Possible causes for API Ammonia false positives

[ThePlummer]

For the last three weeks or so, I've been really worried about the ammonia levels in my display tank, as they have been steadily creeping up and now they are up to 5.0ppm, but the water is clear and the fish are healthy. So, obviously I have a API test kit that is giving a false positive, but only in this tank. It tests fine in the three other tanks that I have set up and I've checked with another lot batch test kit and get the same results.

My question is two fold: Is it possible that vodka dosing can cause a false positive, Dr. Tim's Waste Away, or a combination of both being used. I've been fighting a crazy high nitrate problem (off the charts) and started vodka dosing. I've never done that before but have been told that once you start, you shouldn't stop. During this time, LFS store sold me waste away. I must say, over the next month.... YUP, nitrates are now down to 5-10 range and staying consistent.

Consequently, now I have a major breakout of either red cyano or dinos. Nothing has worked getting rid of those. If I scrub them off the rocks, by the next day, this is everywhere, so that doesn't work.

I've stopped vodka dosing all together and have suspended Dr. Tim's for now, hoping that the ammonia levels would drop... It's been nearly a week and nope, still 5.0 on the ammonia.

Any thoughts?

 

[brandon429]

my first guess: inability to report true conversion levels. My friend Seabass on nano-reef.com says they're so sensitive they could be overreporting, and that makes sense. Some tests read hard zero, Ive seen them too they're mixed with tests that read .25 subjectively etc.

there are confounding additives Dr Tim mentions prime interacting to make false positives, Im not sure of the rest.

but I have a strong, strong, reef inclination that at no time in reefing does anyone's tank reach the tenths ppm and things look and function ok. Biology is more reliable than titration testing for ammonia, in the current state of measure, it seems. go seneye! (and then we also have a noncompliant seneye thread showing readings not like any other tank)

since we don't expect a zero ammonia reading in reefing, I never was sure why API has that reading on the card. seems like a for sure misreport, out of the gate. we can at least get 500 seneye tanks to show the same reading, that means something in my opinion. it reflects at least on a given conversion rate consistency, tank to tank, and I think its reliable tank to tank and not varying given normal working conditions typical for a reef. if the real conversion rate isn't thousandths ppm per today's seneye, its something linked and consistent tank to tank given the surface area we all overdo

 

[taricha]

What are you feeding the tank, coral food, additives etc?
Some forms of nitrogen other than ammonia show up on the api test.

 

[ThePlummer]

What are you feeding the tank, coral food, additives etc?
Some forms of nitrogen other than ammonia show up on the api test.

Currently this tank is a FOWLER, I only feed pellet, flake, and nori sheets. I dose Iron for Chaeto growth.

 

[14 foot reef]

Stop chasing these these values with that test brand test kit. They are not accurate at all. Please invest in quality test kits instead of chasing numbers that are most likley not there and dosing to try to beat something that is most likely not there.

 

[ThePlummer]

my first guess: inability to report true conversion levels. My friend Seabass on nano-reef.com says they're so sensitive they could be overreporting, and that makes sense. Some tests read hard zero, Ive seen them too they're mixed with tests that read .25 subjectively etc.

there are confounding additives Dr Tim mentions prime interacting to make false positives, Im not sure of the rest.

but I have a strong, strong, reef inclination that at no time in reefing does anyone's tank reach the tenths ppm and things look and function ok. Biology is more reliable than titration testing for ammonia, in the current state of measure, it seems. go seneye! (and then we also have a noncompliant seneye thread showing readings not like any other tank)

since we don't expect a zero ammonia reading in reefing, I never was sure why API has that reading on the card. seems like a for sure misreport, out of the gate. we can at least get 500 seneye tanks to show the same reading, that means something in my opinion. it reflects at least on a given conversion rate consistency, tank to tank, and I think its reliable tank to tank and not varying given normal working conditions typical for a reef. if the real conversion rate isn't thousandths ppm per today's seneye, its something linked and consistent tank to tank given the surface area we all overdo

Hmm... I've almost always gotten a 0 reading for ammonia on a cycled tank with the API test. I'm just getting concerned, as I'm currently running FOWLER and have many corals ready to be introduced when quarantine is complete on July 10th. I want to solve this issue before then.

 

[ThePlummer]

Stop chasing these these values with that test brand test kit. They are not accurate at all. Please invest in quality test kits instead of chasing numbers that are most likley not there and dosing to try to beat something that is most likely not there.

Hmm.... not accurate? I've had my water tested by at least 4 different LFS's and these are the kits they use. Also, I've never had an issue, till I started dosing vodka and Dr. Tim's Waste Away.

