New F8Ps and ammonia issues

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Since this board has been up, we have found there are several questions that routinely get asked in order to help diagnose problems. If you can have that information to begin with in your post, we'll be able to help right away (if we can!) without having to wait for you to post the info we need.

1) Your water parameters - pH, Ammonia, Nitrite, Nitrates and salinity (if appropriate). This is by far the most important information you can provide! Do not answer this with "Fine" "Perfect" "ok", that tells us nothing. We need hard numbers.

2) Tank size and a list of ALL inhabitants. Include algae eaters, plecos, everything. We need to know what you have and how big the tank is.

3) Feeding, water change schedule and a list of all products you are using or have added to the tank (examples: Cycle, Amquel, salt, etc)

4) What changes you've made in the tank in the last week or so. Sometimes its the little things that make all the difference.

5) How long the aquarium has been set up, and how did you cycle it? If you don't know what cycling is read this: Fishless Cycling Article and familiarize yourself with all the information. Yes. All of it.

We want to help, and providing this information will go a LONG way to getting a diagnosis and hopeful cure that much faster.

While you wait for assistance:
One of the easiest and best ways to help your fish feel better is clean water! If you are already on a regular water change schedule (50% weekly is recommended) a good step to making your fish more comfortable while waiting for diagnosis/suggestions is to do a large water change immediately. Feel free to repeat daily or as often as you can, clean water is always a good thing! Use of Amquel or Prime as a dechlor may help with any ammonia or nitrite issues, and is highly recommended.

Note - if you do not normally do large water changes, doing a sudden, large water change could shock your fish by suddenly changing their established water chemistry. Clean water is still your first goal, so in this case, do several smaller (10%) water changes over the next day or two before starting any large ones.
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Darkjade
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New F8Ps and ammonia issues

Post by Darkjade »

Ok well I am trying this again.... The forums decided I wasn't logged in after typing out everything and my message disappeared...

I just tested my water and ammonia seems to be a huge issue here (1.0 -2.0ppm :( :( ) and I think that's what I need help with the most. My ammonia tests are old, is there a way to test their accuracy? My tap water has about the same level of ammonia in it and I had just added some salt water to the tank so I wonder if this could be partially why it's reading high right now :S

First off I got 2 f8p a week ago. The tank had previously been set up for 3 years but I had let a lot of the water evaporate and algae had built up and the filter had been turned off. I cleaned the tank and used the same bio-filter and refilled.The tank was set up with just snails for at least 6 weeks prior to adding the f8p. The ammonia was 0, nitrates 0, and nitrites 10. I topped up the tank because I had let about 20% evaporate and added ammolock because I know our tap water has high ammonia. I assume adding the ammolock disrupted the bacteria?

The reason I had originally wanted to post was because I am pretty sure one of the fish has fin rot and I wondered how to treat him and how to ensure it is fin rot before I treat. First mission is to figure out what is going on with the water..

The only thing in the tank right now is the F8Ps, and some snails. It is a 20gallon tank, which I had been told by my LFS would be fine, but now I am seeing it should be bigger. I have a 40 gallon on stand by, for when I decide to switch them over. I have started to add salt today because they have been in FW. I added some but it hasn't changed the hydrometer reading so I guess I didn't add enough. The fish aside from the rot seem to be fine, however the one with the rot doesn't seem to be eating, though has a nice round belly.

My biggest issue is how do I correct the high ammonia problem when my tap water has high ammonia? Should I be adding more charcoal or something?

I unfortunately don't have the nitrate and nitrite reading as i ran out of strips :S Hopefully you can give me tips on what to do without that info.

Thanks for your help,

Crystal
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Re: New F8Ps and ammonia issues

Post by bertie 83 »

Lots of waterchanges using prime to dechlorinate will help. A bigger tank will be needed. Welcome to the forum
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JRC3
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Re: New F8Ps and ammonia issues

Post by JRC3 »

First thing go get some Seachem Prime to help and bind that ammonia. http://www.seachem.com/Products/product ... Prime.html Use the highest directed dose. I'd get the biggest bottle you can because water changes are gonna be in your future until you figure out the tapwater/ammonia problem.

*edit*
I meant Seachem Prime and not Pure as originally typed.
Last edited by JRC3 on Tue Nov 13, 2012 2:32 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: New F8Ps and ammonia issues

Post by defool89 »

Get a product called "prime" and add it to your tap water. Do a 50% change and add prime to the total volume. Its like 20$ for a 500ml bottle that treats 5000 gallons. I think its 5ml of prime per 50g so depending on your tank do the math its powerful stuff. Converts amonia into a safe water soluble product and treats for all other water pollution.
Last edited by defool89 on Tue Nov 13, 2012 2:08 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Darkjade
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Re: New F8Ps and ammonia issues

Post by Darkjade »

I just realized that the water conditioner I have is essentially just like the "Prime" you suggested I use. It says "Helps neutralize harmful ammonia, chloramine and chlorine". Using products to eliminate the ammonia wont disrupt the bacteria?

Thank you :)
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defool89
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Re: New F8Ps and ammonia issues

Post by defool89 »

Does it detoxify nitrites and nitrates?... you need an all round product. Puffers are EXTREMLEY sensitive to poor water. HTH
Last edited by defool89 on Tue Nov 13, 2012 2:15 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Darkjade
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Re: New F8Ps and ammonia issues

Post by Darkjade »

Oh no, it doesn't do that :P Everything but that. I will look for it when I got to the LFS later. Thanks
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Re: New F8Ps and ammonia issues

Post by Darkjade »

I think my ammonia tests are off too... I tested a bottle water and it's at about .50ppm of ammonia and from what I have read it should be 0.
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JRC3
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Re: New F8Ps and ammonia issues

Post by JRC3 »

I meant to say "Prime" and not Pure. And Prime only binds ammonia and nitrIte to make it safer for the fish and does nothing to harm the progress of the tanks cycle.

You could also test your ammonia test kit by checking some bottled/distilled/purified water. That should definetly read 0 for ammonia.
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Re: New F8Ps and ammonia issues

Post by Pufferpunk »

My best suggestion would be to set up that 40g NOW & transfer the fish over to that tank. Add Tetra's Safestart to the filter (NOTHING ELSE WILL DO!!!). Do not add salt until you are sure the parameters are perfect for a month. Use Melafix for fin rot.

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Re: New F8Ps and ammonia issues

Post by RTR »

+1 to PP's suggestion.
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