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cancore

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Jan 22, 2010
25
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Edmonton
Hey I need some advice over night my tank went from crystal clear to not being able to look an inch into the tank, its like a milky white colour. I ran tests and PH, Nitrites and Nitrates are low but ammonia is huge... I was told to let the system work itself out but I dont believe that this high of ammonia is part of the cycle. I think that a water change is the best route, but knowing that snakeheads hate water changes how much if any should i do? And a side note that my rainbows haven't seemed to even notice the change... So any suggestions would be awesome.

Thanks
 
Sounds like a newly set up tank? The ammonia is high because the fish are producing it and there are no bacteria to get rid of it. The bacteria are coming now - the cloudiness is a bacterial 'bloom' - loads of bacteria multiplying very rapidly cos there's loads of ammonia. They will settle out in the filter and the cloudiness will go. Then the ammonia will get changed into nitrites and you'll have to wait for different bacteria to grow to get rid of that, but you wont get another cloudiness.

Ammonia is pretty harmless in acid water, so as long as you keep the water acidic the fish might not die. They might when you get the nitrites though.

You should always cycle a tank without fish. People who have suggested you do it WITH fish dont care about fish.

You need to do water changes to reduce your ammonia and nitrites as low as possible until the filter has fully cycled - or risk losing the fish.
 
Water changes won't hurt snakeheads, I don't know where this comes from I see alot of people say it, they arnt "needed" as much but far from bad for them, why it's clouding has been explained normal in new/cycling tanks if the tank was already cycled then likly u went overborde cleaning the filter and whiped out the bacteria . If u have access to a cycled tank u can speed this process ip just take the filter media and clean it into the cloudy tank, the mulm you ad will turn the water brown but clears up quickly and should jump your tank into "cycled"
 
see thats the thing the tank has been cycling for a good part of a year and i have not cleaned the bio filter since last cycle... well im going to do the water change thing and hope fully everything works out
 
do you use de-chlor in water changes ? or do a larger water change at the same time as a fiklter cleaning ?
 
Hi,
are all the fish presant and correct? that sort of scenario suggests a dead and rotting fish in there somewhere :(
 
Hi,I think a partial water change with aged water might be what you need,give your substrate a good siphoning!
 
HI,

high ammonia, and Nitrate/nitrite low is a sign for the two following possibilities.

1: Its a new set uo tank, and the bacteria havent settled yet, so they cant change ammonia to Nitrite and then nitrate.

2: you feed too much

Cheers
 
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