Sustained Ammonia spikes are misreads

[brandon429]

A new one

Mini cycle

Hello, I bought a 120g used with sand and lots of rocks and tons of nems, and inverts a few days ago. I should have not reused the sand I'm realizing that now. Ammonia is 0.93 (hanna) nitrate 7.9 (hamna). I already had to do a massive water change about 60-70% because I couldnt transport all the...

www.reef2reef.com

That tank shares details with every tank in this thread. A test outcome on a cycled tank caused the post, ability to carry animals wasn’t a concern. All pics look normal completely through the process.



Do not run ammonia tests on a cycled reef tank if you’d like to opt out of the fray. You can clearly see everyone’s tank is fine, no matter what they reported at the start.

 

[brandon429]

the criteria for being included here as a cycle study:

1. owns a display reef, not a quarantine setup as the focus. We have plenty of surface area in display reefs- all of them- to handle typical ammonia challenges.

2. the alert / emergency title of the example read is not referencing tank losses, it’s referencing pending tank loss as indicated by running ammonia tests on cycled reef tanks. All the rocks in every tank here were long past done cycling. They’d already demonstrated their ammonia command ability, in every case here.


So when someone posts an ammonia alert help post, and they have a display reef, and they’re willing to give us pictures over time as their cycle is hashed out—> that is what we collect.

The dichotomy between the fear of an impending biofilter crash per test outcome vs what the tank looks like in pics during the event playout is what we study


we collect pictures of healthy reef tanks to counter balance pending crash test readouts from nh4 kits as the objective here



We are looking for times, if ever, the reef tank pics also look like impending doom. Year four and none found? that may mean something. We want to keep on logging work examples in display tanks that report ammonia noncontrol issues to see if it always works out this way, where absolutely nothing changes within the tank the whole time as the test reading changed or seemed to get stuck.

Old cycling science at its very heart is a stern warning on how to prevent tank crashes from incomplete cycling


Isn’t it amazing among cycle status debates (every example link in this thread) nobody has a single example that includes a dying reef tank picture?

Extended duration ammonia alerts in reef display tanks are misreads.

I predict future ammonia alert threads for display tanks keep meeting these same criteria over and over as long as we chart it.

 

[Reefahholic]

Show me the post where that occurred, as pics not as posted stated param readings. ~ I remember your post on stuck ammonia, we worked it for pages. It was never stuck.

api needs to be benchmarked with other kits for accuracy, we can see in the link example if other kits were used and we can check the context of the .25 with:

was the directions met on bottle bac # of days for cycling

how many days had the tank ran before the test

was any of it true live rock, which never allows a .25 other than on api


we can check to see if the water was clear, didn’t smell, on the original .25 misread that caused the alarm.

in all these links you can read above, we detailed how api is usually the root of these false alarms.

ammonia alerts are misreads:

Hello - Ammonia

I can't seem to get my tanks ammonia to drop lower then 0.50,How can I get it to lower and how bad is this? Thanks

www.reef2reef.com

What is the best ammonia test kit to buy. I’m using an API for the moment (only thing I could find close). Was looking for Salifert. So far the API seems to be reading as expected, and correlating with water changes and bacteria dosing. However, now you have me paranoid. :-)

 

[brandon429]

Seneye hands down. That meter changed cycling science forever. I would love/ value absolutely any seneye readings from calibrated meters in any cycle setting.

These are the things seneye owners can do for reefing:

1. Absolutely end ammonia panic
It'll never happen to a seneye owner *with a calibrated machine* (where you prep the slides correctly, trim the machine into calibration range on a completed system, then use that setup to make cycling proofs)

2. https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/r...ents-and-change-reefing.969264/#post-11169679

 

[brandon429]

Also must add:

Updated cycling science handles ammonia prediction - in display tanks- such that no testing for ammonia is ever required: from cycling to the end of the tanks life.

Ammonia testing is for quarantine setups only within the rules of updated cycling science.


Every tank here is claimed to be in false distress because in every instance here the reefs were cycled, nothing died, only a test kit caused their post and that reading is referenced in their thread title, but never an actual loss is mentioned and these tanks all have the same outcome (remained alive) and they had perfect pictures we coaxed out of each post. That patterning of proof without using any test kit is updated cycling science.