 

[brandon429]

your tank can't have uncontrolled ammonia, or all the life would be dead in 48 hours v thriving.

post a full tank pic

the problem is the tester, not the tank. its always that way. even when blanks measure out for nonliving sources, its never an aquarium failing to control ammonia. pics always show bright clean water, normal animals, no stench, all the signs of full ammonia control

and then a tester disagrees...that's the loop.

 

[ThePlummer]

your tank can't have uncontrolled ammonia, or all the life would be dead in 48 hours v thriving.

post a full tank pic

the problem is the tester, not the tank. its always that way.

I don't doubt that at all, and since the fish are fine, I'm sure it's a false positive. I was just wondering if anyone else had seen this phenomena, and if it's safe to introduce the corals soon. As well as when I can expect this to go away, or if I have to do a water change to eliminate this.

 

[ThePlummer]

 

[ThePlummer]

This is a temporary setup, While I wait for Exotic Marine to send me their overflow and sump package. It should be here by tomorrow. Eventually, everything will be in a innovative marine 120 shallow reef with the AIO cut out and a custom 55 gallon refuge.

 

[brandon429]

that system is in full control of ammonia, at whatever the conversion rate any other reef would show, current best reports are thousandths ppm among tanks until we get better meters.

Your fish are down low, extracting oxygen from any zone because the gills are working.

gills are working because surrounding ammonia isn't burning them, preventing excretion, causing death in a few hours max. cloudy water missing, and benthic clues show that all filter bac are in place because at no time can cyano growth come before nitrification control, given that much rock and sand.

this is certainly a misread. if you were in the tenths ppm, stinky cloudy doom yesterday.


lets say for argument's sake that the ammonia noncontrol just started yesterday or today for some reason. The tank will be dead by Sunday. no animal can forego its kidney function and live; no reef tank can forego its natural kidney function and live just the same. reefs either have enough surface area to work or they crash, ammonia cannot, does not, hover in between the dangerous and totally controlled levels. only titration kits, and the occasional broken seneye, says otherwise lol

 

[ThePlummer]

that system is in full control of ammonia, at whatever the conversion rate any other reef would show, current best reports are thousandths ppm among tanks until we get better meters.

Your fish are down low, extracting oxygen from any zone because the gills are working.

gills are working because surrounding ammonia isn't burning them, preventing excretion, causing death in a few hours max. cloudy water missing, and benthic clues show that all filter bac are in place because at no time can cyano growth come before nitrification control, given that much rock and sand.

this is certainly a misread. if you were in the tenths ppm, stinky cloudy doom yesterday.


lets say for argument's sake that the ammonia noncontrol just started yesterday or today for some reason. The tank will be dead by Sunday. no animal can forego its kidney function and live; no reef tank can forego its natural kidney function and live just the same.

That's what I thought. I've been battling the red stuff for weeks now and can't seem to get a handle on it. BRS TV says the Waste away should combat cyano if that's what I have, but it's just gotten worse as Nitrate's dropped. So, I'm leaning toward a strain of dinos. I'm currently in the process of raising temp from 78 F to at least 82 F. Having trouble getting it there though, to see if this kills off the slime.

 

[taricha]

I still wanna know what's interfering and causing a dark green reading "5.0" on the test kit, while other tanks you have show zero. Chaetogrow is mostly just metals.
Neither carbon dosing nor Waste Away would show as ammonia.
The tank has history of huge NO3, and carbon dosing reduced it, but did it get skimmed out? Or go into algae growth? Or is there still a substantial amount present in some form that the test detects...

 

[ThePlummer]

I still wanna know what's interfering and causing a dark green reading "5.0" on the test kit, while other tanks you have show zero. Chaetogrow is mostly just metals.
Neither carbon dosing nor Waste Away would show as ammonia.
The tank has history of huge NO3, and carbon dosing reduced it, but did it get skimmed out? Or go into algae growth? Or is there still a substantial amount present in some form that the test detects...

Great questions. I do have a protein skimmer, however it's not very efficient. This tank is using a locally made HOB filter from the 90's and the protein skimmer operates off a wood stone and air pressure. It does work and I pull about a quart of green skimmate a day or every other day, so I know it's working. My filter fiber has been clogging very rapidly as of late, mostly since the waste away has been doing it's job.

I don't have a whole lot of cheato growth, bought a golf ball size of Chaeto from Algae Barn and a jar of copopods. The pods must have not lived, as their are zero signs of them, even at night. The Chaeto has tripled in size.

