I Had an Ammonia Spike in 4 "Cycled" Fish Tanks! Here's What I Did
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- čas přidán 12. 07. 2024
- Hello Everyone,
I had an ammonia spike in four previously cycled aquariums. Here is what I did to get rid of the ammonia spikes.
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Want more information on ammonia in your aquarium? Check this out: • How to Lower Ammonia i...
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What more information on cloudy water? Check this video out: czcams.com/video/s6t-d1kBLHg/video.html
Want more information on ammonia in your aquarium? Check this out: czcams.com/video/5l-POiCc0dI/video.html
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Hi - love the channel and noticed an ammonia spike in my tank. I have a water conditioner, ammonia neutralizer and beneficial bacteria to treat for the spike. I am also doing water changes. Is this enough or am I missing a product to help lower the ammonia in my tank?
Have you ever done an experiment on an air sponge filter vs power head sponge filter to see if that makes a difference to cloudy water?
I really appreciate that you show mishaps and minor emergencies and use them as a training tool on how you recover from them. That kind of knowledge is most useful for beginners in my opinion. The thing about beneficial bacteria and the "cycle" is that you can only tell how well it's working based on information and numbers after the fact and there's little way to predict how it'll behave to adding or removing a bunch of fish. I can certainly see how and why this happened in quarantine tanks since the bio loads are probably changing VERY often and they are likely stocked over the capacity that they would be if they were normally running display tanks.
I added a few guppies to my cycled tank, and woke up to cloudy water. I tested and saw that ammonia and nitritAtes were up. (Zero nitrItes). Followed your advice and did 80% water change and added Fritz-Zyme Turbo 700 and Prime to tank. Thank you!!!
I totally agree Jason! Very important to remove as much ammonia and also nitrites as possible. I'm old school and have not tried nitrifying bacteria in a bottle. I squeeze out old filter media (sponge or fluff) from another cycled tank. Thanks for sharing. 👍
For those inexperienced this is great info.
For me it is just common sense
thank you for sharing this with us
Extremely well explained. Thank you.
Great video! I would not be surprised if many people thought they had a nice stable 4-5 year old tank, only for a new introduction of fish to cause spikes.
Great point. Established only means established for those inhabitants.
Thanks for the information as always. Got me concerned after watching this, so going to test my water now.
Thank you! Again nice to see "real world" experience. Hope you all had a great Thanksgiving!!
Thank you!
Thank you for this
Good advice. Thanks for sharing, Jason. Wasn't aware of A.C.C.R. or Turbo Start. 👍
Both good stuff!
Great video!
Very timely video for me. Thanks a bunch! I have a fully cycled 55 gallon that I had not put any fish in yet. Was still deciding what I wanted. In the meantime my good friend had a 55 that sprung a leak 😮 She rehomed to me her 14 swordtails and 3 albino corys. I watched it so closely because of the big bio load all of a sudden. It did fine for a couple weeks then sure enough a big ammonia and nitrite spike! Did a 50% water change and it helped. Now they are doing so well and having babies. I finally feel like a real fish keeper now 😅Thanks for your videos.
Glad it worked out ok!
I’ve got one going on right now in my grow out tank,the super reds have been very good to me lots of fry added!
Thank you _very_ much for showing this issue and letting us know what product to use. In my case I have been breaking my brain trying to find a product that will neutralize ammonia from the tap. Solving that problem will cut my purchased water bill by 3/4. Cheers👍
Good to hear!
I've used fritz turbostart 700 with a fishless dose of 2ppm ammonia to start new tanks for a couple years now. It's amazing. A huge water change then fritz turbostart immediately cleared a spike for me last year. Great video, thank you for sharing with us. Happy holiday season to all.
I start my tanks same way! I use the fish less fuel for ammonia and then turbo start!
@@BigShrimpin416 It's a game changer for beginners especially, as long as they follow bottle directions exactly which is very simple to do. This method is easier, safer and more reliable than the old way of fussing with used dirty media.
@@jeffhester1443 I agree
Great video👍
When I get a spike like that, I do a big water changes and add box filter from another tank. My box filter is polyfil and smaller size Seachem Matrix. And I use little more than recommended of Fritzyme 7.
All good ideas!