We are all building reefs the same way (stacks big rocks in the middle of a tank) so that means our ammonia control ability is the same, for everyone, it doesn't range to unsafe for some tanks like api and common tests seem to indicate

Old cycling science teaches that ammonia control ranges in timing and ability tank to tank, independent from
working surface area and that's its fallacy. It is dependent on kits that make people estimate levels for ammonia control, and timing rates, and these measures are communicated among reefers as fact. The end result is mass concern no seneye owner would ever entertain with a calibrated machine

 

[Reefahholic]

Seneye hands down. That meter changed cycling science forever. I would love/ value absolutely any seneye readings from calibrated meters in any cycle setting.

These are the things seneye owners can do for reefing:

1. Absolutely end ammonia panic
It'll never happen to a seneye owner *with a calibrated machine* (where you prep the slides correctly, trim the machine into calibration range on a completed system, then use that setup to make cycling proofs)

2. https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/r...ents-and-change-reefing.969264/#post-11169679

Hypothetically speaking, if you had to buy an ammonia test kit, which would you prefer.? I don’t check Ammonia much, so it wouldn’t be worth it to buy a Seneye for something I might do once every 3-5 yrs. It would be great to have in that period of time though.

 

[BeanAnimal]

Seneye hands down. That meter changed cycling science forever.

Huh? As far as I know that has not changes since precambrian, Brandon.

Devices like the Seneye may be more accurate than a low volume titration but the science of nitrifying bacteria remains unchanged. To that end, if one treats Seneye readings by adjusting anything non zero to zero the way you instruct people to do, then they are not accurate. So there is that too.

 

[BeanAnimal]

Hypothetically speaking, if you had to buy an ammonia test kit, which would you prefer.? I don’t check Ammonia much, so it wouldn’t be worth it to buy a Seneye for something I might do once every 3-5 yrs. It would be great to have in that period of time though.

I think any hobby kit will likely do for our purposes. Are you having an issue or just wish to test for the sake of testing?

 

[brandon429]

I guess if I had to pick one it would be the seachem badge. Not infallible but way less misleading than api

 

[Reefahholic]

I think any hobby kit will likely do for our purposes. Are you having an issue or just wish to test for the sake of testing?

I started a new temporary tank that’s cycling. Currently using a API ammonia kit, and it seems to be correlating with water changes and bacterial dosing as expected to keep ammonia at bay.

 

[Reefahholic]

I guess if I had to pick one it would be the seachem badge. Not infallible but way less misleading than api

I almost bought one today at Petsmart, but they only had it available in a combo pack with a pH badge for $18 so I passed.

What about Salifert ammonia?

 

[BeanAnimal]

I started a new temporary tank that’s cycling. Currently using a API ammonia kit, and it seems to be correlating with water changes and bacterial dosing as expected to keep ammonia at bay.

As long as you can confirm it has dropped and is not going in the other direction is really all that matters. I wouldn’t get too caught up in actual values.

 

[Reefahholic]

As long as you can confirm it has dropped and is not going in the other direction is really all that matters. I wouldn’t get too caught up in actual values.

Exactly

 

[brandon429]

Are you going to use it for a display or qt

If display: don't buy one. Any brand. Use prediction science from above it's free and has 400 viewable completed jobs on file in linkable threads and at no time will fail.

For qt use I like salifert

Equal in quality to the badge imo.

 

[BeanAnimal]

Because a QT is magically different than a display and "new prediction science" doesn't work there. :zany-face:

You are doing the entire hobby a disservice by trying to redefine things into "new science" as if you have invented something novel. Please, for the sake of the entire hobby... stop.

 

[GARRIGA]

Way too long a thread to read everything but wanted to add an option for getting quick reads on total ammonia. API test strip. Not the reagent. Quickly shows me once added such as during cycle and by next day shows zero on system which has been fully cycled. I’m assuming that’s just me waiting a day to confirm cycle.

Cycle the only times I use this as I also agree a cycled tank will quickly process ammonia aside from a large loss allowed to keep decomposing.