Interesting note: I'm using a 45 gallon trash can as a sump right now, and found that the chaeto went straight to the bottom and wouldn't float, so I bought a clear plastic hamster ball and put it in there. Now the Ball of cheato floats about 8" under the water, so the refugium light works well. I do have to occasionally have to pull the cheato out and clean the inside of the ball. My ultimate hopes was that the cheato would grow through the slits in the hamster ball and encompass it, but that hasn't happened yet. It's been about 2 months since I put that in.

 

[ThePlummer]

BTW, I just noticed in the photo that some of the fish must be camera shy. There is also a medium sized Yellow tang and a half black dwarf angel in there also.

 

[brandon429]

It is very common in reefing/per online posts the last two decades for people to take the lead from the titration reading and begin to list ways the system isn't able to keep up. Can check and verify/google or type in any reef forum on earth "stuck cycle, .25 reading, or stalled cycle" and you will get this exact ratio:
-every forum online has stuck cycle claims, and they run daily to today and through tomorrow.
-all posters on the thread agree with the kit, or interestingly some will state that API is off and then list more ways they have free ammonia
-I claim not any of them are stuck, not one. so there's that lol/tbd chips on the line.
-isnt it neat to imagine that if these readings are true, thousands upon thousands of systems vary in ammonia control, but not so much as to ever show one single diagnostic detail in a pic lol
-we all accepted in the past, due to API, that the most acutely toxic compound produced per minute in a reef is uncontrolled, but not too uncontrolled, and things are still doing fine.

all pics, great. all test readings for ammonia, your bac are dead/dying


that much disparity, that much truth is on one side of the coin and not the other, is why I enjoy tracing ammonia claims in reefing. we haven't got the final referee yet on whats really going on. but I can smell it pun intended

 

[ThePlummer]

It is very common in reefing/per online posts the last two decades for people to take the lead from the titration reading and begin to list ways the system isn't able to keep up. Can check and verify/google or type in any reef forum on earth "stuck cycle, .25 reading, or stalled cycle" and you will get this exact ratio:
-every forum online has stuck cycle claims, and they run daily to today and through tomorrow.
-all posters on the thread agree with the kit, or interestingly some will state that API is off and then list more ways they have free ammonia
-I claim not any of them are stuck, not one. so there's that lol/tbd chips on the line.
-isnt it neat to imagine that if these readings are true, thousands upon thousands of systems vary in ammonia production, but not so much as to ever show one single diagnostic detail in a pic lol


all pics, great. all test readings for ammonia, your bac are dead/dying


that much disparity, that much truth is on one side of the coin and not the other, is why I enjoy tracing ammonia claims in reefing. we haven't got the final referee yet on whats really going on. but I can smell it pun intended

Yup, I've been doing this hobby on and off for the last 30+ years. I've quit in the past, because we didn't know enough about the chemistry, and every 10 years or so, I check up on the newest technology and try it again. Once I've tried the old RDSB in a 5 gallon bucket trick, as well as being able to eradicate disease with a proper quarantine practice (TTM), I've found this hobby to be much easier to maintain.

That being said, in all my years doing this, I've never seen a ammonia spike on a cycled tank, unless you are dumb enough to put a whole bunch new livestock in at once, and that spike usually only lasts for a very short time.

I never did try corals, as I found the lighting options not to my taste. But now that LED's have come as far as they have, and there are many 'reasonably priced' options out there, I'm trying my hand at this.... And finding a relatively easy time with it. My coral tank is super simple.

It's a Innovative Marine 14 peninsula. All I've done is put their protein skimmer, a bag of Fluval ceramic bio sphere's in the dead zone under the filtration section, and another bag in the sump. Haven't had to do a water change yet. Using the cheap Orbit Marine lights and have good growth. Feeding corals with Red Sea Reef Energy 2 part. Nitrates stay undetectable with API, or test strips. Ohh, I have to dose calcium at least twice a week. I'll post a pic of this one next.

 

[ThePlummer]

Ohh, just last week I changed the light on here with a used Oceanrevive light that I got a smokin’ deal on. Not sure if I like it yet or not.

 

[Malcontent]

Interference with ammonium determination by the indophenol-type reaction of salicylate and dichloroisocyanurate - Analytical and Bioanalytical Chemistry

Two widely accepted indophenol-type reactions with ammonium, which use phenol/hypochlorite and salicylate/dichloroisocyanurate as reagents, were compared for possible interferences with other naturally occurring nitrogen-containing compounds. Unlike the first method, the second showed strong...

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