Canister! It helped my tank little sponges are ok in tiny tanks still prefer externals
About a month ago, I walked by one of my 10gal tanks and did not see my guppies (heavily planted, stocked with 6 guppies, 6 Danios and assorted snails). Looking closer I found two dead but there were still four missing. It did not take long to find them, although they were hidden in all the plants. Quick parameter check told me my pH had crashed to below 5 during the night
Did a quick 50% water change (I keep 12 gallons of treated water on hand for just such emergencies), fixed a rushed coral packet for my filter and everything recovered within a day. Monitored for another week. So, yes, I lost all six guppies but the Danios are doing well.
As noted in the video, it's critical to understand when something is amiss in your tanks but even more critical to be able to react to the issue(s) quickly and correctly
Thanks, for explaining this, Jason. 🐠 Gina Hetlage
I have been looking for ideas for ways to keep and display my tanks without spending a fortune and I see the wire shelves you are using. I never thought of using them because I didn't think they were sturdy enough. I see you have a few large tanks on there. Do you do anything to increase the strength or sturdiness of these shelves or are they good to go out of the box? Thank you soooo much for your time. I say I enjoy your channel is such an understatement. I really appreciate the science you bring to your content with out going over my head (most of the time ;)
Here you go! czcams.com/video/EHXeUDDHGbA/video.html
I just recently bought my first aquarium. I bought the Top Fin Vacuum to clean the aquarium out when I did my first cleaning (not happy with it though...). Just wondering what you would recommend for a good vacuum. I have watched through most of your videos and gotten some good information of what I can be expecting in the future, but I'm curious to know what you actually do recommend...even a top 3 for choices. Thanks for the good knowledge to pass on to some of us newbies. New subscriber here too!!!
Thanks for being here! Believe it or not we just use the Top Fin ones from Petsmart. I use hose clamps to secure all the connect points. They last us about 2-3 years before the hand pump cracks, but we're also cleaning 80 tanks per week. :-)
Great advise , and yes it does happen to the best of us. Keep an eye on fish behavior & water clarity. I find that a good size water change before adding multiple fish along with some Fritz complete & Seachem stability keeps things in check. It's usually when the wife wants to impulse buy some fish before I've prepped the tank when I run into issues 🤣
I do about a 60-70 percent water change weekly on my heavily stocked 75s with peacocks in one mbuna in the other
I only do 4-5 water changes a year. 80% Giant tank. Super good environment and biological filters and sump tank
I crashed my quarantine tank too recently. I added another cycled sponge filter from an existing tank and was able to keep the ammonia in check but I seem to have more problems getting the nitrites to go down. To me the bacteria that consumes the nitrites seem to take alot longer to develop. Any tips for the future if it happens again? I've used fritz 7 as well as tried stability.
Great timing! I just had a tank cloud up this morning, shortly after moving CPDs out and Guppies in. Initially I thought the bioload would be similar enough that it'd be good, but I had multiple fry drops from the guppies and upped the feeding to reduce the chance of predation. Is there anything different you'd do with a group of fry in the tank?
Just be more careful about sucking up baby fish. Everything else is the same.
When I moved from Georgia to Indiana last summer, one of my tanks got a spike. Nothing had changed for the tank (same plants, same fish, filter media as in Georgia). Two days later, a spike. Changed 40%, added FritzZyme 7 but still had a spike two days later. I went to a fellow aquarist in Northern Indiana and got a big, cycled filter cartridge and put it in after a 80% water change. That finally got rid of it.
That really helps!
Excellent information brother.
All of my nano tanks receive a minimum of 70-80% water change every Wednesday.
My issue after having these trouble-free tanks for almost five years now, has to do with this sudden appearance of cyanobacteria in my quarantine tank. I only have three inhabitants currently housed in my QT tank. So naturally this problem has left me perplexed.
Nevertheless, after nearly thirty years in the fishkeeping hobby, I think I may be ready to throw in the towel all together. My heart and mind are simply not in the right place anymore. I used to find these weekly water changes cathartic, almost necessary given my background. Whereas now it seems like a chore.
This became apparent once these weekly water changes started to become monotonous and irksome. It just feels like I merely go through the motions rather than actually enjoying the process and more importantly, the finished product. I cannot recall the last time I sat in front of my tanks purely for enjoyment.
IDK Jason, what do you think brother? Does it sound like it is time for me to leave the hobby?
My wife hates the thought of relinquishing these projects to a total stranger (as do I). Especially after impeccably maintaining these nano tanks after all these years. I do worry about giving my tanks to someone that inevitably destroys the years of stability and progress I have built into these ecosystems, quite literally overnight. Tis a shame that you are not local here in Arizona. I would gladly yield these aquascapes to you and Joanna knowing they would be in highly capable hands.
