4 month tank, low ammonia levels

[abizzle117]

Hi all, my 36 gallon tank is 4 months old and was cycled without fish using bottled bacteria (Dr. Tims). I have 4 small fish, about 10 snails and a tuxedo urchin. Since cycling and up until now, I've never seen any ammonia above 0ppm using the API test.

About 5 days ago, my water became cloudy and I tested for ammonia to find it at 0.25ppm. All other parameters I've tested are unremarkable. I don't believe it to be a false reading since I've tested a new batch of saltwater I made and it was clearly 0ppm.

Ammonia 0.25ppm
Nitrite 0ppm
Nitrate 0-5ppm
Ph 7.8 (always been low)
Alk 9
Phosphate 0-0.25ppm
Salinity 1.024


I'm certain as a newbie, I overfeed. Since finding ammonia, I've cut my feedings in half or more. As I test for ammonia throughout the day to make sure it doesn't get too high, I find that it will gradually decrease throughout the day, almost back to 0ppm. When I wake up in the morning and test, it's back at 0.25ppm. This cycle has been going on for days now.

About a week or two before the ammonia, I did introduce two new rock structures, both from Carib Sea life rock. Not sure if this is relevant but some of the posts did mention ammonia after introducing rock. I've also since introduced a nano protein skimmer that is filling my tank with microbubbles. Believe the water is still cloudy but harder to tell with all the microbubbles. I've been dosing Microbater7 for the past few days at aquarium seeding rates.

What's going on and should I do? I have some API Ammo-Lock on hand but don't want to use it if there's some type of mini-cycle going on that I need to wait out. The fish seem more or less OK, the urchin is accounted for, as are the larger snails. I can't say whether I have all my smaller snails.

Thanks in advance.

 

[Mr Fishface]

Very interesting. You mention the ammonia decreases throughout the day, what about the cloudiness? Does that get better too? In my personal experience, inverts are more sensitive to these kinds of things than fish. Try your best to keep a close eye on them as they will add to the ammonia if they were to die off. It's totally possible the rock is adding ammonia to the tank, especially if it did have life on it.

I keep "Prime" on hand for these kinds of things. It even states on the bottle that it will detoxify the ammonia but still allows the biofilter to remove it. I'm not experienced with Ammo-Lock but if it mentions the same thing, you should be fine to use it. I wouldn't worry too much unless it continues to get higher.

The other thing I find interesting is having a lower pH with an alright ALK level and a protein skimmer adding bubbles to the tank. When you added the skimmer, did the pH rise at all by chance?

 

[Mr. Mojo Rising]

Does your test kit go from zero to .25? The fish are always pooping and food always wasting in the water, so there is always a trace of ammonia in the water, our test kits are good enough to pick up that trace amount. It doesn't mean the ammonia is .25, it is somewhere in between 0 and .25. But it is converted to harmless nitrate faster than it can harm the animals.

You should feed small amounts often, I feed 2-3-4 times a day, but only small amounts so that no food gets wasted. You can always add more food , but you can not remove food once its added, know what I mean?

 

[Garf]

Hi all, my 36 gallon tank is 4 months old and was cycled without fish using bottled bacteria (Dr. Tims). I have 4 small fish, about 10 snails and a tuxedo urchin. Since cycling and up until now, I've never seen any ammonia above 0ppm using the API test.

About 5 days ago, my water became cloudy and I tested for ammonia to find it at 0.25ppm. All other parameters I've tested are unremarkable. I don't believe it to be a false reading since I've tested a new batch of saltwater I made and it was clearly 0ppm.

Ammonia 0.25ppm
Nitrite 0ppm
Nitrate 0-5ppm
Ph 7.8 (always been low)
Alk 9
Phosphate 0-0.25ppm
Salinity 1.024


I'm certain as a newbie, I overfeed. Since finding ammonia, I've cut my feedings in half or more. As I test for ammonia throughout the day to make sure it doesn't get too high, I find that it will gradually decrease throughout the day, almost back to 0ppm. When I wake up in the morning and test, it's back at 0.25ppm. This cycle has been going on for days now.

About a week or two before the ammonia, I did introduce two new rock structures, both from Carib Sea life rock. Not sure if this is relevant but some of the posts did mention ammonia after introducing rock. I've also since introduced a nano protein skimmer that is filling my tank with microbubbles. Believe the water is still cloudy but harder to tell with all the microbubbles. I've been dosing Microbater7 for the past few days at aquarium seeding rates.

