’t done one yet and the nitrates and nitrites have been zero for a few days now.

 

[graeve11]

My tank cycled but ammonia is still up. I know it’s cycled because I’ve been testing every day and have watched the ammonia rise and fall to about .5 ppm and the nitrates and ites rise and fall to zero. The problem is my ammonia is still at .5. I have two astrea snails in there right now, should I do a small water change? The tank is about two weeks old and I haven’t done one yet and the nitrates and nitrites have been zero for a few days now.

I am also using an api test kit

 

[melonheadorion]

My tank cycled but ammonia is still up. I know it’s cycled because I’ve been testing every day and have watched the ammonia rise and fall to about .5 ppm and the nitrates and ites rise and fall to zero. The problem is my ammonia is still at .5. I have two astrea snails in there right now, should I do a small water change? The tank is about two weeks old and I haven’t done one yet and the nitrates and nitrites have been zero for a few days now.

what methods did you do to cycle it? live rock/sand, dosing, etc?
i would suspect that you are putting something in the tank to get the ammonia up?
also, what kind of water are you using?

 

[brandon429]

Ignore the reading 100% it’s not seneye, post tank pic for final proof you were right and it’s cycled. We have a false alert ammonia thread your post belongs in

and you were the first on file to doubt the tester and know that what you saw was reliable


others need to see that resolve, well done. It’s cycled based on what you saw, the life forms and the time frames of #days underwater involved in seeing the param movement you’ve already seen.

source for my claims: any cycling charts ammonia line on day fourteen, it’s down all the way. Nitrite cannot harm your animals and neither can nitrate, they’re unimportant to know. Ammonia is what matters and it never does unpredictable things between tanks, your senses were right and the test is commonly off base / in need of TAN conversion before relaying the reading.

most folks add bottle bac that says ten days time on the label, you’re cycled redundantly if that’s the case.

and if not, you added only two snails and feed and waited this long, the cycling charts are still right as they were written long before bottle bac was for sale.

 

[melonheadorion]

with the cycle that it takes, for there to be no ammonia and no nitrites, there would have to be nitrates. so with there being no nitrates, there is something off with the reading.

 

[graeve11]

what methods did you do to cycle it? live rock/sand, dosing, etc?
i would suspect that you are putting something in the tank to get the ammonia up?
also, what kind of water are you using?

I had live rock and put bio spira in it there is also either green hair algae or diatoms in the tank so I got some snails. They went to work and I noticed some poop from them that could maybe be it. I got my water from my lfs.

 

[brandon429]

I’ll relay a cool secret from the rolls of updated cycling science logs: your cycle isn’t the concern, adding fish that aren’t disease prepped is the hidden quiet issue. We all care a lot about not killing fish wastefully via bad cycling but the cycle isn’t the issue, it’s done.

we kill the fish in a few mos by skipping reads from this very forum:

Fish Disease Treatment and Diagnosis

A forum for discussing treatment and diagnosing saltwater reef fish.

www.reef2reef.com

what happens is new reefers literally see the years of work listed there, the daily posts from those who skip preps, and then specifically opt for no disease preps and all the fish are dead by august then new ones are re bought.


aiming all cycle concerns into fish disease prep is the #1 way to care for fish accurately. Because not one cycle chart ever written or available for reading shows ammonia holding at .5 on day fourteen, your params are of no concern here, we can rely on that old guide.

 

[brandon429]

Graeve truly that’s a helpful post.

you have visual cycling completions cues from the microbiology of reef tank cycling thread, ie expected diatom growths on the sand for a new tank (updated cycling science rule, all new growths after setup come after the base ability for ammonia control was set first)


and you have an open coral, they don’t open in bad ammonia water.


and then there’s lots of surface area and flow and that equates to ammonia in the thousandths ppm on seneye, not hundredths or tenths but .00x

this reading here for .5 after TAN conversion for nh3 gets us semi close to what a seneye would read for nh3, all is well.

darn nice post, sticking to your initial senses, after pics, what a nice helpful thread. I’m about to captain morgan this all over the Internet but it’s with good intentions. Well done. Thousands of folks have panicked in every measurable way to something you confidently knew was not out of spec

your issue is a big deal in reefing.