FWIW, I started this endeavor as a result of all the naysayers that claimed you could not accomplish certain tasks and goals using nano tanks. They presented a challenge and I proved them wrong. I suppose now that I have successfully completed my mission, I may need to find something new. My wife suggested one BIG tank to rule them all rather than several nano tanks. Perhaps...
I surmise I have some tough decisions to make in the near future, but I welcome your thoughts nonetheless.
Stay classy my friend.
There is nothing wrong with cutting back or stepping away for awhile.
Do you use same gravel vac in multiple tanks? Trying to figure out if I really need to buy a whole bunch of vacs.
I have gravel vacs for each section of the fishroom. About 8 in total. Each QT section has their own too.
Keep Seachem Prime water conditioner handy… it could be used to remove ammonia in case of emergency
The only thing I would add is I recently upgraded a 16 gal with inert substrate to a 75 gal with Master Soil. I reused all of the filter media, but I wasn't surprised at all when I saw a big 'ole ammonia spike (up to 4 ppm). The first thing I did after testing the ammonia wasn't a water change, I tested pH. My pH hovers around 6.8 naturally, the soil brought it down to 6.1 (and my CO² injection brings it down to 5.1 during the day). At 6.1 (and 76°F) my total ammonia nitrogen is 4 mg/L but my free ammonia was only 0.0028 mg/L. It was completely harmless. During the day it went down even further to 0.0003 mg/L)
So I sat with 4 ppm of ammonia for a good month and I didn't really worry about it. Didn't lose a single fish (Sundadanio goblinus) or shrimp (Crystal Red).
Now, the nitrite portion was a different story, its toxicity is not pH-dependent, the fish suddenly started gasping at the surface when the CO² reached its max. CO² and nitrites both cause the same thing, they lower blood pH converting oxygen-carrying hemaglobin to useless methemoglobin (a condition called methemoglobinemia). I turned the CO² down, added an airstone and some Seachem Prime and then I tested. Ammonia was down to 1 mg/L, nitrites were at 2 mg/L. In my experience, while Fritz TurboStart helps with ammonia it takes some time, particularly in soft water (probably because it has no AOA), but I've seen it clear nitrites in 24 hours and that's exactly what happened here.
At no point did I perform a water change. I also never had cloudy water, since my tank is high light, high CO², high fertilization, what I had was tons of hair algae. When the ammonia went away, the hair algae started turning brown and dying within 24 hours
You brought up some really good points!
PH levels also affect the ammonia toxicity.
Where are you located in chicago. I really want to get back into having a fish tank again
Western Suburbs
Jason, what kind of filter do you use on your fish room ? I’ll make my own fish room just for hobby, but confused about that part. Thank you very much
I have a Jehmco LPH60 for my air system.
@@PrimeTimeAquatics Got it, but what kind of filter sump do you use ? Not sure what kind I need, enough for a fish room with like 30-40 tanks. Thank you and sorry to bother
Hey Jason wondering what TEMP IN CELSIUS is too high for fancy Goldfish...Its summer here in Australia and my AVG temp is 26-29Celsius...Is that too hot for fancy goldfish?Whats the max temp they can go...I have lots of aeration,1ryukin 6cm and one panda oranda 7cm in a 140L tank
Ya, I don't like to keep them much above 24 or so.
Question: When you're adding new water into the aquarium during a water change, do you match the temperature or just add cold tap. I always try to match the temperature but always wondered what others do.
Definitely match the temps. Good question
hi jason, hope you can reply to this as it is an old video but had an ammonia spike 0.25 to 0.50, did a big water change and added some ammonia pads to the top of my 307 filter.
got a bottle of fritz zyme 7 but only the 8 once one but didnt realise it wasent enough for my 252l tank, i thought well adding some is better than adding none. but do i tip the whole bottle worth in seems alot to add? just dont want to harm the fishys
I would just follow the dosing instructions on the bottle. It should help shorten the duration of the spike.
@@PrimeTimeAquatics thanks for the reply tank actully went down to 0ppm but i got a tank back from someone and used the fritz in that, no im now a multi tanker lol
Ran into ammonia spike in my tank at around .5 And I noticed a Cory was being sporadic and not right with a swollen belly. I changed water at 50 percent and treated with prime and stability and then cory was dead next day. Tank is stable now but my Betta now has tumor on his fin growing pretty rapidly and unfortunately I do not know what to do about it. Forums seem to tell you to kill it. He seems fine though. The ammonia spike was strange because I haven't added any fish. But I did give them snacks of bloodworms
Unfortunately, there’s not much you can do about tumors. If any of the blood worms went uneaten, it’s possibly they could have caused an ammonia spike.