What's going on and should I do? I have some API Ammo-Lock on hand but don't want to use it if there's some type of mini-cycle going on that I need to wait out. The fish seem more or less OK, the urchin is accounted for, as are the larger snails. I can't say whether I have all my smaller snails.

Thanks in advance.

I wouldn't do anything. You could keep your eye on it but at those low levels there's no concern.

 

[GARRIGA]

Better off using the API ammonia strips. I've tested that accuracy by making my own source reference and it was spot on. However, don't trust any other strips beyond initial setup where only concern being presence or absence vs an exact number. Something I'll be doing on my test tank reboot shortly.

Honestly, shouldn't ever be any ammonia reading past cycle unless something went wrong like dead fish and nassarius take care of that quick.

 

[EeyoreIsMySpiritAnimal]

First, welcome to the hobby!
I appreciate your diligence in testing and can sympathize with your concerns. A couple of things may be at play.
1. API (and most other ammonia test kits) measure total ammonia which is harmful ammonia (NH3) plus relatively harmless ammonium (NH4+). After a tank is initially cycled, as yours is, I would not be concerned with an API ammonia result of 0.25ppm - there's simply not enough harmful ammonia present (there are calculators available but I don't have access to one at the moment).

2. You say you test in the morning and ammonia is higher. While a change in pH won't cause total ammonia to increase, lower pH results in the NH3:NH4+ ratio changing as well. In lower pH, NH3 is reduced as more ammonia is present as NH4+. Since an average tank without a fuge on an opposite lighting schedule will often have its lowest pH right before the lights come on, this suggests that even if your ammonia is rising overnight, the harmful NH3 is not rising as much as NH4+.

Long story short, I would not worry about the slight increase your API test shows. Most people don't even test ammonia after the initial cycle. I recommend stopping the Macrobacter and tuning your skimmer (or waiting for it to break in), and enjoy your tank

 

[EeyoreIsMySpiritAnimal]

I keep "Prime" on hand for these kinds of things. It even states on the bottle that it will detoxify the ammonia

This has been proven to be false. Prime dies not "detoxify" or otherwise reduce ammonia.

 

[EeyoreIsMySpiritAnimal]

This has been proven to be false. Prime dies not "detoxify" or otherwise reduce ammonia.

Does Prime actually "Detoxify" free ammonia, NH3?

This started when @Dan_P was looking at measuring NH3 with seneye and was curious about performance near zero NH3. I suggested trying Prime to artificially zero out the NH3 sensor, and the results were weird... so I checked with my seachem kit. Prime by Seachem is commonly used to treat tap...

www.reef2reef.com

 

[Mr Fishface]

This has been proven to be false. Prime dies not "detoxify" or otherwise reduce ammonia.

Good to know, thanks for sharing! I hadn't seen that yet.

 

[abizzle117]

Really appreciate all the replies. Seems like the general consensus is that I should just wait it out, hope everything goes back to normal.

@Mr Fishface no, the skimmer thus far as not raised the pH. I was hoping it would. It's been breaking in (I hope) for 3-4 days now. Getting some thin yellowish skim with some spots of gunk. No real foam to speak of. Up to this point, I just can't get my pH to be solidly above 8 without the addition of external products. Seachem Marine buffer 8.3 and Aquavitro balance both raise my pH, with the former also raising Alk significantly. But it never sticks. I've opened windows, added fans and they've had a nearly negligible impact. I basically stopped trying to chase it and I just toss in some Seachem buffer 8.3 if my Alk ever drops below 8. My substrate is Carib Sea aragonite. I have no corals.

@Mr. Mojo Rising the test kits are the standard API saltwater kit, they go way past 0.25ppm. In fact, 0.25ppm is the lowest reading possible other than 0. But with the cloudiness and the fact that I've never seen ammonia after cycling, I was concerned. I definitely have been trying to curb my hand when it comes to feeding. I have a watchman goby who is very skittish and doesn't seem to eat very often. I occasionally try and spot feed him, or throw in some food when I see him out. This probably leads to even more excess food.

Thanks again all, will update when there's something to report.

 

[abizzle117]

Hey to anyone reading. Just wanted to follow up since I said I would.

It's been 3 days now of 0ppm ammonia. Whatever this was seems to have passed. The day after ammonia started to read 0 consistently, the cloudiness started to clear up as well. Tank is basically back to looking more or less normal.

I didn't do anything major throughout the episode except two 20% water changes and dosed microbater7. The entire thing lasted maybe 8 days.

Thanks again to all on this thread for their advice, support and good wishes.