 

[brandon429]

Some of the inclusions above appear to have aggregates that take longer than two weeks to set up

is some of that reef rock from another running tank/ ie a portion is live rock? I’d expect lesser growths and aggregations from a totally dry rock start. If that was dry Caribsea life rock then you seem to have been feeding well to allow some initial flocs and expected attachments this soon.

 

[graeve11]

Some of the inclusions above appear to have aggregates that take longer than two weeks to set up

is some of that reef rock from another running tank/ ie a portion is live rock? I’d expect lesser growths and aggregations from a totally dry rock start. If that was dry Caribsea life rock then you seem to have been feeding well to allow some initial flocs and expected attachments this soon.

It’s about half live rock and half dry. The live rock I bought out of a tank from my lfs.

 

[melonheadorion]

i can say from my experience, my levels were sticking at .25 forever up until just this week. my tank is about a month and a half old or so. i did a fishless cycle, without dosing anything. at about week 3 or 4, i added 2 clowns, who have done fine the whole time, and are still alive. from that point, i slowly added another fish until 2 weeks after i noticed that my nitrates were constantly 0. keep in mind, that my ammonia has always been .25 regardless of what i did. just last week, i added 3 more fish. again, my ammonia didnt change.
as long as fish are good, then any minor ammonia readings should be fine. like i said, ive had fish for the entirety that i have had .25 reading, and none are acting odd in any sense of the word.
i have come to a conclusion as to what has caused my ammonia though, even through the ammonia isnt creating issue for the fish, i have always been curious as to why i always have a reading in the tank when there shouldnt be. without going crazy in depth with stuff i wouldnt understand anyway, tap water can cause a chemical reaction, which caused ammonia. i didnt really believe that, since my water after i prepped it, was at 0. only until i add it to the tank, do i get a reading. the gentleman said there is a reaction that gets created when adding prepped tap water that causes it, so i decided to buy a rodi system to make my own. since then, my ammonia levels are 0, or next to zero. definately less than it was using normal tap water.

in any instance, if fish arent being effected by the amount of ammonia being seen, there isnt a worry to be had. the fish are the tell tale sign if there is a problem

 

[graeve11]

i can say from my experience, my levels were sticking at .25 forever up until just this week. my tank is about a month and a half old or so. i did a fishless cycle, without dosing anything. at about week 3 or 4, i added 2 clowns, who have done fine the whole time, and are still alive. from that point, i slowly added another fish until 2 weeks after i noticed that my nitrates were constantly 0. keep in mind, that my ammonia has always been .25 regardless of what i did. just last week, i added 3 more fish. again, my ammonia didnt change.
as long as fish are good, then any minor ammonia readings should be fine. like i said, ive had fish for the entirety that i have had .25 reading, and none are acting odd in any sense of the word.
i have come to a conclusion as to what has caused my ammonia though, even through the ammonia isnt creating issue for the fish, i have always been curious as to why i always have a reading in the tank when there shouldnt be. without going crazy in depth with stuff i wouldnt understand anyway, tap water can cause a chemical reaction, which caused ammonia. i didnt really believe that, since my water after i prepped it, was at 0. only until i add it to the tank, do i get a reading. the gentleman said there is a reaction that gets created when adding prepped tap water that causes it, so i decided to buy a rodi system to make my own. since then, my ammonia levels are 0, or next to zero. definately less than it was using normal tap water.

in any instance, if fish arent being effected by the amount of ammonia being seen, there isnt a worry to be had. the fish are the tell tale sign if there is a problem

Light bulb went of in my head while reading this! I rinse my test tubes in tap water after each test. That could be just an added variable to a false reading of my tests.

