Amonia will not drop below 1ppm.

tic135 · May 25, 2025

Hi all ive had a reef tank for about a year and I cannot get the amonia to drop below 1ppm. The tank is a 36gallon bow front with caribsea agra-alive about 1"-1.5" deep. Rock is caribsea purple life rock (I am currently slowly changing it out with live rock from my local pet shop because it is breaking down. I read somewhere that it's a problem with it) live stock is 4 clowns, chocolatechip star, fireshrimp, pistol shrimp, yellow watchman goby, pin cushion urchin, 10 blue leg hermit crabs, and orchid dotted back.
All of my parameters have skyrocketed.
2ppm amonia
5ppm nitrite
80ppm nitrate
0 phosphate
8.2 ph
I built my own sump using aquarium acrylic and aquarium safe silicon. Sump is 10 gallons with a red sea nano filter roller, bubble magnus protein skimmer, and a refugium. (No cheato in the refugium haven't been able to get some, I accidentally killed my first batch by forgetting to put it back in the sump when I cleaned the algae off the glass

.) Also has red sea ato system and a carbon reactor.
I feed half a frozen cube of marine cuisine washed with ro water once a day

Tank cycle fine when started and when I slowly added live stock everything remained stable. About 6 months ago the amonia crept up to 1ppm and never came down and over time all parameters have gone out of control. I've tried daily 20% water changes with no luck. Not even able to get the nitrate to drop. I've tried a 80% water change and nitrates still stayed at 80ppm and caused amonia to spike more. I've tried adding dr. Tims bacteria to maybe get more benificial bacteria growing but no luck. Over the 6 months dealing with this it doesn't seem like my live stock has been affected to bad. Does anyone have any ideas what could be going on? I tried to add as much information about my system I could think of but let me know if more is needed. Thanks in advanced!

Quietman · May 25, 2025

Are you using RODI? And how long ago did you lose the chaeto?

tic135 · May 26, 2025

Yes im using RODI water and ive tested it before mixing and it shows 0. Im using red sea coral pro salt.

I lost the chaeto right when I noticed amonia starting to go up. So I removed it to clean the refugium chamber and just forgot to put it back. LFS hasn't gotten any in stock since.

Quietman · May 26, 2025

Hmmm. I was hoping it was recent then it could've been losing a major ammonia uptake.

At that pH 90% of the ammonia (assuming your test kit reads total ammonia like most do) will be ammonium and not toxic. So the fish only see maybe .2 ppm ammonia which is right at the limit but could have negative effects long term.

Nitrite isn't toxic in seawater and while nitrate is high it's also at the accepted limit but again, long term isn't optimal at that level.

For other causes:
Not sure how often you're changing out live rock. Are you curing it first to ensure it doesn't cause a cycle or add excess nutrients? Any possibility that the live rock organics are breaking down causing a long nutrient spike. Curing live rock can take some time.

Remote possibilities.
Is anyone in the house feeding without your knowledge? Possibly any antibacterial agents being sprayed near the tank?

Indications:
Test kit old or contaminated? Wouldn't think so since your values are consistent but worth checking.

Reefer1978 · May 26, 2025

What test kit are you using?

tic135 · May 26, 2025

I just started changing out the live rock last week and I only changing 25% of the rock at time. I was going to wait 2 weeks or and do another batch untill it's all changed out. No parameters have changed since changing the first batch. The live rock is cured at the LFS. It's bought wet.

It's just me my wife and 5 month old daughter. My wife only looks at the fish she don't dare touch the take so unless my daughter has super powers no one is feeding g without my knowledge lol
As far as chemicals I use an aquarium glass cleaner and we don't use harsh cleaning chemicals in the house. We do have a cat but 4 years ago when the tank was freshwater he jumped in it and has never went near the tank again lol ive had plated freshwater tanks since I was a kid with discus so I'm knowledgeable in that aspect but new to saltwater.

I'm using red seas test kits. I did buy a new test kit last month thinking the samething but both kits tested the same.

At every water change i add seachems stability as well. Should I go back to doing daily 20% water changes or leave it for now? It's almost like it started cycling again. If you look at the picture of the sump ive noticed this green sludge forms. It's like super fine powder like. If I clean it out it's back within a week or so. Not sure what it's from.

Thank you for the replies!

Quietman · May 26, 2025

If I had to say my money would be on the live rock additions causing your problems. Not helped by the fact that without the chaeto you've lost a major ammonia/nitrate consumer. Live rock might be bought wet but you can still have die off as it adjusts to new tank parameters.

Good news is that your tank appears to be mature enough to support the addition without critically endangering your fish.

I would have an increased water change schedule - maybe not daily but enough to get the nitrates under 40ppm (they'll come down eventually with water changes). 1 ppm Ammonia will convert into approx 4 ppm nitrate.

I would cure the live rock going forward in a 5 gallon bucket with a heater until the ammonia in bucket stops increasing. Also 5 gallon water change in bucket is easy. No need to use high end ammonia tests - get some cheap strips.

tic135 · May 26, 2025

The issue start months before I started changing the live rock. I am changing them be because the life rock has a lot of nooks and holes that can't be cleaned out and I figured fish food and waste was getting in them and breaking down causing amonia.

Also thank you for the advise on curing the live rock from LFS i will be doing that moving forward.

How often should I continue the 20% water change? Every other day or so?

Quietman · May 26, 2025

As long as your ammonia and nitrate don't exceed current levels you can decide on the WC schedule. If it was me I'd do one every other day until I saw things moving in the other direction. Oh and I wouldn't add any more bottles of bacteria. There are a lot of dead bacteria/organics in those bottles as well as live (perfectly fine when starting a tank but less helpful to you now).

Randy Holmes-Farley · May 26, 2025

I’d stop making any changes and just observe. The nitrate is not accurate unless you already made the nitrite interference correction, and the other values, whether real or test error (which I suspect for ammonia) are not an emergency concern.

tic135 · May 26, 2025

Okay great that makes me less concerned about the amonia. Im going to stop making changes and let it play out doing a water change every other day untill nitrates come down some then go back to weekly. Ill give this a shot over the next few months and report back. Thank you all for the help.

Randy Holmes-Farley · May 26, 2025

tic135 said:
Okay great that makes me less concerned about the amonia. Im going to stop making changes and let it play out doing a water change every other day untill nitrates come down some then go back to weekly. Ill give this a shot over the next few months and report back. Thank you all for the help.

FWIW, nitrate may not be high at all. That level of nitrite will read falsely as a huge level of nitrate.