amonia still high

[vamptrev]

look into trying TLC bacteria in a bottle. ive never used it but ask around and see if it would be wise to try. it might take ur filter a long time to cycle otherwise.

other then that, keep up on water changes and down on feeding.

 

[turkeyboy85]

i put the top fin bacteria supliment in and i retested about 20 minutes later and it is down quite a bit so i think its helping

 

[FishDog]

You could have chloramine in your tap water. If you do when you use regular dechlorinator the ammonia is released into the water. My dechlorinator says to use 1 ml per 20 gallons of water or 5 ml per 20 gallons if the water contains chloramine. Try a conditioner made to handle chloramine and see if the level drops.

 

[ewurm]

What water conditioner are you using? Many water conditioners will neutralize ammonia and chloramine but still give a false positive reading.

 

[andersp90]

is it ray safe to do more then one water change a day? i just did a 50% and it helped but its still high

How big are the rays, and how much do you feed..? An FX5 is a big filter.. But it wont be able to handle the bioload, if all 3 rays are big..

 

[turkeyboy85]

two 8" rays and one 10-11" so they are getting to the point where i need to move them but they are not HUGE by any standadards

 

[rvrrays]

You can absolutely do more than one 50% water change per day. You can very easily do two or three of them per day.

Colin

 

[FOX-P2]

test strips are not accurate.
Change as much water as you need to as often as you want.

 

[turkeyboy85]

im using aqua safe, its sopose to get rid of chloramines in the water... could that be why its giving such a high reading?

 

[Hawkfish3.0]

I'm not sure, but I personally prefer prime.

How is the behavior of your rays? Are they acting funny?

As far as cleaning out the filter, that may not have been a good move. Your tank may have to partially re-cycle, depending on how much BB you killed off. Don't change the water too much, keep an eye on the parameters and keep adding bacteria supplements as directed on the bottle.