 

[brandon429]

Graeve what a succinct and helpful thread.
I wanted you to see the madness that ensues from not being resolved about cycles. I could tell in your very first post you knew it was ok.


read these guys and gals initial post description
have popcorn, extra butter and dark sunglasses/reco

Sustained Ammonia spikes are misreads

The reason you think your reef tank can’t control its ammonia is due to false training from old cycling science. That and you don’t own a seneye on the tank in question: if you did, you wouldn’t ever think your ammonia was out of control...

www.reef2reef.com

notice how ammonia troubleshooting is highly debated and disagreed

the hobby is undergoing evolution in how we evaluate what nh3 is doing in challenge tanks.

It’s not doing anything the masses think it’s doing that’s the very very fun part. You were already hip to the game.

that reef never needs ammonia testing ever again, not ever. It’s forever locked into control. If a huge dead fish is ever rotting in the tank we don’t need a kit to tell that, pls remove it lol

 

[graeve11]

Graeve what a succinct and helpful thread.
I wanted you to see the madness that ensues from not being resolved about cycles. I could tell in your very first post you knew it was ok.


read these guys and gals initial post description
have popcorn, extra butter and dark sunglasses/reco

Sustained Ammonia spikes are misreads

The reason you think your reef tank can’t control its ammonia is due to false training from old cycling science. That and you don’t own a seneye on the tank in question: if you did, you wouldn’t ever think your ammonia was out of control...

www.reef2reef.com

notice how ammonia troubleshooting is highly debated and disagreed

the hobby is undergoing evolution in how we evaluate what nh3 is doing in challenge tanks.

Hahaha I’ve been reading a lot and

Graeve what a succinct and helpful thread.
I wanted you to see the madness that ensues from not being resolved about cycles. I could tell in your very first post you knew it was ok.


read these guys and gals initial post description
have popcorn, extra butter and dark sunglasses/reco

Sustained Ammonia spikes are misreads

The reason you think your reef tank can’t control its ammonia is due to false training from old cycling science. That and you don’t own a seneye on the tank in question: if you did, you wouldn’t ever think your ammonia was out of control...

www.reef2reef.com

notice how ammonia troubleshooting is highly debated and disagreed

the hobby is undergoing evolution in how we evaluate what nh3 is doing in challenge tanks.

It’s not doing anything the masses think it’s doing that’s the very very fun part. You were already hip to the game.

that reef never needs ammonia testing ever again, not ever. It’s forever locked into control. If a huge dead fish is ever rotting in the tank we don’t need a kit to tell that, pls remove it lol

woohoo thanks for the advice/reassurance!

 

[KrisReef]

I am also using an api test kit

“Bingo”

 

[brandon429]

We gotta see that test read clear pic against its color card

i like to pick on non seneye ammonia readings but this above isn’t to harsh the kit, it’s so we can get an idea what the nh3 component might be after TAN conversion is applied. We can get an idea of total ammonia vs bad ammonia from that pic


I wouldn’t have known about TAN conversions if Dan and Taricha hadn’t explained it to me. am bad at chemistry good at spotting web post trending.

 

[melonheadorion]

also, make sure you shake the test solutions really good. i found that if the API isnt shaken well in the bottle, it gives a zero reading. so shake them vigorously before putting them into the vial

 

[graeve11]

We gotta see that test read clear pic against its color card

We gotta see that test read clear pic against its color card

i like to pick on non seneye ammonia readings but this above isn’t to harsh the kit, it’s so we can get an idea what the nh3 component might be after TAN conversion is applied. We can get an idea of total ammonia vs bad ammonia from that pic


I wouldn’t have known about TAN conversions if Dan and Taricha hadn’t explained it to me. am bad at chemistry good at spotting web post trending.

 

[graeve11]

I dumped my test and did not rinse it and I got zero this time. I think I found the culprit

 

[brandon429]

Nice nice

Melonheadorion nice call.

nice teamwork here a rarity alignment.

you had conflicting studies between what you’d read in prep compared to initial test reading, found the prep issue and the biology did not waiver to accommodate either reading.



that one ammonia test above sure looks clean to me it would TAN to the thousandths which is now a direct match to what a tuned seneye would read on that system.

it is therefore not a stretch to consider many folks reporting and reacting to bad params in our collection thread above may be making test changes unexpectedly.