@@PrimeTimeAquatics of there was any the shrimp got it for sure lol. Today I now had a nitrite spike. I knew something was off since the Betta was attacking everyone which he never does. So I tested yet again to find that spike. So another big change of water and added prime and stability. Checked a few hours later and no nitrite and nitrate around 25. Gotta just keep checking twice a day until I figure it out. Wondering if big water changes are killing shrimp off and it's causing fluctuation with dead shrimp. Hard to spot them dead some times with a planted tank like mine with a good pint of crypts, java , swords and s few others I forgot names to. It's pretty covered in plant life
Is it okay to dip the test strip directly into the tank? I have been taking a sample of water out to dip the test strips in.
Sure - I have always put them in the tank. Never had an issue.
Hey north siders :) new fish keeper any suggestions on south sub local (fresh water) fish shops? The big box pet stores especially Petco near me are utterly horrible. Dead and diseased fish in multiple tanks. I don't know how these people keep their jobs?
Up by you there is Fish Planet?
@@PrimeTimeAquatics Well, that's a bit of a haul to the north. I'm all the way down in Chicago Heights. I did some more searching last night and it looks like the best option for a fish store south of Chicago is in Tinley or Northwest, Indiana.
I should trade some Local SEO & web development services for fish stock & supplies. Some of these shops may be good, but you would never know it if you only looked at their website & GBP. Time for a water change. Woke up to cloudy water. Thanks for the response! next time I'm up North I'll stop by that fish planet.
Hi Jason, I have a quick question: Can it be harmful to fish to do a water change at night?
Maybe a little more stressful if it’s dark and they can’t figure out the source of the disruption?
Simple math: .5ppm Ammonia with 20% waterchange = .4ppm Ammonia; still too high. Immediately under .1 is required; so 80% minimum required. And then Your water conditioner will help as well, but time will work best.
Question I know this video is a year ago but doing a big water change to remove ammonia won't that get rid of alot of beneficial bacteria
Good question - no because the microbes are attached to the surfaces not in the water itself.
I got the same problem right now. 75 gallon, didn’t add any fish though. Cleaned the two canister filters about .. 3 weeks apart. Notice all the fish gasping few days later after last filter cleaning (sponges in sink, media in tank water). Ammonia measures were thru the roof, now tank is in a bloom.. don’t know why exactly
Big water changes and some Fritz Turbo start should help!
@@PrimeTimeAquatics yea, just got done doing a WC an hour. Realized my fx4 is running really lagged and suddenly started blowing white crap all from the output. Something to be discovered really soon!
couple days means how many water changes?
i have a 180 liter tank and since my guppies been breeding i got amonia spike and ph lowerage.
As many as it takes. Nearly 100% possibly 1-2 times per day!
@@PrimeTimeAquatics okay in the water chages should ii put stability ? ( jutst what i have aviable here) . in the bottle says that the bacteria is incubated , and it takes 24 hours for them to haatch , so am i wasting bacteria ? idk =/
What about only detoxifying the Amonia/nitrites and let the nitrogen cycle run it’s course? Would that work ? And if so do you still need a big water change? Thank you!
If there were no fish in the tank, sure. But the fish would die before the ammonia comes down in many cases.
Oh ok. Thank you vm! I was thinking that potentially the use of product such as Seachem Prime that claims to instantly detoxify Amonia would alleviate the need for a large water change.
@@yomanb258 that usage of PRIME is only effective for 24 Hours per Dosage. The PRIME bonds the Ammonia together, but the bond breaks down. PRIME doesn't eliminate the Ammonia.
Water Changing is still necessary.
How about doing no water changes and adding prime and stability everyday for 7 days? Saw from another CZcamsr
Prime is just temporarily neutralizing the issue - the longer the ammonia spike happens, the more damage it's doing to the fish.
Where do you put your fish when you clean the tank?
I never remove the fish when maintaining a tank. This may help: czcams.com/video/49aH46SmgHI/video.htmlsi=ImEPbCq9_KtuNmaC
Im just curious because i have a friends with huge tanks plenty of fish they definitely don’t change there water every week not even 10% hes had his fish for years and they seem fine what am i missing just curious as a beginner.
