1 month of cycling, high ammonia?

[Hemlawk]

Hi everyone.
Im confused on why I still have high ammonia.I wanted to buy fish tomorrow but I'm not sure if I should.
heres my parameters.

pH - 8.0
NO2-0.0
NO3- 0.0
Ammonia 0.5?
Phosphate 0.04
Temp 80.0
salinity 1.023

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

Hi everyone.
Im confused on why I still have high ammonia.I wanted to buy fish tomorrow but I'm not sure if I should.
heres my parameters.

pH - 8.0
NO2-0.0
NO3- 0.0
Ammonia 0.5?
Phosphate 0.04
Temp 80.0
salinity 1.023

yea, dont buy fish.

What did you do to cycle the tank?

 

[sithrico]

I would try a different test kit. For me API always shows ammonia in my tank and I have zero. It's been running for a year. When I get lazy and check with API It always shows .5. My RedSea shows zero. That's me though. Just a suggestion.

 

[Hemlawk]

I used Pukani rock (didnt cure), live sand and a bottle of Bio-Spira. I used a shrimp for the first few days to generate ammonia. By week 2 I had zero ammonia and feed the tank fish food every few days. I did buy a few corals after the first week and they are happy. 2 days ago I added about 10 frags.

I just did a 25% water change.

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

yea, maybe retest or hit a LFS. Prob want to use the rest of the bio spira too,

 

[JamesP]

Throw in a $7 ammonia alert. Its good for a year and is super easy to read. Lets face it, after cycling nobody tests for ammonia. One of these gives a reading any time all year long. Its actually good for one year according to Seachem. Put it in the sump and take a peek whenever you think about it.

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

Throw in a $7 ammonia alert. Its good for a year and is super easy to read. Lets face it, after cycling nobody tests for ammonia. One of these gives a reading any time all year long. Its actually good for one year according to Seachem. Put it in the sump and take a peek whenever you think about it.

good thinking!

 

[Hemlawk]

good idea. I'll get one of those asap. And a different test kit.

 

[Hemlawk]

what the heck. I just rested and it shows 0.0 ammonia. hmmm

 

[JamesP]

I stay away from API anything. Maybe thats harsh against them, but it just seems cheap. Stories like this just reinforce that mentality.

 

[Hemlawk]

I'll pick up some better quality test kits tomorrow.

 

[40B Knasty]

What about nitrites and nitrates?

 

[JamesP]

BRS just put out an awesome video comparing nitrate test kits. Ill cut to the chase, get Red Sea, but watch the video too. Its worth your time.



And I would say use Hanna for phosphate. Digital for $50. Cant beat that.

Nitrite is not worth testing IMO.

 

[Hemlawk]

What about nitrites and nitrates?

everything is 0.0

 

[40B Knasty]

BRS just put out an awesome video comparing nitrate test kits. Ill cut to the chase, get Red Sea, but watch the video too. Its worth your time.



And I would say use Hanna for phosphate. Digital for $50. Cant beat that.

Nitrite is not worth testing IMO.

I was just watching this and about to post this here hahaha. After seeing this. The companies are pretty disappointing. Just wow on the company responses about their products and flat out right admitting they are basically a scam for our need of a test kit and not test accuracy.

 

[brandon429]

good titration requires consistent fill line compliance

api is still the horseshoes of ammonia testing even if you used pipettes to fill their tubes to the white line exacting. this was a handy post, linked to our cycling thread as testing woes and how handy it is to have alternate gauges for a cycle beyond the api

 

[sithrico]

what the heck. I just rested and it shows 0.0 ammonia. hmmm

See what I'm saying. I think it has to do with cleaning the vials and syringes. Then it just picks up anything. I was taught to put tank water in swishing it around and dump it down. Then put new water in and test.

 

[sithrico]

good titration requires consistent fill line compliance

api is still the horseshoes of ammonia testing even if you used pipettes to fill their tubes to the white line exacting. this was a handy post, linked to our cycling thread as testing woes and how handy it is to have alternate gauges for a cycle beyond the api

I don't trust the line. I use a syringe to fill and it is always past the line.

 

[brandon429]

and we don't know which line their reagents are set to...I like to consider api only when it is purple lol. if this tank was mine, considering whats already in it, it would be 50% or 100% water change time since we aren't sure what the levels are and because wc are good habits, its ok to run one if they turned out unneeded. I prefer them to dosers like prime, which ironically skew api testing even further, then we'll have a stalled nitrite post.

corals will not open in true .5 ammonia, they'll stay closed up tight, to start using bioindicators vs the testers.

 

[brandon429]

Hem

How far apart in time were the two tests above