Okay so I’ve posted before about my high Ammonia and how one of my fish seemed to have ammonia burns.
I have my ammonia down to 0.50 ppm which is still pretty high and I’ve been doing water changes 20% every day and adding seachem’s prime to the new water.
I tested everything today and my pH is super high, it’s at 8.8! Also my alkalinity is at 3ppm which is HIGH but I’m not sure how to fix that/what that affects.
Nitrates and Nitrites are still both at 0.
Hardness is at 75ppm (SOFT) which I also am not sure what that means.
I use test strips and the API Freshwater Master Test kit and these are my results.
As I said my ammonia is 0.50ppm which has dropped from 4.0ppm in 3 days of water changing.
I’ve reduced feeding to only once a day and I feed them until they seem full and don’t swim for the food.
Also I do use a gravel vaccuum to perform my water changes and I make sure the tank doesn’t have left over food and poops.
I use an Aqueon 55/75 filter for 90gal tanks and I have a Fluval dual air pump with air stones in the tank.
Let me know your advice and please give me your rude opinions on how I started my tank.
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Your tank is not cycled yet, or has become uncycled. Your ph is likely bouncing because of this, and will settle at the same ph as your water source “tap water” when the cycle is complete.
it takes 4-8 weeks to cycle a tank.
After adding a source of ammonia, “fish, fish waste, fish food, grocery store shrimp, pure ammonia…” You will have ammonia in the tank, no nitrite, no nitrates.
then healthy bacteria come in, and turn ammonia into nitrite. than more bacteria come in, and turn nitrite into nitrate, now you need to maintain the tank with zero ammonia, zero nitrite, and 20 or less nitrate. Its a good idea to know what your ph is, but it does not change very often. you don’t really need to know the hardness, unless you are trying to change the ph for cichlids or some very sensitive fish. Alkalinity, I don’t know, its not important for average comman fish.
Feed fish what the can completely finish in 3 minutes once a day, and stop if they look less interested. but don’t just keep feeding them till they look full, they will trick you into over feeding.
shrink feeding and circulate away it on my own. each tank is a different ecosystem containing micro organism the digests fish waste (ammonia) and turns it into nitrites. different micro organism turns the nitrites into much less risky nitrates which you save from achieving poisonous ranges by ability of changing 20% f the water weekly. Your tank hasn’t progressed adequate of the constructive micro organism to handle the ammonia consequently the smell. Rinsing the filter out makes it worse as many of the little organisms stay there. regrettably, the super volume of ammonia will reason the fish to fall ill. attempt no longer feeding the tank for 2 days to shrink the quantity of waste being extra to it and alter very small quantities daily (10%) for some days in hopes of saving your fish. save a open container of baking soda next to the tank to absorb the smell and the tank will splendid itself interior a week. playstation those snails gets out of hand quickly so i could propose paying for a loach whilst your tank is complete cycling A