Live plants can help. Without that - if the nitrates are high he is slowing killing the fish.
A 20 percent water change will only cure 20 percent of the problem. Best to think of it in these terms during an emergency. How much percentage do you need the problem to change.
Hey Jason, I have a quick question. I have a Platy that is super pregnant. I put her in her own tank. She keeps dropping unfertilized eggs at night. I can see fry near her anal fin but all she is dropping is tiny clear orange eggs. What could be going on?
I haven’t seen that before. Wish I knew
Do you put that bacteria in the fridge?
Yes!
@@PrimeTimeAquatics even if it says don’t refrigerate you think I should?
Great work. I noticed your Fritzyme expired in 2020. :)
I used the current stuff so I grabbed that one so I had a visual.
I keep getting nitrite spikes even though I’ve used Prime. I’m doing 30% change a day but still registering 5 ppm nitrite 0 ammonia I don’t get it
That will happen. The prime will only temporarily control a spike until the bacteria have grown to a sufficient concentration.
@@PrimeTimeAquatics I have bio balls in my filters, do you know if I can also use Seachem, Stability?
are you really using the test strips? they are so unreliable .. i used 4 strips on one tank once and had 4 different results within an hour , never used them again!
I find them to do a reasonable job. They didn't show any difference compared to the liquid kit.
The main thing is to test. Was it ammonia or nitrites or even something else? Even the strips will give you a strarting clue.
First 😀
I believe your tanks are under-filtered. 30ppi filter foam has a surface area of about 1.4m^2/l (1l is about the size of these filter sponges). That is roughly the glass sides of a 50gal tank. Sachem Matrix has a surface area of 1600m^2/l (about two and a half basketball courts per liter). I use 4 liters of Sachem matrix in my 50gal with a 250gal/h turnover, and I have never seen anything like your amonia spikes, even after complete cycle death. I understand why you use filter sponges on air, it is very economical.
I’ve used filters this size to easily house 100-150 fish in tanks with no issues. The tanks are fine now. Even small sponge filters have more than enough surface area to house beneficial bacteria in almost every situation.
@@PrimeTimeAquatics I dont think systematically it is a question of if a sponge can work (evidently it can). I see it more like a question of how much buffering capacity a system has. Kind of the same reason why you dont run very low KH, because then there is very little buffering capacity. I think it works the same way with providing thousands of times as much surplus surface area than what is strictly required, even though 99.9% of it is wasted 99% of the time. Because then populations of microbes adapt and rebound much faster than if they need to fight tooth and nail for every scrap of real estate.
There is a tradeoff to be made, and a point of diminishing returns. And this needs to take into account means and realities. I can and do afford to splurge on my tank, it is the only tank I have, and I dont want to babysit it trough every hiccup. I want my tank to be a system with the maximum buffering capacity that I can reasonably build in. I could not afford to run 10 tanks like this.
But you need ammonia for your cycle. Won't removing all the ammonia will limit the development of the nitrifying bacteria? And more ammonia will just build up throughout the week anyway. I was told not to do water changes the first 3 weeks to allow the cycle to happen, but add something like prime to make safe for the fish.
Good question! It won't remove it all. There will still be some for the bacteria.
Won't thus 80% water change kill off benifial bacteria
Good question - Not at all. The bacteria adhere to surfaces and are not found in the water column.
If you're sponsored by Fritz, I'd use products that didn't expire coming up on 3 years ago.. o.o
Too funny - I used all the current stuff we had and grabbed that bottle so I had something to show.
I want to start by saying I respect you guys very much, but isn't it not totally accurate to say ammonia is instantly toxic? I thought you had a video on this? Depending on temp and ph ammonia and nitrite toxicity can change. Those tests read total ammonia nitrogen, not free ammonia. Someone could have a lot TAN but not much free ammonia.
Sorry - I’m assuming here that I’m dealing with UIA, which is - also given the water parameters it would be assumed as well. Great observation though!! 😀
Hello Jason. I have a quick question 😊 Would the Fluval Ammonia Remover chemical media work just as well as the Fritz Accr? I heard mixed reviews about the Fluval media but already ordered it and I’m hesitant to use it. Am I ok using this media temporarily? Thank you so much. Have a great day! 🙏🏻🫶🏻🐟
I haven’t used it so I’m not sure how well it works?
uh, i do like 25% water change and all my ammonia is gone. Sometimes as high as 2ppm