How many water changes might it take to get parameters to change? I did a 75% change last night and everything is the same. I know it won't change overnight but curious about others' experience. Also how many water changes are too many?
What do you think I might be dealing with here?
- Thread starter SCM_2123
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The water changes don't make the bb colonies grow any faster, they are to reduce the amount of ammonia in the water to make it more tolerable for your fish. It's not about how many water changes, its just going to take time for the bb colonies to establish. If I'm reading the pictures right you have ammonia in the tank, but no nitrite or nitrate which means theres not much of anything processing the ammonia. You could still be several weeks or a few months away from being cycled I'm sorry to say.
What filtration are you running on your tank? After the medication(s) you used did you run the system with carbon to nuetralize the meds? Some HOB filters have carbon in the replaceablce filter cartridges that catch all the poo. I know I cautioned you about changing filter medi, this first one can still be changed periodically, as long as you have other media behind it like bio media or sponges etc and don't change everything at once. If you haven't done any of this you may still have traces of the meds in your system preventing the bb colonies from establishing.
What filtration are you running on your tank? After the medication(s) you used did you run the system with carbon to nuetralize the meds? Some HOB filters have carbon in the replaceablce filter cartridges that catch all the poo. I know I cautioned you about changing filter medi, this first one can still be changed periodically, as long as you have other media behind it like bio media or sponges etc and don't change everything at once. If you haven't done any of this you may still have traces of the meds in your system preventing the bb colonies from establishing.
I have an Aqueon 75 HOB that does have carbon in the filter and an ALEGI sponge filter rated for 100 gallons. As far as running carbon no, I never knew that was a thing. I put the carbon filter back in after the meds were administered. The HOB has ammonia reducer pads in addition to the filter cartridges. Should I change both of those at once or one at a time? If so, which should be changed first? I thought I had read somewhere that it was good practice to leave the old cartridges in the tank for a bit to promote a bit of BB growth? Is that correct?
Hello; Many medicine makers suggest removing carbon when using their product. A thing is the carbon can adsorb the medication and suppress its usefulness.
Another thing about carbon is it quickly becomes loaded and so becomes largely useless anyway. Some say within days. I suspect it depends on what chemicals are around. I have not used carbon in a few decades. In your case. OP, I suspect the carbon made no difference if it was in the tank for some time.
Assuming you are going to keep trying to salvage the current setup it might not hurt to add a carbon pack if you have them about. Might help remove any residues of the medications that the WC has not diluted.
Putting the carbon filter back in after the meds should have nuetralized them, so you should be good there. I'm not familiar with these ammonia reducing pads though. If they are inert material that bb can grow in and thus reducing ammonia through the normal process then they should not be removed at the same time as the main cartridge and i certainly wouldn't replace them every 2-3 weeks as the company suggests. If they have some active ingredient to reduce ammonia, I cannot answer but would likely not use them myself as I don't know how that would interfere with the normal cycle.
Hello; According to these images your tap water is showing ammonia. This brings up some questions. First for me is to understand what the water company puts in the water assuming you do not use a well. Water companies make annual reports available to customers. Might fine such online.
If you use a well such changes things. A friend who lived a few miles from me had his well contaminated from the cattle nearby. We live in a Karst formation of old seabed limestone.
Over the years members well versed in water chemistry have posted about false positives when testing water. Some chemicals become "bound" by the water conditioners such as prime/SAFE so as to not be a problem but still show up on tests. I need to review this if I can do a search properly.
Last question raised is about potential contamination of test vials. That the vials can be contaminated and so give false readings is possible. Such is why i recommended getting a gallon of distilled water to clean the vials.
Regardless the tap water showing ammonia is a concern.
Hello; short summary. Water companies can use chlorine to make drinking tap water safe to drink or they can use chloramine. My company uses only chlorine which I may talk about later. Chloramine is popular because it lasts longer in the water, but requires aquarium keepers to use something such as PRIME to treat the water.
Note-Chloramine in tap water shows up as ammonia when tap water is tested.
Note- When we use PRIME it treats the chloramine by splitting it chemically. Splits the chloramine into chlorine and ammonia. The Prime binds the chlorine but apparently leaves the ammonia in the water. I think the idea is in a cycled tank the split off ammonia will be taken in and converted by the BB into nitrite.
Note- Apparently PRIME/SAFE only binds the ammonia from showing up in a test for around 48 hours. After a couple days the same water will test positive for ammonia again if the BB have not "eaten it".
Here is a video which attempts to explain the chloramine.
ammonia in tap water - Search Videos
The video seems to lay out the situation as i understand the chloramine in tap water.
Back to my water company. I have the luxury of only dealing with chlorine. I put tap water into containers and allow them to sit for around four days. The chlorine gas leaves the water. So when I do a WC I do not need to use PRIME/SAFE.
To the OP- try to find out what is in your tap water. if it does turn out to be chloramine then the ammonia reading in the tap water is likely the chloramine.
